Urbita Lake Railway

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Urbita Lake Railway
Urbita Springs, San Bernardino, California
Urbita Springs, San Bernardino, California
Route length: 0.8 km
Gauge : 457 mm

The Urbita Lake Railway was a 1/2 mile (0.8 km) long park railway on a scale of 1: 3 with a gauge of 18 inches (457 mm) that operated from about 1910 to at least August 1915 in Urbita Springs Park on the premises on which the Inland Center shopping mall in San Bernardino , California has been in operation since 1966 .

history

In 1910, the Pacific Electric Railway took over the San Bernardino Valley Traction Company and thereby also became the owner of Urbita Hot Springs. At the time, Urbita Hot Springs was a profitable business, originally developed by R. Paragette in 1901.

'Buddy' Courcy (right), the youngest railroad president, and his train (1915)

According to a newspaper report, the railroad was unique because it had the youngest president in the two-year-old buster 'Buddy' Courcy and the oldest train driver in the world in the retired railroad worker Bill Simpson.

locomotive

The locomotive, built by John J. Coit as No. 1903, had previously been operated on the Long Beach and Asbury Park Railway , the Venice Miniature Railway and the Eastlake Park Scenic Railway . The oil-fired steam locomotive was 19 feet (5.80 m) in length over the coupling and 1295 mm (51 in) from the top of the chimney and had a 2-6-0 wheel arrangement . This locomotive had some technical innovations, such as valve adjustment without an eccentric, which made the adjustment and maintenance of the valves much easier. The locomotive had automatic couplings and an oil burner for which John Coit had a patent.

The locomotive weighed 3,628 kg (8000  lb ) with the tender and 2,328 kg (5,134 lb) without the tender. The tender could hold 780 liters (206 gallons ) of water and 322 liters (85 gallons) of heating oil. The weight of the locomotive was transferred to the rails on three coupled drive axles with a diameter of 463 mm (18¼ inches) and a leading axle, the wheels of which had a diameter of 254 mm (10 inches). The Vanderbilt boiler had an output of 25 horsepower at a maximum pressure of 10 bar (150 psi)  . The cylinders measured 5 "by 7" with a 1 "stroke. This gave the locomotive a pulling force of 4.8 kN (1076 pounds ).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Rich McInnis: Urbita Hot Springs.
  2. ^ 'Buddy' Courcy was 'president' of miniature Urbita Lake railway in 1915.
  3. ^ Eastlake Park Scenic Railway (Lincoln Park), Los Angeles, California, 1904. ( Memento of the original from January 17, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.lincolnheightsla.com
  4. ↑ Peter Panacy: Venice Miniature Railway. A Brief History and Its Influence on the Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad.
  5. ^ Arthur W. Line: Model Railways - XIX. - Eastlake Park Scenic Railway, Los Angeles, California. The Model Engineer and Electrician, April 23, 1908. pp. 395 , 396 , 397 , 398 and 399.

Coordinates: 34 ° 5 ′ 5.7 ″  N , 117 ° 17 ′ 50.2 ″  W.