Mt. Rainer Scenic in Tacoma, 19-20 May 12

[Hotrail]

Mt. Rainer Scenic Railroad will be in Tacoma, WA to give train rides on the Tacoma Hill on 19 and 20 May. This is being held in conjunction with the model railroad show and swap meet at Freighthouse Square. The locomotives will be Polson #70 and Northern Pacific F9A #7012A. Boarding is at Freighthouse Square. (This trip information was posted on the MRSR web site earlier today, but for some reason has disappeared from there.) The train rides start at 10 AM and go to 4 PM on Saturday. Sunday will have the same schedule except the train rides will stop earlier in the day. The train will leave Tacoma at about 4 PM on Sunday and travel to Mineral with the regular consist. Also included in the train will be the two passenger cars that have been sitting on the Tideflats for a few months. There may be also some freight cars mixed in the train as it returns to Mineral. The fare for the train rides is $10 for adults and $5 for kids, 3 to 12 years of age. (This fare rate is what was posted on the MRSR web site but is currently not there. I hope I all got this correct!)

Another heads up: MRSR will be in Tacoma again on 2-3 June 12 to help celebrate the opening of the Curtis Lemay Auto Muesum.

 

[RentonRailFan]

Are these the ones you’re talking about? I saw them back in December near one of the port entrances. City of Prineville 520 and 545.

 

[Hotrail]

Yes, those are the passenger cars that are scheduled to go to Mineral on Sunday. When I was on the Tide Flats on Monday (7th) one of the cars was missing and I assume that it was in Progress Rail getting some work done on it. I believe I was told that they would get some fresh paint before rolling up to Mineral. As I understand it, Mt. Rainer Scenic has bought these cars from the City of Prineville fleet.

 

[Jon Bentz]

Great to see some Milwaukee cars on Milwaukee rails. There's too little MILW equipment around.

 

[RentonRailFan]

Great! I'm excited to see them running next weekend.

 

[cnw8717]

I believe this trip has been cancelled due to the construction for the Sounder line to Lakewood near the Freighthouse.

 

[Macster]

The May trip has been canceled due to the Sound Transit construction project.

The LeMay event may also be canceled due to the same issue.

 

[speeder3]

Brian is correct. The May 19-20 special operations out of Freighthouse Square have been cancelled due to the track and street construction for the Sounder extension. We had hopes of being able to participate in the model railroad show and swap meet as we did last May, but the contractors working between D and C streets will not have the area in a safe and suitable condition for loading/unloading passengers. Regrettably, I had to make the call last week to cancel the operation.

At this time, there is no indication that we will not be able to run out of FHS for the opening of the LeMay museum on June 2-3. An official announcement of this operation will come from the MRSR management at the appropriate time.

Brian Wise
General Manager
Mt. Rainier Scenic Railroad

 

[GoalieFergy53]

As I drove past Progress Rail today, the Milwaukee car that was being painted was out in the yard (wasn't able to get a picture.) Looks excellent!

 

[speeder3]

Progress Rail did a fantastic job of painting our car (ex-MILW coach #520). We were hoping to take it and the other car (ex-MILW #545) home on the 20th, but they will have to wait a little bit longer for the line to Eatonville to get cleared up.

Brian Wise
General Manager
Mt. Rainier Scenic Railroad

 

[GN Goat]

Mount Rainier in Tacoma

I saw the new paint job today driving to work. The car was behind a row of cars lined up for TR to pull out.

Looked good! Like all the paint jobs Progress Rail does.

I hope MRSR can run on June 2 and 3.

I drove by FH Square tonite and that street is now open and crossing is perfect!

The next crossing down (towards Pacific Ave) (sorry don't know the street name) is still closed but they have some heavy equipment there.

Are the new cars going to be replacing any cars in MRSR fleet or additions?

Also, for Brian, I went to MRSR site and it looks like it hasn't be updated since 2011. Hope your staff can provide some new information on whats happening at MRSR.

 

[Bob]

I saw the new paint job today driving to work. The car was behind a row of cars lined up for TR to pull out.

Looked good! Like all the paint jobs Progress Rail does.

I hope MRSR can run on June 2 and 3.

I drove by FH Square tonite and that street is now open and crossing is perfect!

The next crossing down (towards Pacific Ave) (sorry don't know the street name) is still closed but they have some heavy equipment there.

Are the new cars going to be replacing any cars in MRSR fleet or additions?

Also, for Brian, I went to MRSR site and it looks like it hasn't be updated since 2011. Hope your staff can provide some new information on whats happening at MRSR.

What site did you go to that hasn't been updated since 2011?!? Please give me the exact URL of the page you're looking out.

Edit - I just realized you're probably talking about the mrsr.info site, which hasn't been updated in a while. Brian posts updates to that blog on an irregular basis, since it's mostly just an informational site rather than providing current schedules etc.

However, for current schedule and event info, you can find everything you need at http://www.mrsr.com/ which is updated quite often.

 

[RentonRailFan]

Can anyone tell me if and when Tacoma Rail will be running tomorrow? I will be at Freight House Square all day exibiting at the show.

 

[speeder3]

I saw the new paint job today driving to work. The car was behind a row of cars lined up for TR to pull out.

Looked good! Like all the paint jobs Progress Rail does.

I hope MRSR can run on June 2 and 3.

I drove by FH Square tonite and that street is now open and crossing is perfect!

The next crossing down (towards Pacific Ave) (sorry don't know the street name) is still closed but they have some heavy equipment there.

Are the new cars going to be replacing any cars in MRSR fleet or additions?

Also, for Brian, I went to MRSR site and it looks like it hasn't be updated since 2011. Hope your staff can provide some new information on whats happening at MRSR.

We have every intention of running out of FHS on June 2-3 for the opening of the Le May Museum. The track construction down there should be far enough along that we can safely board passengers at D Street.

The new cars are additions to the fleet, but the one that has been painted will be put into service soon to replace our existing Concessions Car. The existing Concessions Car is a baggage, and as such is alot of dead weight to haul around. The MILW car will give us both concessions capability on the train plus an additional 50 seats while keeping the train length at 4 cars (the length of the run-around in Elbe). When both of the new cars are in service, we'll have enough equipment to run two trains at the same time if the need arises.

As for my blog on the web site, yes I haven't updated that in quite a while. I switched to Google Chrome a while back and then my blog software didn't want to work. I eventually got it working again, but I really hate the way it deals with photos so I lost the motivation to work with it. I'm looking at using a new program that is more user friendly so I can get back up to speed.

Brian Wise
General Manager
Mt. Rainier Scenic Railroad