Strasburg Rail Road

Little can compare with the sights and sound of steam. This little clip, shot in the parking lot of the Red Caboose Motel, is a good example. The Strasburg Rail Road does as good a job of any tourist road in the country and better than most. Their standards of rolling stock condition are unequaled in my opinion. It requires a ton of dollars to keep an operation like this healthy. One of the biggest revenue sources, to the dismay of some railfans, is the Thomas steam engine built in the Strasburg's shops and sent around the country all year long. The shops themselves are another source of revenue as they do a lot of work for other tourist railroads.

Railroad Turntable Demonstration

Demonstrated on 6/30/2011 by visitor service guides Traci & Kaitlyn.

The table, which 40 years later would be moved to the Museum site at Strasburg, materialized from the Reading Company's realization that it needed a modern turntable to accommodate its huge 2-8-8-2 Mallet locomotives at the Mine Hill & Schuylkill Haven roundhouse at West Cressona, PA. The American Bridge Co, of Ambridge, PA, a major builder of turntables, was engaged in 1927 to meet the need, and it installed its Standard Continuous Deck Turntable with Type ED27 center pivot. By June 1928, it was in operation.

It was made operational in Strasburg in 1970