PORTLAND PARKS & RECREATION'S HISTORIC LOCOMOTIVES TO GET NEW HOME: CITY COUNCIL VOTES UNANIMOUSLY TO CREATE ENGINEHOUSE & RAIL HERITAGE CENTER
Posted: July 28th, 2011 2:32 PM
July 28th, 2011
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Mark Ross, Public Information Officer
503.823.5300; cell 503.823.6634
Portland Parks & Recreation's Historic Locomotives to Get New Home
City Council Votes Unanimously to Create Enginehouse & Rail Heritage Center
(Portland, OR) -
The Portland City Council voted unanimously yesterday afternoon to approve a new, permanent home for Portland's heritage steam engines. The first phase of Portland's new Enginehouse & Rail Heritage Center could be completed within a year.
The Rose City is unique as America's only city that owns two operating steam locomotives - the Southern Pacific 4449 and the Spokane Portland Seattle 700; along with a third - Oregon Railway & Navigation 197 - currently under restoration.
Portland Parks & Recreation owns the 3 steam engines, secured by donation in 1958. Beginning in 1980, each moved for restoration to the Brooklyn Roundhouse in southeast Portland. It took three decades and thousands of volunteer hours to restore two of them into operating condition. The Oregon Rail Heritage Foundation has been instrumental in working on the steam engines.
Thanks to the city council vote, in less than a year the historic trains will move out of the Brooklyn Roundhouse into a new home near OMSI. The soon-to-be-built permanent maintenance and display facility will be just east of the Oregon Museum of Science & Industry. The Enginehouse & Rail Heritage Center will provide space for locomotive maintenance and restoration, as well as direct public access.
The new Willamette Bridge will deliver streetcars, light rail, cyclists and pedestrians right to the Center's front door.
The city is not required to invest much money in the operation. The City council has agreed to extend the terms of an existing $978,598 loan to the Oregon Rail Heritage Foundation (OHRF), a nonprofit organization that raises funds to help maintain the locomotives.
This loan allows the foundation to buy the site adjacent to OMSI for the new facilities between Southwest Water Avenue and the newly rebuilt Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard Viaduct.
"The Parks Bureau can not be successful without strong community partners," says Parks Commissioner Nick Fish. "I am grateful that OHRF stepped up to save the trains and build them a permanent home in the OMSI district."
To learn more about the Oregon Rail Heritage Foundation and the project, visit http://orhf.org
For more information, call 503.823.5300 or visit portlandparks.org.
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Mark Ross Public Information Officer
Portland Parks & Recreation
503.823.5300 (office); 503.823.6634 (cell)
Mark.ross@portlandoregon.gov
Healthy Parks, Healthy Portland
portlandparks.org
Nick Fish, Commissioner | Sue Keil, Interim Director
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