I had no idea that such clubs even existed or that railroads would let these groups of motorcars use their tracks for organized events.
Does anyone here participate in the motorcar hobby? I imagine it must be quite an expensive hobby as it can’t be cheap to rent the railroad tracks. Does anyone know what it costs? It seems like it would be a fun hobby for railfans.
It’s a potentially deadly hobby. More often than not, the railroad is unaware that somebody is doing this on their tracks, the owners of the speeders rarely ask for permission. This issue has been discussed on other threads.
Yes I met a fellow at Saginaw TX that owns a hi railer & is going on a hi rail trip in BC shortly. He also showed me pix of a hi rail trip the group took thru the Copper Canyon [:p]
Sorry CSSHEGEWISCH more offten the railroad DOES know that they are there because most of the owners are on sponsored outtings. The 2 clubs I have belonged to are MCCA (Motor Car Collectors of America) and NARCOA (North American Rail Car Owners Assocation). both have good safety records.
Sorry I have to disagree with you since the fellow I met said they receive permission from the RR prior to the outing. He further said that he would NEVER enter onto RR tracks without the permission of the owner of the tracks. [:)]
Paul, the link I provided in the original post takes you to official event. Some of the pictures even show the Canadian Pacific Railway hi-rail vehicle that led the trip.
I followed some of the links provided on the website and the clubs were very clear to highlight that all of their trips occurr only with the permission of the railroad. Many of the trips take place on shortlines on Saturdays and Sundays when the railroads aren’t operating trains. The few that do take place on lines when train operations occur concurrently, typically have a hi-rail vehicle from the railroad company leading the motorcars and a hi-rail vehichle following the motorcars. This is one reason I figured it must be an expensive hobby because the members will have to pay for all of the support and liability from the railroad associated with the event.
The events I was referring to are officially sanctioned events. Clearly to use any active railroad without the appropriate clearances would be very fool hardy.
On a somewhat similar note, back in the early 60’s Field and Stream magazine published an article about a couple of hunters that converted an old Plymouth automobile to run on rails. They used it to get to an area that was very remote and just happened to have abandoned rails running through it.
The MR Dream-Plan-Built DVD series had a segment on this aspect of the hobby. They said they always get permission and that they prefer smaller and less used branch lines as they tend to be more scenic and rural, hence more enjoyable to ride thru.