More Miscellany - Relocation, Removal, Disappearances

Today's entry is something of a catch-all of recent updates. First, thanks to Bill Wall for sending the above photo showing Public Service Coordinated Transport 5173. This is what remains of a four-wheel snow sweeper from the Newark subway; it burned in a fire in the subway in 1972 but its frame has been owned by the North Jersey Electric Railway Historical Society since 1980. It's been stored in Phillipsburg for years, but was just relocated to join the rest of the NJERHS collection in Piscataway. I'm looking for information on this thing, especially who built it and when - anyone have a good PSCT roster handy?

Next up, we have a removal: Scarborough Rapid Transit 3027, a linear-induction-motor car shown above, has been dismantled by the Halton County Radial Railway. HCRR acquired two of these cars, 3027 and sister car 3026, with the idea of dismantling one, so this is not unexpected. The Halton County roster currently stands at 54 cars on PNAERC, while the overall list has 2,088 cars.

Finally, I tell you a mystery: two Texas Electric freight trailers have disappeared from the grounds of the Texas State Railroad in Rusk, Texas. The two are TE 605, built by St. Louis in 1907 as Texas Traction coach 6, rebuilt as a freight motor in 1914, and rebuilt as freight trailer 605 in 1918; and TE 613 (shown above), built in 1907 as Texas Traction coach 7, rebuilt c1914 as an RPO-coach, and then rebuilt in 1925 as a freight trailer. For years, both cars sat on the ground at the east/southeast end of the TSRR yard in Rusk. But at some point, they disappeared, both from Street View and (as near as I can tell) from aerial photos. Does anyone know for sure what happened to them? I believe they were just used for storage, so my best guess is that they were dismantled, but I'd love to know for sure. I've changed the status of each car to "unknown" pending word one way or another. (The third body owned by TSRR, ex-C&LE box motor 646, is still visible on Google Street View as recently as a year and a half ago.)

One Removal and a Couple of Questions

Thanks to Gord McOuat for confirming that the Halton County Radial Railway has dismantled Toronto CLRV 4010 as a parts source.

Car 4010 was the first CLRV to go to a museum, back on November 4, 2019, and operated at HCRY as soon as it arrived. But the museum has since acquired several other examples of the type, with the idea that the one or two cars in the worst condition would be dismantled as parts sources, and that ended up including 4010. This brings the number of CRLVs currently at Halton County down to "only" eight, though a couple of those are owned by other museums and just stored in Rockwood for the moment.

Supposedly, Halton County has also dismantled one of its two Scarborough Rapid Transit cars (the ones acquired just a few weeks ago) - but I'm not sure which one. Anyone know?

And in unrelated news, Joshua Sutherland has sent me an update on Hanna Mining 306, a large industrial steeplecab built by GE in 1928. This locomotive has been on display, albeit in somewhat neglected condition, at Hill Annex Mine State Park in Minnesota. As it turns out, that state park was permanently closed this summer to allow mining and extraction work to resume. It sounds like the old equipment and buildings may simply get demolished to make way for resumption of business (or maybe they're already gone) but I don't know for sure.

If Hanna Mining 306 gets cut up, it would not be a huge loss. Three other identical locomotives from this operation have been preserved, including one preserved indoors in impeccable condition in Duluth and two more displayed outdoors in decent condition elsewhere in the region. For the time being, locomotive 306's status has been changed to "unknown." Any updates on what happens to the artifacts at this site are appreciated.