The Ohio Rail Development Commission this week awarded a $10,240 grant to be used to rehabilitate a connecting track between the Indiana & Ohio Railway and Hocking Valley Scenic Railway.
The track is currently out of service and once reopened will be used to receive new or rebuilt passenger cars.
I&O workers will repair the track while the HVSR will supply materials.
ORDC said in a news release that the interchange track is the tourist railroad’s only connection to the country’s rail network.
Ohio Power Company 0-6-0 No. 3 will pull four excursions on the the Hocking Valley Scenic Railway in October.
The trips will run on Oct. 3, 4, 17 and 18, leaving at noon and 2:30 p.m. each day.
They will be the first steam trips to depart Nelsonville in nearly 20 years.
No. 3 was built by Baldwin in 1920 for Beech Bottom Power Company in Power, West Virginia, to haul coal from mines to a power plant in northwestern West Virginia.
It was later sold to Ohio Power Company. Moved to Nelsonville in 1982, restoration work began about 2001 with volunteers from Ohio, West Virginia and elsewhere gathering on the first Saturday of each month for workdays.
The locomotive was steamed up this past June.
The Hocking Valley Scenic Railway in southern Ohio is working to have an 0-6-0 steam locomotive in operation by the end of summer.
The 12-year-restoration effort of former Ohio Power Company No. 3 reached a milestone on May 9 when the locomotive was steamed up and tested.
Last Saturday visitors to the railroad located near Nelsonville saw No. 3 moving around the yard under steam.
No. 3 was built by Baldwin in 1920 for Beech Bottom Power Company as No. 13. It was used in Power, West Virginia, to transfer coal from mines to a power plant in northwestern West Virginia.
No. 3 was sold to Ohio Power Company and had been dormant for several decades before arriving on the Hocking Valley in 1982.
Restoration work began about 2001 with volunteers from Ohio, West Virginia and elsewhere coming together the first Saturday of each month to work on the engine.
Once the No. 3 enter service, it will become the only regularly operating standard gauge steam locomotive in Ohio.
For more information on the project, visit the Hocking Valley Scenic Railway Steam Locomotive No. 3 Restoration Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/hvsr3 or go to http://www.hvsry.org.
Four Ohio groups are among the 13 that received Railroad Heritage Grants recently from the Tom E. Dailey Foundation.
The grants totaled $53,300, which bring to $140,205 the amount of grant money that the Chicago-based Dailey Foundation has awarded
The Hocking Valley Scenic Railway received $12,500 to assist in restoration of Baldwin 0-6-0 No. 3 to operating condition. In addition to a direct grant of $10,000, the Foundation’s board approved a challenge Grant of up to $2,500, to match donations from other contributors to this project on a dollar-for-dollar basis through Dec. 31, 2013.
The Fostoria Rail Preservation Society received $2,000 to restore a Lake Erie & Western/Nickel Plate Road caboose.
The caboose, which was acquired in 2011, was built in 1914 and retired in 1959. It is one of only three of its kind in existence and likely traveled through Fostoria.
It had been on static display outdoors for 50 years with little upkeep. When restored, the caboose will accurately depict the living quarters of train crews in the caboose era.
The Neighborhood Design Center of Columbus received $3,000 to provide a streetcar statue. The organization has been working with the Streetcar District neighborhood to create a vision for Livingston Avenue through a Safer Neighborhoods UWCO Grant.
This grant will partially fund the cost of a second Streetcar District sculpture planned for summer 2014 installation.
The Bradford Railroad Museum received $1,000 to assist in the ongoing development of the museum, which was founded in 2002 to preserve the railroad history of Bradford.
The museum acquired a former bank building in 2006 and completed interior and exterior restoration in 2010.
Also receiving grants were the Keokuk (Iowa) Union Depot Foundation, Iowa ($1,500), the Virginia Museum of Transportation ($15,000), Friends of the (Connecticut) Valley Railroad, Connecticut ($1,800), the Southern Forest Heritage Museum in Louisiana ($2,500), the Medina Railroad Museum of New York ($2,000), the Alexander (North Carolina) Chapter of the National Railway Historical Society ($3,500), the New Maine-based England Electric Railway Historical Society ($2,500), the Empire State Railway Museum ($4,000), and the Abilene & Smoky Valley Railroad Association of Kansas ($2,000).
akronrrclub.wordpress.com 