ScaleTrains.com, Inc., announced at the Virtual Railroad Hobby Show on Sunday that it acquired M.T.H. Electric Trains’ HO-scale and S-gauge tooling assets at the end of last year.

The acquisition includes steam and diesel locomotives, freight cars and track in both scales. HO tooling includes turbine and electric locomotives, subway sets, passenger cars and other models. Engineering schematics for several all-new steam-era HO projects also were received as part of the agreement.

“M.T.H. is recognized as a leading manufacturer of HO-scale steam locomotives,” ScaleTrains.com President Shane Wilson said in a statement. “M.T.H.’s HO products also allow us to broaden our product line into passenger cars, track and more. We believe there is an opportunity to grow the S market as well.”

Both scales are being melded into ScaleTrains.com’s umbrella of brands, including Rivet Counter. Several molds have been transferred to the ScaleTrains.com factory, and testing is underway.

Two regional U.S. train shows in January are on schedule, although they’re taking different paths to reach rail enthusiasts.

The 36th annual Dallas Area Train Show is going on as planned Jan. 16-17, raising the curtain at the Plano Event Center. Nearly two thousand miles away in Palmer, MA, the Amherst Railway Society Railroad Hobby Show, one of the country’s largest, will host a virtual show a couple of weekends later after shelving its annual in-person event.  

In Plano, amid strict covid-19 protocols, vendors will be selling and clubs will be running trains. The show, sponsored by the North Texas Council of Railroad Clubs, has scaled down to accommodate the safety of guests, vendors and others.

Officials have worked closely with the event center to establish social distancing, masking, temperature screening and restricted entrances and exits, as well as contactless payment. Occupancy, monitored by an app, will be limited to 2,000 people at a time.

By TIM BLACKWELL/Cowcatcher Magazine

Christmas came early for the Red River Railroad Museum in Denison, TX.

Located in an office in the former Katy Depot downtown, it is a treasure trove of history, including accounts of how the railroad made its way through Indian Territory from Kansas to the bawdy little town of Red River City. Outside reside fairly well preserved relics of the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad – an F unit and a couple of cabooses.

The Katy’s arrival in 1872 put Denison on the map. The railroad’s car shops, headquarters, hospital and Ray Yard sprawled across the town, providing a vital connection from the Midwest to the Gulf of Mexico.

Additional infrastructure investments identified

While making its annual pitch for federal funding, Amtrak formalized a request this fall for up to $4.857 billion this fiscal year to bolster the national passenger railroad network, which has been hit hard by the pandemic. Another $5 billion is needed to build necessary infrastructure and help stimulate an economic rebound.

In a letter to Congress, Amtrak President and CEO Bill Flynn justified updating the railroad’s forecast for FY 2020 because of a slow return of riders after a huge drop at the start of covid-19. At the beginning, Amtrak shut down routes as ridership plummeted because of lockdowns. Revenues dropped 83 percent from March to July compared to 2019.

To offset, Amtrak cut expenses, including reducing the size of consists on long-distance trains. Now ridership has slowly returned and some routes have reopened, but Amtrak still anticipates FY 2021 ridership and revenue improving to only 40 percent of levels before the pandemic. More cuts are planned.

The Missouri Pacific Historical Society pays tribute to a unique short line with the September release of Missouri-Illinois Railroad: Missouri Pacific’s Route through the Lead Belt and Little Egypt, a 376-page hardback that traces the railroad’s colorful past.

The Missouri-Illinois operated 146 miles of track, connected by the Mississippi River, in Missouri and Illinois. It ran through the “Lead Belt” in Southeast Missouri, which contained the largest concentration of lead deposits in the world. The land between the Mississippi and Ohio rivers in Illinois was thought to resemble Egypt’s Nile Delta and became known as Little Egypt in the early 1800s. A city in the region was named Cairo.

The M-I was unique because one of its predecessor roads was built as a three-foot narrow-gauge line, which was unusual in the Midwest. Also, the M-I operated a car ferry across the Missouri River for five decades, and it had the only switchback between the Allegheny and Rocky mountains.
Like many short lines, the M-I depended on second-hand locomotives and rolling stock.

The railroad’s roots trace to the narrow-gauge St. Joseph and Deslodge Railway, which operated on 13 miles of main line from Bonne Terre to Summit, MO. Over the years, several other railroads, including the Mississippi River & Bonne Terre Railway, would lay tracks that eventually became part of the M-I network.

Funds will be used to convert portion of line to welded rail

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Amtrak announced it will receive a $5.6 million Federal Railroad Administration Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and Safety Improvements (CRISI) grant to stabilize and rehabilitate the Southwest Chief route in Colorado and New Mexico.

Combined with $4.9 million in Amtrak federal funds set aside for this service and $1 million from the New Mexico Department of Transportation (NMDOT), a total of $11.5 million will be invested from Trinidad, CO, south of Lamy, NM.

This federal grant is the fifth for the route segment in Colorado, New Mexico and Kansas. The grant addresses only a portion of the line that Amtrak is planning to restore.

Between 2016 and 2020, Amtrak has committed $15.8 million in direct funding for the Southwest Chief route, and an additional $12.8 million in matching funds to previously awarded federal grants. Amtrak has also invested between $4-$8 million annually in this segment, outside of any grant programs, including selective installation of ties, replacing bolted rail in curves, and bridge or culvert repair.