Eastern Railroad Discussion > NS Used Asset sale - she's a beauty!

Interesting NS Storyard post from 1/8/26. $60M realized from scrap metal sales in 2024 - impressive!

Uncovering hidden value in unused NS assets

 

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JPB Wrote:
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> Interesting NS Storyard post from 1/8/26. $60M
> realized from scrap metal sales in 2024 -
> impressive!
>
> Uncovering hidden value in unused NS assets
>
>  
Can stop laughing. The picture is funny, but the captioning is priceless!

It actually isn't all that impressive. The amount of junk that they had laying around is what was impressive. There were years that they would not dispose of anything because it cost money to do so. For example, the auto facilities each had 2-3 ramps that were broken down or stripped for parts but I could not get rid of them due to the cost of disposal - huge cost to dismantle. So they sat there. 

In short, when you let a bunch of scrap sit for years and then finally get someone to take it, it will look good on the balance sheet. 

It's not just NS.   Pretty much every corporation has 'stuff' that's mysteriously still on the books but is, in fact, scrap.

My two favorites are a similar backhoe on a publicly-owned line, that showed up for me to appraise, and it had literally turned into a terrarium.   There was enough vegetation grown up on the INSIDE of the backhoe cab that you could no longer get the door open without a machete to clear an opening.

Other lifetime award goes to the appraisal of a steel mill, that had a fleet of reasonably new hirail and pickup trucks on the property.   One of them wasn't easily found.   Had to ask where it was to my escorts.... 'oh, you want THAT one?'  You sure about that?'   well, OK......   and we drove down into a slag pit, far away from prying eyes.   There it was, looked OK ....at first glance.   Got out, walked around it, .....OMG!    The entire passenger side was MELTED off, the mirrors, the paint burned, the glass shattered, while the driver side was a 'like new' vehicle.   What happened????
"Well, you see, ________ drove it up to the scale track and parked too close to the track.   The bottle cars came up from pour, engineer didn't see the truck from his side, stopped the bottle cars beside it, left for lunch.   Came back and found the truck that way - melted off from the heat from the bottle cars'....

The truck was only two years old and was going to stay in the pit until it depreciated off....apparently.

Two former NYC vertical lift bridges have sat unused since 1970 in South Chicago.
The former B&O bascule bridge in Chicago at 16th Street hasn't been used for decades.
Imagine the scrap value of all that steel.

Thanks for the photo and caption about the backhoe.  There is no way to top that one!

Movable bridges demolished over navigable waters are a multi-million dollar effort and require extensive coordination and precise timing with the associated navigation schedule. Not worth the scrap vs/ cost.

Further, out of service bridges either need to be pinned in place or maintained in an operable state as a USCG requirement.  

How much steel is in that truck? Compared to a few stocks of 100 pound rail sitting on the weeds, doesn’t seem like much.

Posted from iPhone

Can't speak for bridges, but the small scrap yard I worked at for a couple years usually did cleaning up of old buildings or prep work for things like new installations of piping/water heaters.

How it usually worked was you'd put a bid in for how much you were willing to do the job for, along with your game plan of how you would execute that job.

From there, we'd come in, cut out what we needed to be removed and haul it away. From there, anything that was ready got hauled to a dealer while anything worth saving or that needed cleaned/cut up would get hauled back to the shop. An example would be 4 inches of steel pipe on either end of a brass valve. That stuff can be cleaned (seperated) at a later time.

Anything reusable like an electric motor that still worked would be put aside to be resold. Otherwise, it too got cleaned.

Now what's my point in this? With proper insurance (ours covered up to $5 million which was required by some locations), equipment and paying the team under the table with no benefits other than lunch at Pizza Hut or Burger King, there is no way we could afford to stay in business strictly off scrap; not in the long run at least. Some jobs paid better than others, but the point was we were there to prep for demolition or installation for the next party to do their job.

Now imagine doing a bridge. Is there a lot of scrap? yep! Scrap doesn't pay for a giant crane. It'll buy you a burger though. ;)

Posted from Android

If that engine isn't a DEF(Diesel Exhaust Fluid) drinking fool then it's worth some money. As a farmer who uses diesel engines to run irrigation systems we could buy an old run down JD 9500 combine and take the engine out to rebuild it vs buying a new $40,000 - $50,000 DEF sucking piece of sh*t that will not run reliable enough over time. Just depends which lense you use when looking at a thing or situation. ;)

I ran into a guy a few years ago that had a very fine, large car collection and a nice building to store them. It seems he made his money by salvaging heating and air equipment from industrial buildings, much of it on the roof.

Victor Baird



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/11/26 12:47 by wabash2800.

Another complication:  if the bridge being salvaged is painted with old school silver paint, you may have an asbestos problem. A lot of silver bridge paint gained its protective properties from high asbestos content, and consequently scrap yards may be unwilling to accept it. 

The first time I heard this, I thought it was nonsense. Then, one of my jobs involved taking down an old footbridge and we had to landfill all of the steel because we received no bids at all for the steel.