[PRCo] Re: New Images on Historic Pittsburgh site

[Fred Schneider]

Look closely at the image of West Penn 832.

Yes, Herb, you're going to have to paste the link back together or go  
to the Fairbanks file and then click on page 81 and you'll also find  
it there.

Notice how the sides were rusted out under the belt rail in 1949.    
The car was repainted after that but the steel was never redone and  
it rusted right through the new paint.   Why?   Because Cincinnati  
Car Company used cork insulation inside the car to keep the heat in  
and the cold out in the winter.   Trouble was, it also absorbed water  
and the side sheets rusted from the inside out.   And that,  
gentlemen, is thy the car needed to be total rebuilt after it came to  
PTM.   That is why Bazinsky started on the project.   Then he died  
and the car went into a long winter's nap sometime in the 1960s,  
hopefully to appear back in the shops under Justin's tutelage in 2008  
or 2009.

I remember the rails laying in the streets in Cheswick and Aspinwall  
and Blawnox.   I would love to hang a while on blue New Kensington -  
Pittsburgh sign on the car and run it before I pass on.

I remember reading the application to the state public utliity  
commission in which West Penn proposed to lease those cars from  
itself.   They were not dumb.   Allegheny Valley Street Railway was  
no longer supported by the power company when those cars were bought  
so they were not purchased by AVSRy.   Instead they were owned by  
West Penn Securities and leased to AVSRY.   That way, when the  
company folded, they were not an asset of the railway.  In 1937, the  
securities company turned around and asked the PUC for permission to  
lease them to West Penn Railways so they could be used in Coke  
Region.   And once they were fully written off, or almost so, then  
the Securities division sold them to the railways for a trivial  
sum.    I vaguely remember that the 12 cars already had something  
like about 750,000 miles on each car when the Valley Route shut down  
in 1937.

I suspect that PTM is rebuilding a car with over a million miles on it.

http://images.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/i/image/image-idx? 
g=imls;sid=8aabb374afdd86044def7374e93aec67;c=fairbanks;q1=200709;rgn1=f 
airbanks_all;evl=full- 
image;quality=2;view=entry;subview=detail;lasttype=boolean;cc=fairbanks; 
entryid=x-11-832-01-7;viewid=0289.TIF;start=81;resnum=92
On Dec 21, 2007, at 3:31 PM, ROBERT R ROCKWELL wrote:

> There is a color pix of a West Penn bus in there that is painted  
> almost like the National City Lines stuff. I wonder if NCL had  
> plans for West Penn ?
> Robert Rockwell
> w3syt1 at msn.com<mailto:w3syt1 at msn.com>
>   ----- Original Message -----
>   From: Barry, Matthew R<mailto:mrb190 at pitt.edu>
>   To: 'pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org'<mailto:'pittsburgh- 
> railways at dementia.org'>
>   Sent: Thursday, December 20, 2007 3:32 PM
>   Subject: [PRCo] New Images on Historic Pittsburgh site
>
>
>   There are new Frank B. Fairbanks images on the Historic  
> Pittsburgh site.   This set contains both Pgh Railways and some  
> West Penn Railways photos.
>   Like the one attached of a Millvale PCC inbound after just  
> leaving the Millvale Loop.
>
>   The link is here:
>   http://images.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/i/image/image-idx? 
> q1=200709&rgn1=fairbanks_all&type=boolean&g=imls&view=thumbnail&c=fair 
> banks<http://images.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/i/image/image-idx? 
> q1=200709&rgn1=fairbanks_all&type=boolean&g=imls&view=thumbnail&c=fair 
> banks>
>
>   Matt
>
>
>