$16 Per Minute
Getting this shot cost $50 for a three minute ride....and it was totally worth it!
In 2014 the North Carolina Transportation Museum held their biggest party ever and in my humble opinion the single greatest railfan event I've ever attended before or since. Following up on their wildly successful heritage unit family portrait event for Norfolk Southern's 30th anniversary they planned something even bigger.
Gathering 26 surviving freight and passenger diesels from the classic first generation era, they all came together for three days of festivities centered around the old Southern Railway 37-stall roundhouse that was constructed in 1924 with a 100 ft turntable.
The structure replaced a smaller 15-stall roundhouse that had been built in 1896. The new building was more than twice the size of the old and remarkably, the former structures were demolished and the new ones erected within a span of only 10 months. The new 120,000 square-foot roundhouse and turntable cost approximately $500,000. Railroad officials named the new facility for roundhouse supervisor, Bob Julian.
Everything seen here was once the principle steam shops of the Southern Railway having been opened in 1896. Original buildings included a machine shop, storehouse building, office building, wood working shop, boiler shop, a power plant, and the roundhouse (purportedly the largest surving in the US). Although Spencer Shops survived into the diesel era, the facility was outdated by the early 1970s and shuttered before being donated to the state of North Carolina in 1977. Gradually restored over the past 45 years it is now nome to the fabulous North Carolina Transportation Museum.
The large building partially visible on the left of the frame is back shop erected in 1905. At 150' wide by 600' long it is the largest building on the site and once the largest industrial structure in the state. But with the Southern being one of the first major Class 1s to fully dieselize this building was completely shuttered by 1960.
This view was not taken from a drone but actually from a helicopter. For $50 you could take an approximately three minute ride looping up over and around the complex and shoot as much as you could out the open sides. This was I think only the third time in my life I'd ever been up in a chopper and while the price was steep it was just too cool to pass up!
I won't single out the specific visiting and resident equipment you can see in this photo, but if you want to learn more about this railfan event of the century in case you weren't there this gentleman has a fabulous overview on his site: www.wvncrails.org/streamliners-at-spencer.html
Spencer, North Carolina
Saturday May 31, 2014
$16 Per Minute
Getting this shot cost $50 for a three minute ride....and it was totally worth it!
In 2014 the North Carolina Transportation Museum held their biggest party ever and in my humble opinion the single greatest railfan event I've ever attended before or since. Following up on their wildly successful heritage unit family portrait event for Norfolk Southern's 30th anniversary they planned something even bigger.
Gathering 26 surviving freight and passenger diesels from the classic first generation era, they all came together for three days of festivities centered around the old Southern Railway 37-stall roundhouse that was constructed in 1924 with a 100 ft turntable.
The structure replaced a smaller 15-stall roundhouse that had been built in 1896. The new building was more than twice the size of the old and remarkably, the former structures were demolished and the new ones erected within a span of only 10 months. The new 120,000 square-foot roundhouse and turntable cost approximately $500,000. Railroad officials named the new facility for roundhouse supervisor, Bob Julian.
Everything seen here was once the principle steam shops of the Southern Railway having been opened in 1896. Original buildings included a machine shop, storehouse building, office building, wood working shop, boiler shop, a power plant, and the roundhouse (purportedly the largest surving in the US). Although Spencer Shops survived into the diesel era, the facility was outdated by the early 1970s and shuttered before being donated to the state of North Carolina in 1977. Gradually restored over the past 45 years it is now nome to the fabulous North Carolina Transportation Museum.
The large building partially visible on the left of the frame is back shop erected in 1905. At 150' wide by 600' long it is the largest building on the site and once the largest industrial structure in the state. But with the Southern being one of the first major Class 1s to fully dieselize this building was completely shuttered by 1960.
This view was not taken from a drone but actually from a helicopter. For $50 you could take an approximately three minute ride looping up over and around the complex and shoot as much as you could out the open sides. This was I think only the third time in my life I'd ever been up in a chopper and while the price was steep it was just too cool to pass up!
I won't single out the specific visiting and resident equipment you can see in this photo, but if you want to learn more about this railfan event of the century in case you weren't there this gentleman has a fabulous overview on his site: www.wvncrails.org/streamliners-at-spencer.html
Spencer, North Carolina
Saturday May 31, 2014