Very small narrow gauge line in Saugus?

The amusement park in Wakefield was "Pleasure Island", NOT Treasure Island. It had a two foot gauge train ride which used leased equipment from Edaville RR. It also had (for a short time) the growing collection of full size steam locomotives owned by the late F. Nelson Blount, which became the nucleus of STEAMTOWN. From Pleasure Island they moved to North Walpole, NH, then Bellows Falls. Pleasure Island closed after the 1969 season, if memory serves, having lasted 10 years. The little steam locomotive (#5) used there, is now the #10 of the Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington RR restoration at Sheepscot, Maine. Virtually nothing remains of Pleasure Island except the road of the same name which exits next to the Colonial on Rte. 128/95. There is a group called, Friends of Pleasure Island, which has collected much memorabilia of the former park.

Crap, I knew that...not sure why I got it wrong...

On recent tours of the former Pleasure Island site by car and on foot, I could find no trace of it left. (If there is any trace, either I missed it, or I saw it but didn't realize it.) But it's all built-over now as an office park; what's there, IF it's there, is elusive.

Fifteen years ago STEAM and I walked the site, and found traces of the 2' gauge RR still there (ties) along the banks of one of the fake little "ponds" on the site. Today, the ties are either gone, or I was looking in the wrong place. I suspect over the last 15 years that time, nature, and commercial development, have gotten all that was left of PLEASURE ISLAND.

Even on google satellite views, one is hard-pressed to find where the "Engine City" steam engine display was. Thirty years ago from the air it would have looked like a railroad yard!

Wow that's an interesting post. That friends of Pleasure Island site also has lots of cool photos dating back to when the park was used, as well as pics of the 20 or so years after it was abandoned and left to rot before being redeveloped. Being someone who explores abandoned things, I would have loved to have seen that.

I believe the pond is still in the middle of the park, which is rumored to still hold the Moby Dick whale and porpoises on tracks under the water, and I also heard that there are decorative wooden barrels that have flowers in them, allegedly left over from Pleasure Island.

Speaking of Wakefield--when was the last time Surfit Stone (tracks under 128) was serviced? or is it still?

I may have got a few photos of one of the last Guliford freights to go under 128. If you stop on the west bound side (there is a pull off) and look you may still be able to see a very bad washout just before the cutoff to the old park area. The MBTA owns it but has not done any thing.

Before they put up all those ridiculous sound barriers (wimpy NIMBY neighbors, no one complained much in the last 60 years the road was there before...), you could always see how bad the line was flooded out, and occasionally I saw 4 or 5 cars parked on the tracks curving from Smufit Stone out onto the main line, that was probably about 5 or 6 years ago???

The line is badly overgrown even south of the flooding area, you can barely walk down the ROW.

my friend told me that he walked from salem st. (?) north to Surfit Stone and he coludn't even make it through all the thorns and brush past a quarter mile.

There are plans underway to make that line a rail-trail in the near future.

I remember seeing the ads for Pleasure Island on TV (probably on the Rex Trailer and Major Mudd shows), but my family never made it there.

When I became old enough to drive, I do remember noting the Pleasure Island Road exit sign on Rte. 128.

In the late 70's, I was a traffic reporter for a radio station, and used to fly up and down 128. One day, I looked down and saw what appeared to be a half-sunken old ship in a lagoon, in the middle of an apparent wasteland.

It then dawned on me; "So that's where Pleasure Island was."

If you go to the pleasure island website, there are pictures of that boat, I think it was part of a ride called the Wreck of the Hesperus. Kids set it on fire numerous times apparently, until there was hardly anything left and it just sank.

On Sunday, I went to an abandoned amusement park in Dartmouth, Lincoln Park. It's in bad shape, but there is still a big decrepit wooden coaster that looks like it's from some post-apocalytic movie.
Apparenltly, they had a small train you could ride on. It is very overgrown there now but I have a pic of the old drop off/pick up point for the train, I also found a site with pictures of it, I just don't have all the info in front of me right now. I think the train has been preserved someplace else now.
I'll post some stuff tomorrow if I get a chance.

The amusement ride train is owned by someone locally, I think in
Fairhaven or Rochester. I remember riding it as a youngster.

Lincoln Park is going to be developed for condos/apartment next
year. Plans are going through the planning board process right now.
There is a book on the place (Spinner Publications) and a video.

Dave