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December 3, 2007

Streetcar Update...

St. Charles: The weather has been pretty good, so things are moving along in terms of the power upgrade. Riverbend by Christmas is still a real possibility. The electric wire has been re-run up Carrollton to Jeanette (the back of the barn). Approximately half of the 900s are in service daily, on all three lines. Transfers at Napoleon from streetcar to bus and vice versa appear to be going smoothly.

The 900s are being housed at the SIS at Randolph. Two of them are at Carrollton, though, undergoing repair work for streetcar-versus-auto collisions. Both cars sustained a bit of damage, but it's one of those "you should have seen the other guy" situations.

Canal: The Von Dullen cars are being worked through the paint shop at Carrollton. All the 2000-series cars except for 2023 are at Carrolton, being cleaned, stripped, and repainted. There have been a number of issues with getting the Von Dullens back on the street. For some critical parts, there was a one-year lead time to ramp up fabrication. NORTA had spares, but not enough to rebuild the entire fleet. Additionally, problems with the 2000's propulsion system are being addressed in the rebuild. NORTA is looking at Tatra propulsion now for the 2000s, with the units being built by Brookville.. These delays have pushed back the return of the 2000s until some time next summer.

Von Dullen 2023 is up at Brookville. NORTA sent it there immediately after the storm. There's been some talk that all the work on the Von Dullens would be done at Brookville, and it appears to have come up once again this weekend at the APTA meeting in Tampa. While Brookville will certainly be involved in the work, it's not likely they'll do all of the re-bulid. If they were going to send the cars north, it's not likely they would have re-painted them until after they came back. So, why is 2023 at Brookville? Because they're experts on those trucks and propulsion. It's just like when you get in a auto accident and you take your car to a body shop. The surface damage might not look so bad, but a little digging can reveal much more serious problems. It was a very prudent move on part of NORTA to get 2023 (as well as one of the 400-series cars) up to Brookville so they could start looking them over.

Posted by YatPundit at December 3, 2007 8:11 AM

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