Port Jervis Transportation History Center Chugs Ahead
Twenty assorted train cars will soon roll into Port Jervis to entertain and educate as part of the Port Jervis Transportation History Center. The long envisioned venue at the historic Erie turntable near Pike Plaza will open in November, according to Carolyn Hoffman, Operation Toy Train (OTT) co-founder, and Michael Ward. Outdoor Club of Port Jervis (OCPJ) president. Their nonprofit groups are collaborating to create and maintain the new attraction, along with two other nonprofits, Friends of Port Jervis Art & History (FOPJAH), and Tri-States Railway Preservation Society. The four groups signed a contract for the project with the city on July 26, Hoffman said.
Exhibits, theatrical productions, dining car dinners and films projected on train car walls bigger than the screens at Bethel Woods will be among the happenings there, Ward said.
“We avoided the term ‘museum’ because the state is picky about how the term is used,” said Hoffman.
Exhibits will range from railway memorabilia from the Tri-States Railway Preservation Society, now housed in the Port Jervis Recreation Department building, to a variety of train cars. OTT will provide three Erie Railroad cabooses that ran through Port Jervis from the 1940s through the 1970s and several boxcars decorated for collection of toy donations during the holiday season, OTT’s original mission, which continues.
“Other kinds of cars are in negotiation,” Hoffman said.
“One box car has a movie theater in it, and we can put an LED movie screen on the outside of the car. It’s 80 feet long,” said Ward, who is a theater electrician for Broadway shows.
“We can use the cars for dinners, fundraisers and restaurant tastings. We have an open plate for events,” Hoffman said.
Hoffman and her train historian husband, Rudy Garbely, submitted their proposal for a transportation history museum to Port Jervis city officials thirteen months ago, but the train cars that had been abandoned on the track by the turntable for 12 years impeded progress. On April 29, their owner, Jim Wilson, removed most of the cars, threatened with losing them to the city through a lawsuit.
One engine remains, Hoffman said, and its future is uncertain.What is certain is the coming of an 18-ton, 19 feet long army locomotive, built in 1941, that can move cars through the train yard as needed, she said.
OTT cars will occupy the track vacated by Wilson’s cars. Meanwhile, a quarter of the roundhouse will be restored by Outdoor Club volunteers, and the club’s train car acquisitions will then be stored there, Ward said. He noted that, should OTT choose to take their equipment elsewhere, the center would continue to have train equipment owned by the city for exhibits. The old turntable will be used to move railroad equipment from one track to another.
“The turntable is the largest of its kind surviving east of the Mississippi River and fully operational ,” said Hoffman.
The city contracted with OCPJ and FOPJAH to manage the Transportation Center property and also the D&H Canal because, as nonprofits, they can apply for grants not available to the city. FOPJAH can apply for restoration project grants, OCPJ for event and infrastructure funding, Ward said.
“The Outdoor Club will build ADA approved ramps, platforms and staging and give it to the city,” said Ward. FOPJAH can obtain and restore historical sites, like the roundhouse.
He has been working with BOCES students on the D&H Canal, clearing trees and bushes, aiming to connect it with regional trails, like the O&W in Sullivan County, the Heritage Trail elsewhere in Orange County and the Empire Trail that meanders from Manhattan to Albany and Buffalo.
For information or to volunteer with the Port Jervis Transportation History Center, visit www.pjthc.org. For information on Operation Toy Train’s Toys for Tots collection operations, visit www.operationtoytrain.org.