Re: Silly Pendennis Castle ideas

["Thomas Johnson" <tej22@**REMOVE*THIS*BIT**cam.ac.uk>]

Bill McNiven wrote in message ...
>chris@enet21.com.au wrote in message <38994433.5C1B1E4A@enet21.com.au>...
>>I know this will start a long debate again, By why doesn't the RTM grab
>Pendennis
>>Castle, its ideal for main line running and much cheaper to restore an
>maintain than the
>>57 or probably the 35. I bet sponsors would like it too.
>>After a week of letter writing to virtually every politican and major
union
>in the
>>country I reckon  Rio will give it away to any non-profit or public
>standard gauge
>>museum in Australia.
>>Letters of reply are starting to flow in, and they are not favourable to
>Rio Tinto.
>
>
>But the RTM already has a large collection 4-6-0s awaiting repairs: 3001,
>3203, 3214 (for which there was a half-hearted restoration appeal in the
>early 1980s), 3526 (for which there was a restoration appeal late 1998,
with
>no action visible since), 3609, 3616 and 3642 (which retired very quietly
>some time in the last few years).
>
>Surely, if we armchair experts are looking for a main-line home for a GWR
>locomotive in Australia, we should speculate about:
>Hotham Valley -- beautiful SG line to Kalgoorlie and beyond and not a
single
>SG steam loco
>SteamRanger in SA -- beautiful SG line from Adelaide to Mt. Barker Jct. and
>not a single SG steam loco
>West Coast Railway -- the name goes with Great Western Railway and an
>oil-fired blue 'Castle' would be a change
>Dorrigo -- it would make up for the fact that the greedy RTM has three 36's
>while Dorrigo didn't get any
>QR -- they do a pretty good job of restoring and operating 3'6" gauge
steam.
>With a Uniform Gauge steam loco, they could let Sunsteam run to Kyogle and
>maybe put steam on the GSPE.
>
>All of this of course ignores the facts that Rio Tinto own the machine and
>are free to do as they wish with their property -- keep it, scrap it, give
>it away -- and that 4079, as a participant with Flying Scotsman (then IIRC)
>GNR 1452 in the 1924 Locomotive Exchanges, is a key part of British Railway
>history.
>
>Rgds <g,r,d>
>
>Bill :)
>


According to this months Railway Magazine:

"The Australian quarrying company Hamersley Iron has generously decided to
make a gift of 'Castle' class 4-6-0 Pendennis Castle to the Great Western
Society
. . . . . . . . .
the society has to find the shipping costs of GBP125,000. That's the 'going
rate' the P&O line has quoted for bringing the loco half way round the world
from the Indian Ocean port of Dampier."

Thomas Johnson