Contact your state and US reps

No. 7 -- VIRGINIA AND TRUCKEE RAILWAY -- Nevada Railroad Reconstruction Chronicles

Here's a suggestion of a short question you can send to Harry Reid, Dean Heller, John Ensign and the various state officials who represent you:

Why is the V&T Reconstruction project getting $3 million of ARRA funds from the State Transportation Board while the 395 extension goes unfunded? I have many complaints about this process, and the V&T project is going to hire out of state workers to build the track. Why are highway funds going to a project that is clearly not related to transportation? Since this won't come close to finishing the railroad, why is this a higher priority than completing 395? Since this is supposedly Nevada's first stimulus project to be bid out, this will get attention, for better or for worse!

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First "Shovel Ready Stimulus Project" in Nevada

No. 6 -- VIRGINIA AND TRUCKEE RAILWAY -- Nevada Railroad Reconstruction Chronicles

A detail from the mid-May budget meeting of the Nevada Commission to Reconstruct the Virginia and Truckee Railway...

The Commission is supposed to be receiving $3 million from the ARRA / stimulus package, otherwise affectionately known as "porkulus." Commission Chairman Bob Hadfield says this will the the first project to get started in Nevada using stimulus money. He said another $20 million will be coming behind that.


Here's a link to the full list of NDOT funded Nevada projects:

ARRA-Nevada-NDOT-stimulus.pdf

Notice a couple things:

First, the V&T Commission has jumped in front of the Highway 395 project in Carson City, which still awaits funding. The 395 freeway is only built halfway into Carson City, going south you exit on Highway 50. It's supposed to continue south a few miles and relieve traffic congestion. This project has been in the works for years, and has lacked funding for a long time. They certainly are "shovel-ready." How a poorly planned, poorly managed, well over budget questionable tourist railroad got funding over a clear highway project is beyond me.

Second, notice that these highway funds are being used to continue a tourist railroad. Now go read the recovery.gov website, if they disclose this funding to an over-budget boondoggle of a railroad, I can't find it. The site says DOT/FHWA ARRA/stimulus grants are for highway projects. Because this is a continuation of TEA-21/ISTEA funding, rail-oriented commuter projects also qualify. There's even a way for transportation musuems to get funded.

Now that brings us to a really sore point. The Nevada State Railroad Museum has been begging for funds for a long time. The rumor is they are going to cut back hours this year due to budget shortfalls. Certainly they have drastically cut back their steam operations in favor of motorcar operations.

While the museum must go through the normal legislative process, the V&T Re-con project was able to bypass the Nevada Legislature. This $3 million in funding comes courtesy of the Nevada State Transportation Board. That's right, a committee of unelected members picks and chooses where this money will go.

(MORE DETAIL HERE AND IN THIS POST: V&T Serving Public Transportation Needs?

On my initial checks, I called the State Transportation Board and unelected body, like the V&T Reconstruction Commission. I turns out that the STB is the same as the Nevada Department of Transportation Board of Directors. This includes Governor Jim Gibbons, Attorney General Katherine Cortez Masto, Lt. Governor Brian Krolicki and State Controller Kim Wallin. This board of Directors approved the NDOT Stimulus project list with almost no debate or dissent, as that top level board doesn't dig very deep into the ARRA spending staff recommendations. Also, at some level, I am told these spending recommendations are passed through the Nevada State Assembly and Senate Transportation Committees. I am still pulling the minutes of those meetings to see if there was discussion or if these committees simply rubber-stamp the STACC lists.

END OF MORE DETAIL, SEE LINKED POST FOR MORE EXCRUCIATING DETAIL)

One more subject before I wrap up this post. Let's follow the money.

The V&T people will tell you how much stimulative effect this project has in Nevada. I will post some reports I wrote and link them here later, for now let's consider that most of their projects have gone to Granite Construction. While Granite employs locals, they are a publicly traded corporation in Watsonville. They have an international shareholder base. All of the profit goes out of state.

It's true that the current Phase 2C of the project is being done by Q&D, a company based in Sparks, Nevada. Hopefully they get the next phase. But the trackbuilder has almost always been H&H Trackbuilders, a California based company. While some of the money goes to local motels to house the out-of-state employees, the bulk of their paychecks goes to stimulate California, not Nevada.

This whole stimulus plan is based on Keynesian economics, which has been proven wrong over and over again. Despite this, it gives government a cheap excuse to print and spend money so your kids will pay the bill. Currently the velocity of money is not that high, so the stimulative effect is lessened even more.

If goverment could really take a dollar and create many dollars in economic activity, why don't we just pay 100% taxes?

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Special Train Service Proposed for Carson City Residents

No. 5 -- VIRGINIA AND TRUCKEE RAILWAY -- Nevada Railroad Reconstruction Chronicles

Posted on a Yahoo Group, Great News from Staff Reporter Steve Stough (all rights reserved)...

Posted on this Yahoo Group, virginiaandtruckee1976

Special Train Service Proposed for Carson City Residents

May 26, 2009
Mound House, Nevada

By Staff Reporter

At the next meeting of the Nevada Commission for the Reconstruction of the
Virginia and Truckee Railway, a local entrepreneur who operates a service
business in Mound House offers to break the deadlock between the Commission and
the owners of the existing Virginia & Truckee Railroad.

The Robert C. Gray family operates the existing V&T Railroad from Virginia City
to Mound House. They have been in negotiations with the Commission since
January 1st of this year. The Gray family is trying to get permission to run
trains over the Commission's track, but the Commission has not been able to
reach a decision. The tourist season has already started and the Commission's
track is lying idle.

Now, a local entrepreneur has stepped up to break the logjam. He won't reveal
himself until the June Commission meeting, but his remarks to our reporter show
that he is in earnest. "All busiensses, whether it be the telephone company or
anything else are about services. We propose to bring a unique ridership
service to the residents of Carson City," he said.

Unable to explain the lack of interest in working in good faith with the Gray
family in any other way, the businessman in Mound House reached the conclusion
that members of the Commission were implying that they wanted some kind of
personal services in return for voting in favor of an operating agreement with
the Grays. So, the Mound House businessman proposed a solution.

He offers to run special trains from 7:00 pm to 2:00 am the next day every
Friday and Saturday night. He will provide his own specially-equipped rail
cars, staffed by experienced service personnel from his existing Mound House
business. He plans to charge a rate that varies with the services performed and
the length of trip. Five percent of all profits would be given back to the
Commission.

The business owner has an unusual condition, however. He wants to erect a 100
foot tower in Mound House within sight of the railway and Highway 50. He
proposes to contract with Industrial Light and Magic to erect two ten foot high
mechanical cotton-tail rabbits at the top of the tower in what can only be
called an intimate, oscillating embrace.

Members of the Commission be offered rides on the "Bunny Tail Special" without
charge. The special trains accommmodate the tastes of both men and women.

;-)

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Oh, yeah, there was a vote, here's how it went

No. 4 -- VIRGINIA AND TRUCKEE RAILWAY -- Nevada Railroad Reconstruction Chronicles

I guess I assumed you all read the Nevada Appeal article saying the Commission voted to sell the cars, AFTER BEATING A DEAD HORSE FOR 30 MINUTES.

John Tyson was trying to get a motion passed that the Commission would revisit the issue next month and see what it would cost to evaluate the condition of the birdcages, er, passenger cars stored at Portola.

In the middle of this Dwight Millard made a sensible motion to just go ahead and sell the cars. After John Tyson withdrew his motion, Dwight's motion passed. Ron Allen voted no, John Tyson voted yes and stated he was voting reluctantly but had no choice.

The other yes votes were Larry McPhereson, Dwight Millard, Bob Crowell and Bonnie Weber. So it was five to one. Here's a bad picture of them voting to sell the cars -- again!

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Who Loses if the Commission Sells the Birdcages?

No. 3 -- VIRGINIA AND TRUCKEE RAILWAY -- Nevada Railroad Reconstruction Chronicles

I will use this post for at least this one follow-up. After the discussion noted in the previous post Bonnie Weber continued to triangulate. Contradicting her early statements that the cars should be used in a parade, she then took the tack that it was time to see them go. More discussion ensued and then Dwight Millard said something, and I don't think he realized how funny it was!

He said that the only loser in the whole situation is the Western Pacific Museum because they will no longer get the rent money. I can't speak for FRRS or WPRM, but I think their attitude would be "don't let the door hit you on the way out."

If the Commission had taken care of these cars they would have been moved into the fenced yard a long ago. As it is now, all the traffic that goes by on the UP mainline gets a bad first impression of the Western Pacific Railroad Museum.

The many UP freight engineers who go by may not care much about the museum's "front door" on the rails. On the other hand, the UP 844 steam special went by this year with many passengers. There were both UP bigwigs and paid passengers who rode up through the Feather River Canyon. (Just to make you jealous, I rode from Portola to Winnemucca in a UP dome car, it was great!)

More to the point, last year Amtrak made many detours with the California Zephyr through Portola due to trackwork on Donner Pass. Every Amtrak passenger got a bad first impression of the WPRM.

Dwight Millard makes good points most of the time, but suggesting the WPRM would be the loser must have a lot of people in Portola laughing.

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V&T Commission's Wildlife Condos in Portola

No. 2 -- VIRGINIA AND TRUCKEE RAILWAY -- Nevada Railroad Reconstruction Chronicles

Summary: At the May 4, 2009 meeting of the Nevada Commission to Reconstruct the Virginia and Truckee Railway, it was deja vu all over again. As noted in the Nevada Appeal Article linked below, the commissioners seem to have forgotten what happened a year ago when they decided to sell railroad cars they own. The highlights are one Commissioner suggesting the decrepit cars be used in a parade, and another commissioner getting caught up in red tape and forgetting his own price quotes from a year ago...

V&T Commission Votes to Sell Cars -- Again!

The link above will take you to a Nevada Appeal article expaining how, a year after deciding to sell the unused railroad passenger cars they have stored in Portola for years, they decided -- again -- to sell the cars.

It's worth putting this all in context that Chairman Bob Hadfield was not at this meeting, so John Flanagan was running the meeting. I nearly guarantee you that if Hadfield were there this conversation would have taken about five minutes.

For a short backgrounder, when the Nevada Commission to Reconstruct the Virginia and Truckee Railway had a few different commissioners a few years ago, the idea pushed by then (and still) Commissioners Ron Allen and John Tyson was that the Commission itself would run the train. Toward that purpose, they took a $500,000 loan and bought the old McCloud Railroad #18 steam locomotive and five former Southern Pacific Harriman coaches. #18 was lent to the Sierra Railroad below the Commission's cost, but that's another story.

The passenger cars were acquired from the Golden Gate Railroad museum as they closed. IHMO these cars were in such bad shape that no one wanted them, so the Commission spent about $5000 per car plus transport costs to hire the Feather River Rail Society / Western Pacific Railroad museum in Portola, CA for transport and storage.

The folks in Portola hauled the cars to their yard, and the understanding was that once the Commission boarded up the broken windows and otherwise sealed and maintained the cars, they would be moved inside the WPRR museum's yard.

Last year, leaving aside a few details, a slightly different group of commissioners now felt the government should not be in the business of owning and operating a train. They had variously selected either the Gray's Virginia and Truckee Railroad or Sierra Railroad of California to provide equipment and operate the tourist railroad when it's finished. In the July, 2008 meeting the Commission voted pay pay the unpaid back rent to Portola and put the cars up for sale, to generate revenue for the Commission.

Fast forward to May 4, 2009 and we find the Commission rehashing the issue from scratch. Ron Allen never sold the cars and claims he's being tripped up by RED TAPE! Funny to see a government body tripped up by red tape.

Here are some excerpts of the 5/4/09 discussion of the delayed sale of the SP coaches that have been stored in Portola. You can view the meeting for yourself by visiting the ACCTV.org webpage for the meetings of the V&T Commission. This discussion begins about 35-40 minutes into the meeting:

Ron Allen: "I wasn't aware until recently ... I guess there's a procedure we have to go through to make these cars surplus and then be able to sell them ... I need to get that so we can get going on the sale of those cars."

Mike Rowe: "This matter was discussed last July, I guess, and back then I developed that information, I'll verify that it hasn't changed."

Ron Allen then suggested that maybe the Commission had changed their mind. Ron said at the time he received five or six inquiries about the cars. He then blamed the economy but said he still thought he could sell them.

A member asked if the cars need to be appraised, and Mike Rowe said no, that's not needed, just to follow the procedure to sell surplus property. To me it's funny, usually government sells surplus property AFTER they use something. Here the Commission bought these cars years ago and left them to rot in Portola. Portola, CA, for those who don't know, is in the Sierra Nevada mountains and gets snowy winters and hot summers.

Commissioner Dwight Millard asked how much the Commission paid for the cars. Ron said the Commission had $10,000 into each car. Dwight pointed out that the Commission was paying $6,000 per year to pay for storage, and suggested that if they couldn't be sold they should be junked.

Dwight suggested that they might be worth more as scrap than as sold. "If we're going to sell em let's get rid of em, if we're going to keep em let's keep em."

Bonnie Weber piped up, saying "it's interesting we're having this conversation again ... I'd like to know" what the motion was from the previous year. "I thought at our last meeting we would have this item on our agenda to have a final discussion ... are we now asking to go back and decide" whether to sell the cars. She said, "I would like to see if someone can do the research and get the minutes and see what the motion was." Here you are, Bonnie:

Mike Rowe seemed to recall that they agreed last year to pay another year's rent. I don't have that in my notes, and it doesn't appear in the minutes. To review the minutes see Item 10 in the July 7, 2008 minutes. A review of those minutes seems to indicate that only the back rent was to be paid, from the minutes,

Commissioner Millard said he had two questions. One was why would they pay the 3^rd quarter, June, July , August and September, when they don’t know what they are going to do with the cars. Two, what if they decide they don’t want the cars and leave them, why would they pay for them. It was discussed to amend the motion to $7500, to table the issue and Commissioner Millard said since they do owe so he asked Ron if he would amend his motion to $7500. What to pay was discussed. Commissioner Allen amended his motion for the Commission to pay the Feather River Railroad Society in the amount of $7500 which would take them through period January through June of 2008. Commissioner Baushke said the second agrees.

...

Chairman called for a vote on the motion and the motion carried and was so ordered.

Then came the discussion of whether to sell the cars, here's a summary of what the 2008 motion said. Again, check the minutes for a fuller understanding:

Commissioner Teixeira said they should put them up for sale and get rid of them. Commissioner Weber seconded his statement. Chairman Hadfield asked for discussion on Teixeira’s motion to sell the cars or dispose of in any manner to bring revenue back to the Commission ...

Chairman Hadfield called for a vote on the motion. The motion carried by a vote of six to two and was so ordered. Commissioner Allen and McPherson voted no.

CONDITION OF THE CARS -- Negative!

If you go to Portola you can see these cars for yourself. I wrote a letter to the editor of the Nevada Appeal that was published on May 22, 2009. The titled it, "Railroad cars morph into wildlife condos." I went to look at these cars last weekend. I didn't enter the cars, what I saw from the outside was bad enough. I pulled up to one of the cars, opened my door and stood up on the doorjamb/sill to get a look inside. I scared a bird, but it didn't fly away, which makes me think it was nesting in there.

A person from the area who is more familiar with the cars said there is human feces and the rodents and pigeons have "made it interesting." In a side note, because there are birds making nests in the cars, Federal law prohibits disturbing migratory birds nests. I guess they have to wait till to babies fly the coop to sell the cars.

LET'S HAVE A PARADE!

Bonnie Weber apparently has not seen the cars for herself! That's just a guess, but here's more of what she said: "I would like to see what the sentiment is (about selling of keeping the cars), maybe the sentiment has changed. We don't want to get rid of them, we do want to get rid of them. I think that at one point in time if there's nobody that was really anxious to purchase them, that using them again to have out on a location, that the V&T is coming, or some form of use for advertisement, parades, I don't know, I don't know what you would do with them. It seems to me that rather than junking them it would be great to utilize them if we can. Maybe I'm not the one to be speaking on that, maybe it costs too much to do that."

DISCUSSION OF COSTS TO EVALUATE AND RESTORE CARS

Millard, bless his heart, said, "I think we made a major fopp-poo (his version of faux-pas) when we made a decision to sell them and then didn't do anything about it. I guess we assumed that Ron (Allen) was our agent. ... I think we either junk em or list em with a broker and sell." Millard went on to say to Ron Allen that he wasn't blaming him but that naming him as a agent was probably a mistake, pointing out that Ron would not be likely to sell the cars.

John Tyson said. "we were going to sell them until we found out that we had to go through specific procedures as a government agency." No shit, sherlock. Weber seemed to recall that that aspect was discussed, and Mike Rowe indicated earlier that he indeed had done the paperwork to declare the cars surplus. IMHO, since Ron Allen has been the champion of keeping these cars, as long as he's in charge of the sales process the cars will not be sold. Apparently they won't be maintained, either!

Allen said he could only speak for himself, that his sentiment has not changed, and he still thinks the cars are valuable. Now they really began to rehash a decision that was already made a year ago. Larry McPhereson said he was under the impression that out of the five cars they could get two good cars. He obliquely referred to another agenda item that was pulled from this meeting where a discussion of buying MORE cars would take place. Larry thought there were cars available for $5000 that we ready to go, already sitting on the track. I have no details about these other collectors items, er, I mean railroad cars. Larry suggested that you could buy a whole new car for a few thousand dollars, but he certainly must have meant a whole used car. Between these comments from Larry and Bonnie Weber's comments, these people have little to no idea of the cost of refurbishing railroad cars. That's where we get to another interesting point.

WHO'S THE EXPERT?

In summary, John Tyson declared his extensive knowledge of the costs of refurbishing cars, because he owns the Metis, an Amtrak-certified private railcar. He then claimed not to know how much it would cost to refurb the cars. He implied that it would cost less than a $7000 wheelset.

Fair enough, you can't blame Tyson for trying, right? Ron Allen really crossed a line in my opinion.

In the July meeting last year, Allen said he knew someone who would evaluate the cars for $26,380. He suggested this was a good deal because the Nevada State Railroad Museum had paid $50,000 for an equipment evaluation. That was last year. This year, he conveniently forgot the $26,380 quote and said he didn't know how much an evaluation would cost.

Tyson at one point suggested that for the next meeting, an agenda item be added to perform an evaluation of the cars. He suggested that if it was going to cost $70,000 to refurbish a $5000 car that might be a bad idea, but it might be done with volunteer labor and volunteer/donated materials.

Weber asked if he had any idea how much it would cost to have them evaluated and who would do it. He said he didn't know how much the evaluation would cost, "haven't a clue, haven't a clue." He said he knew from his own experience what upholstery, windows and paint costs, but he was unable to give even a guesstimate of the cost to evaluate or refurbish these cars.

Tyson then said, "I would like to believe if the V&T (abandoned in 1950) had been able to hang on much longer they would have replaced the wooden cars they had with cars very similar" to the former SP coaches going to rot in Portola.

Here's some more details and then I will wrap this post up:

John Tyson said, "The last discussion I had with Mr. Hadfield was that he thought we could restore two of them and use the rest for parts. ... I know that the Gold Hill Historical Society has offered to put a lot of volunteer labor to restore two of those cars, and they haul ninety people apiece ... but they are historic in the sense that they were made in the 1920's and they hauled a heck of a lot of commuters over the years."

(I might note these cars were used in service on the San Francisco peninsula, where you don't find a lot of tight curves and 2+% grades. )

Tyson said "we looked at those cars to see what condition they were and, and the running gear was in perfectly good condition." He noted that the cars came up on rail, not on highway trucks. This doesn't square with a quote from Ron Allen in a March, 2006 Nevada Appeal article where he said there were problems with the wheelsets. The article says some axles needed to be borrowed and returned. To my knowledge this has never been repaired.

Tyson did qualify his statement by saying the inside of the cars need work. That's an understatement. All they need is a little TLC: Tools, Labor and Cash. Tyson said it's worth looking into the cars to see if it's worth saving them.

Bonnie Weber spoke up again, saying she wasn't "into all the train things." Tyson replied, "I understand, believe me, we all understand." Weber continued, "Is anybody here the expert that is the one that knows" how much it will cost?

Tyson replied that he was the expert because he owned and runs an Amtrak-certified private car. He stated that the most expensive part of the car is the running gear and gave a price of $7,000 for running gear. My opinion is that it will cost a heck of a lot more than $7,000 to refurbish the totally trashed interiors of these cars in Portola. I like Tyson but he is doing a great disservice to imply that these car interiors can be made ready for just a few thousand dollars.

He went on, "the brakes on those cars and the running gear is in excellent shape, what's going to need work is the interior. Some seats need to be reupholstered, new paint is needed, the windowsills need to be redone, but when you compare what that's going to cost compared to replacing a brake system or a truck or a wheelset I don't think there's any comparison to be made."

As noted, according to Ron Allen in the Nevada Appeal article, on top of the complete refurbishing of the interiors, the wheelsets DO need work. So I just don't know what John Tyson is trying to say.

He appears to be seriously underestimating the cost of refurbishing the cars. Materials alone will be quite pricey. Bonnie Weber continued to beat a dead horse by asking, "who does the work? Do we hire somebody ... can we trade it with someone? It seems to me we've already spent a lot of money on it. ... Who is the expert who says yes, this is what we need to do. ... I think we asked Sierra what it would take..."

John Tyson replied, "they had their own self-interest in mind." Ooooohhh, that evil self interest. In this Nevada Appeal article, Sierra indicated it might take $250,000 per car to refurbish, and said Sierra could build usable cars for $175,000.

Referring again to a couple Nevada Appeal articles, Ron Allen claimed it would take $10,000 per car to make them ready. In another article titled, "Rail cars bought for V&T may only be worth their steel," Robert Pinoli of the Sierra gave his much higher quote and a rather negative opinion of the cars, saying, "From a distance they look great, but up close you start seeing visible signs of wear and aging." He told the Appeal there could be compatibility issues with using 1920's equipment with more modern steel. He indicated there was an asbestos issue and that almost every component of the coaches needed repair.

Again trying to bring some rational thought to the discussion, Dwight Millard said the ongoing discussion goes right to the heart of the matter of whether the commission was in business to own railroad equipment. He asked, "Do we really want to run a train or own a trainset?" In the recent days when Mayor Marv and Bob Hadfield ran the show, the clear answer was no.

Then the conversation really took a turn for the worse, when Dwight Millard suggested they needed to pick an operator or take a fresh look at who will operate the railroad. I know if Hadfield had been there he would have thundered his gavel down and yelled, "we already have an operator, it's Sierra Railroad, case closed." In fact the Commission spent a big chunk of time (and money) using a consultant to run an operator selection process, and Sierra Railroad won.

At this point they started rehashing the whole question of who will run the railroad. This post is already way too long, so I'll leave it at that. Until next time, whenever that might be.

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The first blog post about the Virginia and Truckee Reconstruction Project

No. 1 -- VIRGINIA AND TRUCKEE RAILWAY -- Nevada Railroad Reconstruction Chronicles

This is the new place for analysis of the Virginia & Truckee Reconstruction Project Biased Analysis and Criticism.

I will then move on to explain how porkulus (stimulus / ARRA) funding meant for highway projects is being diverted to this unfinished tourist railroad in Northern Nevada.

At a meeting yesterday, Janice Ayres (former Carson City Supervisor, former V&T Re-con Commissioner/Chair, and currently president of the Norther Nevada Railway Foundation) complained about "all the people who don't want to see the railroad built."

This really shows the unfair cast of her mind. She sees any criticism of a government process gone bad and a desire to kill the project. What she and others don't seem to understand is that people like me want to see the railroad built, we just don't think they behave well as a government body. More on this later... for now if you go to the RenoRailfans website you can see much of my 2008 coverage, including my meeting notes for 2008 meetings.

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