I sure would like to see TRAINS magazine do an article on the “locomotive graveyards” around the country.
These are the kind of photos that make me wanna cry:
Have all of the big operations of the 1980s shut down, like Pielet in Chicago and St. Louis Auto Shredder, and Naporano I&M in Newark ?
Who is tops now, Larry’s Truck and Electric ?
http://www.trainweb.org/lfnwfan/html/Larry’s.htm
Does Progress do a lot of scrapping at Waycross ?
There used to be a large operation in Mount Vernon, IL. I believe it was called Precision National. They scrapped, but they also rebuilt. You could look at their yard from the street and see which units were being dismantled.
There was also a yard on the St. Louis riverfront, where the last of the Illinois Terminal streamliners were being kept. For some reason, they weren’t cut up until the '70’s.
Finally, like Pop, I remember when steam was being scrapped. There was both hope and despair as we realized that the diesel had won out.
Pielet Bros. has closed. And I believe the site has been leveled.
The former Pielet Brothers was purchased and renamed Midwest Metallics LP in the mid 1990s. In 1998 the EPA took Pielet Brothers and other associated businesses to court to get them to clean up a site in NW Indiana that was unlicensed and was accepting illegally Auto Shredder Residue tyhat contained lead and PCBs. It was then listed as a “Supersite”.
The United States subsequently filed a motion for summary judgment seeking recovery of $2,959,006.34 in unrecovered response costs from owner James Pielet. After the Court granted Pielet several extensions of his deadline to respond to the government’s motion, Pielet elected to default, resulting in an order making substantive findings that Pielet was liable to the United States for all remaining past costs at the Site.
I was a member of one of the fire departments that responded each time good old Pielet Bros. had their once-a-year, two-day fire in Summit, Illinois.
I was always suspicious of the origin (they always claimed spontaneous combustion, of course) as was anyone in a helmet and bunker gear that had to stand there and dump water on the huge pile of shredded material for over 48 hours, usually in the heat of summer. Of course, it was always the towering mountain of separated combustible materials from the salvage operations that went up – and the origin of that material was not exclusive to trains. My opinion was that it was cheaper to burn than haul away.
From a news report four years ago:
"City co
Sadly, there once were long lines of large CB&Q steamers waiting to be cut up at Northwestern Steel & Wire in Sterling, Illinois. They were turned into wire, of which a lot of nails were made.
Of course, because of this carnage I always as a steam fan thought it was justice when NWSW went bankrupt in 2001 and closed.
I believe another company is now operating at the site.
We could play “name those locomotives”?[:D] Eolafan, isn’t that Peilet Bros? It’s now a container storage yard for APL/OOCL, and probably a few others by now.
The Mt. Vernon, former PECO shops is now owned and operated by NRE, and has been assembling many GenSets, and they created the genset Prototype, UPY 2005.
St. Louis Auto Shredders, I have heard of them, but I do not know where they are, however, St. Louis does have a graveyard of its own, Metro East Industries in Alorton, IL, in the worst part of East St. Louis.
I’m not sure I knew where the Pielet Brothers junk-yard was in Summit–close to Argo (the crossing, not the plant)? The one that handled locomotives was in McCook, and yes, it is an intermodal storage facility now, and a lot of the buildings are intact.
Snag, I’m pretty sure Jim’s shot wasn’t taken at Pielet Brothers–they didn’t have that many tracks parallel to each other.
This is pic I took of the National Rail Equipment @Silvis IL facility. I wish they would let me get closer. They rebuild locos but also dismantle them for parts.
Nope, this shot (taken by Paul Duda), is of Larry’s Truck and Electric in OH. Peilet Bros. is gone now but I recall seeing rows and rows of F’s, E’s, old GP’s, switchers, etc. in there back in the late seventies and early eighties when I used to drive by EMD to see what was going on there (Peilet Bros was right next door to EMD’s LaGrange (McCook), IL plant.
Ah, Ohio. Thx Eolafan. I remeber Peilet from the late 80’ amd 90’s. alot of trade in GP30’s, 35’s, SD35’s, SW’s, even BN U30’s. It was strange years later standing on the same ground picking up cotainers where once was a line of GP’s going to meet there maker (literaly, right across the tracks.) as most of this stuff were trade-ins.
Spokyone, be very carefull at Silvis. That’s the old RI facility. They used to be rather open to visitor’s, but someone got picture’s of some badly handled drums and scrap and put them in the newspaper. They been very unfriendly since.
There used to be two locomotive and railcar scrap dealers in my neighborhood. Iron & Steel Products used to be located at about 135th and Brainard, across the CSS/CWI/NKP rights of way from Brainard Avenue. It went out of business in the early 1960’s, probably coincidentally with the end of steam. Hyman-Michaels had a facility at 136th and Avenue O, mostly for cutting up cars, but some locomotives met their end over there. This facility is still in existence. Chrome Crankshaft occupied a corner of the property in the late 1970’s-early 1980’s.
It would be neat (or sad) to follow one engine through the process of being received all the way to being scrap. That would be an article (with pictures) worth reading.
Great pic! Looks like lots of ESPEE units but a couple of centercabs!
Here is another shot of the locomotives at the Silvis Illinois Graveyard.(old Rock Island Shops)
http://www.pbase.com/trailryder/image/77389882
I too would like to see this article.
Later Bill
It would also be interesting to read the same type of article, following a locomotive through the rebuild process.
That’s even better. Take locomotive ‘X’ from active duty on RR until RR decides to retire it. From there to the scrap/rebuild place. From there to ready to rebuild chassis through the rebuild process. That would be neat!
Trains did an article on the IC/ICG Paducah rebuilds for one of their ‘Annual Motive Power Survey’ of the late 1970’s.
Have a good one.
Bill B
Gee whiz, some days I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast let alone what I read in TRAINS back over thirty years ago! A good idea worth repeating I think.