Bay Coast Railroad

The Bay Coast Railroad's excursion branch, Bay Creek Railway, is reportedly starting excursion service this year over the tracks of the former Eastern Shore Railroad. Does anyone have information on the start date?

Also, I received word recently of the possibility of a chartered excursion on the Bay Coast Railroad between Pocomoke, MD, and Cape Charles, VA, for a minimum of 60 riders. Likely dates are May 20, July 29 or August 5, all Sundays. Mondays are also possible as their current plans are for Friday and Saturday regular service. The trip would include a light breakfast, lunch, and light dinner and would take about 12 hours. The price is not set but should be between $100-200 including the food. The train will be two cars - one 42-seat coach and one 40-seat diner, both made from interurban cars found in Texas and being rebuilt in Alabama. Has there been any further word on this one?

The trip is sponsored by the Southern Appalachia Railway Museum of Oak Ridge, Tennessee. SARM operates a number of rare mileage trips and diesel photo freights each year.

The trip is scheduled for August 5th and will run Cape Charles to pocomoke City and back. Details for all of our trips are on the website at www.southernappalachia.railway.museum

The trip is almost sold out, but if demand continues, we are looking at scheduling a second trip.

Bart Jennings
Southern Appalachia Railway Museum

To bad about the sold out excursion, that would have been a nice trip.

Hey Bartman, the last time I met you you were Dr. Jennings.

Enjoy the trip.

On Aug 5th and 12th the Southern Appalachia Railway Museum has chartered trips from Cape Charles, VA, to Pocomoke, MD, a 128-mile round trip lasting 12 hours and will include 3 meals. The railroad will use both its interurban dining and passenger cars, with a total of 60 riders on each trip.

Yes, we added a second trip on August 12th due to the one on the 5th selling out in less than a week. Sales of the 5th were from our past riders of our trips from around the country.

We announced the trip on the 12th last week and orders are coming in quick so if you are interested, go to the SARM website (www.southernappalachia.railway.museum) and get an order form and get it sent in. The day should be good with three meals, a museum tour, and several photo stops.

And yes, I am still Dr. Jennings. I'm up in Illinois for a while starting up a new degree in supply chain management but I still teach my railroad industry workshops (and run a few charters each year - check out the June Railpace for my April event report).

Bart Jennings

Thats going to be one heck of a bunch of sea-sick riders....

They had better tamp that entire 64mile main before they make the first run.

They are going to try and serve food on board? No comment.

It still will probably be a great trip for the diehard railfan.

I just don't see it going over well for the family vacation.

The trips that SARM run are for the hard core railfan, especially the mileage collector. We seldom advertise locally as we like to keep the ridership down around 50 to 70 with no more than 50% of the seats sold.

The light breakfast and sandwich dinner will be on the train while lunch is served buffet-style on the ground.

This trip is nothing for our group. We did 4 full days in western Oklahoma a few years ago, much of it at 10mph or so.

Bart Jennings

That's good that your group enjoys those kinds of trips. I was unsure if it was like a family day thing or just a diehard railfan trip.

They do plan on eventually making it a family day thing, which in the railroads current state, I don't think it would fair well at all.

I would like to just ride, but my luck I'll be the one engineering that day...

I received an email this morning from Barton Jennings of the SARM that the August 5 trip has been postponed until November 18; I don't know of the disposition of the August 12 trip. Delays in the renovation of the passenger cars to be used in the trip seems to be the problem.

Are any trips taking place on the Bay Creek Railway in 2008? I haven't seen anything in print or online yet.

Here's some video footage of the Cape Charles yard area along with a southbound train shot last Friday (March 28). Not the greatest (it's an inexpensive digital camcorder) but enough to whet your appetitie. I should be posting some camera shots over the weekend. Then there's my update about the passenger equipment they've been waiting for...
John

VaCentralRwy wrote:Here's some video footage ...

Where?

Let's try that again:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYEdh--XlWc

They were supposed to go down to Alabama this past week to inspect/arrange for shipment (via truck) of the passenger motorcars that they've been waiting for.
Somewhat bizarrely, Bayshore Concrete won a contract to supply a California power station so they've been loading large concrete forms on KRL heavy-duty flats. Amazing how concrete is getting shipped 3,000 miles.[/url]

Saw on another forum that at least one of the cars was spotted being shipped from Alabama.....

I and the Southern Appalachia Railway Museum had the trip scheduled for last year that was delayed due to the cars not showing up.

We are already working with the railroad to operate a series of railfan trips over the entire line. You can check out our website (www.southernappalachia.railway.museum) for details on this and other trips we are running around the country.

Bart