The Redwood Empire Live Steamers is a non-profit organization dedicated to preserving Sonoma Counties Railroad history thru the re-creation, in miniature, of railroad equipment and historic landmarks. Visit us and ride the trains at Youth Community in Santa Rosa, California.
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Congratulations to Tom and Steve Waterfall for there recently published article on multi-use freight cars. Read the article here.

 Update:

 

Our sod busting days are over!

As of 2:00pm on Sunday December 13, 2009, members of the Redwood Empire Live Steamers removed the last piece of sod from the lawn area of Youth Community Park. Only an unforeseen change in busses hours at the local quarry prevented us from putting in the remaining rock base. This is a major accomplishment, a real impact on the ground and a demonstration of what motivated volunteers can accomplish. We now will be focusing our efforts on building the track panels that will go in this newly cleared right of way. It will not be long before we have a point to point railroad in operation.

Work parties will meet on the first and third Sunday of each month. If the weather is good, we will meet at Youth Community Park. If the weather is bad, we will build more track at Jims. Contact Steve Waterfall at: for details.  Next work party:

 Sunday February 7th at 9:00.

It’s slow going when you are surveying in a swamp! Members of the Redwood Empire live Steamers took advantage of a break in the weather and continued to survey the main line of the youth community park railroad. We have moved out of the civilized grassy area of the park and into the rugged back country. Our survey crews battled there way past bogs, poison oak, blackberry bushes, and a reported “spider!” to complete this portion of the survey. We are lucky to be in the company of hearty brave souls such as these.

To all.

We did it.

Had a late start, but Steve and I met at Jims at 1:30 to pick up the test panels and headed to the park.

Leaving off where we finished last weekend in the eastern fenced area headed West for the turf area. After clearing the fence, we made a rough layout of the reverse curve into the trees. Things were not looking good, as we headed straight into a large tree.

Plan B. We started laying track east from the North east corner of the Turf area east back into the trees. After a couple of tries we had a good path. But it didn't connect with our westbound path. By then it was 4:30 and Steve had to go so we loaded up the test panels, and I finished up staking and painting. I just couldn't let it go, so I took some of the test panels out and started relaying the West bound trackage out of the fenced area. Making the curves fit obstacles like trees is a challenge. The two tangent ends of reverse curve track meet within 4 feet. The solution is the two curves will have to be tweeked from 75' radius to 73" radius. I think we can live with that.

So the layout is completed. Now we need to do a level survey to establish the "grades" in the trees. Next weekend I will plan on bringing a laser level and rod to run the elevations so we know were to cut and fill to make grade.

Dave