DECEMBER 2012
VOLUME 10, ISSUE 2
THE GOOD NEWS JUST KEEPS ON COMING by Morris Gould, Executive Director funds needed to acquire the FEMA funds.
THE ONGOING STRUGGLE TO BRING RAIL PASSENGER SERVICE BACK TO GALVESTON By Dr. John Bertini, Board Member, and Member, Rail Passenger Committee
Friends, members and long time followers of what is happening at the Museum will be happy to learn that BNSF is considering donating a switch engine to the Museum. This new engine will replace SP 1303, the workhorse of the Museum until she was flooded by Hurricane Ike and rendered inoperable. She was sold and her parts were salvaged. We were all sad to see 1303 go. She was a dependable engine for switching cars and for hauling the MP caboose on for the Saturday train rides. An additional plus to this donation is that the Federal Emergency Management Association allows funds allocated for one project to be moved to another project if a donation is made. So, the funding that would have been spent on a new switch engine can instead be used to build a new maintenance building. This building will replace the ramshackle old shop across 28th Street from the Museum’s gates. Once that old structure is gone, the City of Galveston will rejoice. But, besides the new switch engine, there is plenty of other good news emanating from the Museum. Repairs and restorations of the rail cars and buildings are mostly complete. A new O-scale model railroad display has come on line. Two new F-units, painted in Santa Fe colors, arrived at the Museum in November (see article on the Funits below). All in all it is a great time to be associated with the Museum. Visitor attendance is back to pre-Ike levels. The Museum is indebted to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and to the foundations and individuals who collectively provided the 10% matching
Forecasts for the Houston-Galveston region indicate that rapid multi-county population and employment growth, and the associated rapid suburban expansion and increasing freeway congestion. There is also limited transportation and infrastructure funding to meet these growing needs. Freeway expansion projects along US 59, IH 10, and US 290 are an attempt to accommodate this growth. Often, this is controversial due to right of way acquisitions and multi-year, construction-related impacts on the traveling public. The IH 45 Gulf Freeway, as the oldest freeway in the region, also has been continuously in one state of reconstruction or another over the last 50 years. The Metropolitan Transit Authority of Harris County’s (METRO) commuter bus services, which are at or near capacity along the IH 45 Gulf Freeway corridor, provide some relief from freeway congestion. More recently, the Texas Department of Transportation has indicated it will soon move into the planning stages of IH 45 Gulf Freeway improvements inside Beltway 8. The gridlock associated with the Hurricane Rita evacuation in the summer of 2005 indicates surface transportation system capacity needs often exceed even the daily commuter needs. Since 2002 the board, volunteers and staff of the Museum have been part of a group of consultants, participating in a Intelligent Transportation System Federal Grant Program to study commuter rail into Galveston. The study report was prepared by The Goodman Corporation of Houston and issued in December, 2011. The research centered on the use of the Galveston, Houston and Henderson (GH&H), now Union Pacific (UP) Galveston Subdivision line which parallels State Highway 3. The GH&H is an ideal route, passing through several major population centers between Houston and Galveston. It’s current level of fright traffic could allow time segregation of freight verses passenger traffic to allow the use of the rail corridor to transport people onto and off