A recycled passenger car Retired passenger cars sometimes found other uses/Julian Cavalier
ALASKA RAILROAD, AUTHOR’S COLLECTION: MOOSE PASS, AK; 1949
In the first half of the twentieth century old passenger cars were sometimes reused as stationary shelters. Railroads used them to serve as crew quarters, yard offices and depots. The Alaska Rail-
O
lder passenger cars were often used by various railroads as off- track structures after they had become obsolete for rail service. Usual- ly the trucks were removed from the cars, as well as any other useful parts, after which it was placed on the ground near the tracks to resume its new role of service for the railroad. Some of these cars may also have been pur- chased for similar reuses by small, pri- vate companies or individuals for busi- ness purposes of various kinds. Generally, the railroads made good use of these cars as yard offices, track- gang shelters, station stops and stor- age sheds, etc. The interiors and exteri- ors were fitted with various items suited to the needs for which the car was to be used for. If used as a station stop, some type of trackside platform was added as well as station name signs and possibly an order board. The Moose Pass station in Alaska, owned by the Alaska Railroad, had such items and also doubled as a Railroad Express Agency, as seen in the accompanying photo, taken in 1949. The drawing shows a typical converted older pas- senger car, like the Moose Pass Station,
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road turned this old wooden coach body into a station at Moose Pass, Alaska. Note the small wood passenger platforms that ex- tend from the car platforms at each end of the car to the tracks.
with high smoke stacks and some screened windows and a trackside plat- form. Generally, these cars were often left in their original paint schemes that faded with time and weather, al- though car numbers may have been changed as a reference for the railroad. Many of these reused cars were of various lengths and types, such as older wood or steel coaches as well as com- bines and baggage cars, although coach-
es seem to be to be more widely used. Those cars reused as station stops may have had a somewhat neater appear- ance, depending on how much attention was given to it by the railroad and the general condition of the car. Kitbashing such cars in any of the various scales and making use of scrap- box parts for detailing them can be an enjoyable project, one yielding a struc- ture suitable for almost any layout.
Alaska Railroad reused passenger car station Full size for N scale: .075″=1′-0″; 1:160 Drawn by Julian Cavalier
Support blocks 59′-2″ AUGUST 2013
Grade level
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