Steam & Excursion > Last chance for Frisco 4500?

Once proud, flashy and beautiful Frisco 4500, still in her original Meteor paint scheme, may have her last chance this coming Tuesday 6/3. To explain, the Tulsa Parks Board is voting on what to do with the 405 ton Northern with 74inch drivers in a morning meeting with the City of Tulsa Mayor (Mr. LaFortune), The Oklahoma Railway Museum, and A local, small Tulsa group intent(hellbent) on keeping her in Tulsa. The local group wants to restore her cosmetically and display her outside on the west bank of the Arkansas River....the original plan made no mention of a roof, fence, or security to protect the locomotive.....although they do have a paint guy from a local body shop willing to paint her for free. Our group, ORM www.oklahomarailwaymusuem.org would like to bring her to OKC and restore cosmetically or, remotely, someday in the next 5-10 years send her to a shop for either cosmetic or complete restoration. We have the support of some state political leaders as the only railway museum between the two cities but our chances look less than 50/50 against a local Tulsa group who\'s city owns the locomotive. As you can imagine, this situation is far more complicated than the scope of this board allows, but I can tell you ORM will likely have the cash flow and the political/media support to allow some constructive things happen in the years ahead. It seems certain the 4500 will stay in Oklahoma so as far as We are concerned it may be a win/win senario AS LONG AS THE TULSA GROUP CAN PULL IT OFF WITHOUT BOTCHING HER AND WITH COVER AND SECURITY.
So, I\'m asking all of you for some last minute input as to what to include in the letter to the leaders of the City of Tulsa to hold them and esp. the local "keep the 4500 for Tulsa" group accountable. It will likely be her last chance.......Also, for those of you who know this plight, Sunbelt...the 1st Tulsa restoration group in the late 1980\'s has lost their lease and will likely have to move or go belly up. For more info....look up the City of Tulsa and 4500 auction. BTW, even though I live in OKC, I\'m originally from Tulsa. I would rather she be here at our museum....but taken good care of in Tulsa would also be OK.
My proposal to the Parks Board is being drafted now.....bullet point format....short input would be appreciated.

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Here she is in 1945. Wouldn\'t you agree she is worth saving? Thanks for any wisdom you guys can contribute.....just looking for a few short thoughts. (Thanks to M. Morrow/Dischinger Collection and FRISCO IN COLOR by Marre-Sommers)

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Mike, I\'m not sure that the general public even cares, but if you could bring to their attention that this locomotive and the Frisco contributed greatly to the growth of the Tulsa and OKC areas, and should be preserved as a national treasure, maybe some interest could be aroused. Do you have a group of railfans there who can help with that effort? Hey, maybe even put a few words in on your weathercast.

They are not going to scrap her, as near as I can tell from the contretemps, regardless of whether your bunch get her or not. Is that correct? Or have I read what the papers and politicians have said incorrectly?
Also worth noting, is that none of the four surviving 4500s are indoors, unless someone stuck one there recently.
In fact, neither are the six surviving small Frisco mountains ( too bad no one ever thought to save one of the big heavy hitters from that breed, but you take a 1500 and be happy - when you can get one) being stored indoors. As far as it goes, there are a couple of Frisco survivors that have open picnic shelter affairs built over them.
If your plan is to rebuild another big 4-8-4 , that will have no place to run, with all due respect; that is not exactly a worthy goal. It would appear that given the need to try and get half, say , of the operable northerns, venues to run on, would be more useful from an aesthetic and economic end point.

Which does not deal with the large number of locos of other arrangements that : are in working order ; can pull a ten or more, passenger car consist ; and are also, without rights of way to go down.
None of this can be solved by individuals, and some of the problems will require those who care about it to organize within the RL&HS,NRHS, and any other groups extant, or created, to further this end - to bring pressure to bear to make it possible to have steam excursions . In the next two weeks, in the United Kingdom , more mainline steam excursions will operate than in this entire country of a quarter billion people , this year.

This is not accidental in either case. They are organized and seek out political ends to finance, and legislate their right to operation. I am uninterested in any crap from representatives of the six gorillas about private enterprise. You have chosen to exist by acquiring the use of the state\'s power in the national, and state legislatures of this country. Without that, largesse, from the citizens of this nation you do not have railroads to run from Omaha, Jacksonville, or wherever you are doing it from.

Nowhere in Adam Smith, or Bastiat, will you find ordained the artificial entity of a corporation. Nor is it ordained by the U.S. Constitution or the Holy Bible. Furthermore, railroads exist by the transferance of state power that took place in the legislative bodies of this Republic. The right to place conditions on those powers rests with the citizens of the Republic of the United States, and the several states composing it.

In other words go after the pols you have elected in an organized fashion, if you want to see more steam excursions. It is simple, but remember that the railroads are in there paying off legislators, to do what they want(especially with the recent rulings against McCain-Feingold reforms of campaign financing).

The insurance issue is also a political one. The U.S. government guarantees property insurance to over 1 & 3/4 million properties because the owners cannot obtain affordable (or at any cost in some cases-e.g. Key West) insurance because of the threats of damage from natural disasters. The time has come to use our government to insure the existence of our avocation. If they can serve other special interests from capitol buildings reaching from Juneau to Tallahassee, and Honolulu to Augusta, as well as at the big dome in DC ; they can serve ours.

Under current conditions don\'t waste your time working up a plan for operation. Center your efforts around proper preservation concentrating on proper storage and the cosmetics. Grab any and all forms of publicity from the operating era to show what this loco meant to the times that it operated in. This can be broadened to include the railroad scene and what a great part it played in moving the public, the war effort and industrial growth.


ge13031: get her under a roof!

If you ever want to do future restoration, avoid letting the engine get re-displayed. Once that happens, all of the wrong folks who don\'t rebuild, operate and otherwise enjoy railroad equipment will have too much invested in the display (track, building, dontated supplies). I\'ve been down this road before.

The greatest thing that any group can do is get an engine out of the park. That is the dumbest place for a piece of railroad equipment. Get it out of the park and keep it on live track !!!!!

Too many engines have made their 2nd trip to the park already.

While I\'m the biggest promoter of preservation and keeping items operational, the 4500 or any loco is not a nat\'l treasure. It\'s just a neat Frisco 4-8-4 to be maintained and enjoyed by people who like it as such.

Next thing you know, we\'ll be hearing how this old steamer is the locomotive that built Oklahoma, hauled some dignitary\'s train, was operated by my dad, is the 434th. oldest steam eninge, and could become the centerpiece of a new national world-wide RR museum even bigger than the California State Museum.

As everyone gets older, and the existing steam engines require more attention, there is even less manpower and interest to do so. I hope SLSF 4500 and its companions fare as good as 1522 has.

Anyone else?? We have almost 4 miles of our OWN track, the turntable that used to turn her, and nearly direct access to the old Frisco line....now owned by the State of Oklahoma... in good shape....between the two largest cities OKC and Tulsa....Thanks for the response so far. Look for the results of the meeting soon. Thanks Again,
Mike

A previous post offered good advice, keep her on live track or something connected to live track
Right now from what I\'ve seen the biggest chore is to just find all of the parts the previous group removed. Several of us inspected her about 4 years ago, and we were interested in a lease/donation or whatever. I put a lot of effort into identifying what was missing for the city in the hopes they would pressure the group to return all of them and we could have had a shot at restoring her. The city dropped the ball and didn\'t respond to us.
The engine is restorable. The boiler shell at the time I looked at her was pristine looking outside. That\'s the result of the Frisco removing the lagging before donation, and the years she spent under a roof in the park. The cost to restore is always staggering, as is the work. This may not be the best time to undertake the job, but the engine needs to be saved from the scrapper, the rest of the parts need to be recovered and a responsible group should put her back together and protect her from Mother Nature. That way, if restoration is made possible by a ton of money, talented volunteers and a complete reversal of the insurance situation, there\'s something to start from. It ain\'t a pleasant world for steam out there right now.
Bear in mind, if conditions were right, the 1522 would still be in the running.

Frisco1522, I would like to meet you sometime in STL, at your convienience, I\'ll buy lunch.....how about at the transportation musuem. May I contact you off-line after tomorrow\'s meeting?

oktrainboys wrote:

> Anyone else?? We have almost 4 miles of our OWN
> track, the turntable that used to turn her, and
> nearly direct access to the old Frisco
> line...

Has FP45 #90 been moved to the museum yet, or is
it still sitting in the spur up by the Santa Fe station?
I can\'t find any mention of the unit on the museum\'s website.

Evan Werkema, The FP45 is on the medium short list...a rip track and house track will probably need to be laid down first. We are running short on none "mainline" track ATTM. We are working very hard on our goals. #90 can still be seen at the Sante Fe Depot downtown.

Many people don\'t realize that even to keep a steam engine as a static display costs lotsa money, lots and lots of money. You would be shocked at the cost to just paint one of the darn things.

Well, the verdict is in......drumroll please....
The City of Tulsa has agreed to let the local "Save the old Frisco for Tulsa" group have a crack at it......anyone surprised? They have 30K of the 35K they feel is needed to move/reassemble and display the engine. One hitch of several is that the city wants to transfer ownership/liability to The River Parks Authority.....the city does not want the liability. It will come to a vote.....we\'ll see if the Riverparks people want it. They plan to move her in 30 to 60 days to the BNSF Cherokee yard where they will be granted free lease space and the use of cranes.....generous and commendable of the BNSF. A final display location on the west bank of the Arkansas River is TBA with final resing place in about 1 year ...No immediate plans for a fence....perhaps a roof?...Oh almost forgot, the paint job is reportably free minus the cost of the paint....of course the current paint is lead based, don\'t know if riverparks has thought about that.....Any Thoughts??

Looks like this goat roping has no end. I wish them well, and it looks like the city has unloaded a liability and risk.
30-35k won\'t go far, as they will discover.

Mike:

From your initial post, it sounds as if Tulsa will lean toward the local group.

I\'ll assume that for you, it\'s your worst-case scenario, as you imply re-display results in an un-restorable [operationally, that is] engine, although history teaches us that NOTHING is ever impossible, just highly difficult.

That being said, what will you do if Tulsa picks the local group? Will you commit resources to assist them in the locomotive\'s preservation?

oktrainboys wrote:
> Well, the verdict is in......drumroll please....
> The City of Tulsa has agreed to let the
> local "Save the old
> Frisco for Tulsa" group have a crack at
> it......anyone surprised
>.....Any Thoughts??

My previous post came without the benefit of reading the "verdict."

I reiterate my assertion: will you offer to help the Tulsa group with the project? If $35K proves too low of a figure to accomplish the task, would you be willing to commit resources and efforts to help raise the needed funding? Since you also command a level of experience/expertise in such matters, will you make that available to them as well?

The trend in historic preservation today is for the development of strategic partnerships amongst all types of organizations, both public & private, to implement projects. Somewhere down the line, such partnerships often lay the foundation for a realistic examination of such things as operational restoration.

tvrha, Well....those are good questions. No one on this board probably really cares what I may or may not do personally. The issue is really all about one of the finest Northerns ever to grace the rails. She needs to stay safe. But if I had to give you a short answer, I\'d rather donate to our own Museum, ORM, and to the living steam programs still left out there, and maybe save enough pennies to someday make a meaningful contribution. :)