(The following story by Fred Leeson was published on the Portland Oregonian’s website on January 23.)
PORTLAND, Ore. — Give $20,000 to most young men interested in vintage muscle cars and their thoughts will turn to vehicles like a Corvette, a Porsche or a Z.
Not Chris Fussell.
The Parkrose High School graduate dreamed of something a little heavier, at 129 tons; a little more powerful, at 3,000 horses; and a little longer, say 56 feet. And still capable of 100 miles per hour.
An Amtrak diesel locomotive, to be specific.
Today Fussell, 20, is the only person in Portland, and perhaps on the planet, to own his own F40 locomotive.
From 1976 until late 2001, Amtrak operated as many as 216 of the F40s, making it the undisputed workhorse of the national passenger rail system. Fussell’s locomotive, No. 231, pulled trains on Amtrak’s West Coast run between Seattle and San Diego.
But after the model was replaced with a newer version, Amtrak started selling off its old equipment quickly — mostly for scrap metal.
“Since July, more than 70 have been scrapped,” Fussell said. “I wanted to save one. I saved it by five days from being scrapped.”
Despite his tender age, Fussell knows enough rail history to know that even rail buffs don’t catch on to the historical significance of locomotives until they almost disappear or fall into serious disrepair. Fussell didn’t want that to happen to the F40.
“Lesson learned: Now is the time to save it,” he said. “It’s my favorite locomotive. To get it while it is still in running condition and to get it the way it was retired is unique.”
Museum-bound someday Proud as he is of his acquisition, Fussell doesn’t expect to be tooling around the tracks of Portland with it by himself. He plans to donate it to a rail museum that will preserve it, show it to the public and maintain it in operating condition.
There are a couple glitches, however.
First is that Fussell’s locomotive is sitting in Indianapolis. He had hoped that Amtrak would pull it to Portland for him. “But now that they don’t own it, they won’t touch it,” he said.
He hopes to find a freight train that will bring it to Portland in the spring.
Second is finding a permanent home. A potential recipient of the locomotive, the Oregon Rail Heritage Foundation, is struggling to find a location where it could move a World War II-era roundhouse that sits in the Brooklyn neighborhood.
“We want to save the building, but we’re pretty sure it won’t be here,” said Dave E. Brown, treasurer and founding member of the rail foundation.
Brown said the land is more valuable to its owner, Union Pacific, for nonrailroad uses. He also said TriMet, which houses its operations headquarters nearby, has expressed interest in expanding into the old rail and roundhouse site.
Saving the old roundhouse would not be difficult, Brown said. Its bolted timber frame and corrugated aluminum siding easily could be dismantled and reassembled at another site.
“This is the Simon Benson House of the railroad world,” he said, comparing the roundhouse to a historic Portland residence that was moved in 2000 to the Portland State University campus.
But finding a site for the roundhouse isn’t simple. Brown said it needs to be within Portland to accommodate the city-owned steam locomotives. It also needs accessible rail lines.
The roundhouse is home to three vintage steam locomotives owned by the city, including the monstrous Southern Pacific 4449 that pulled the Freedom Train as part of the nation’s 1976 Bicentennial.
Rail buffs dream of an easily accessible public museum where visitors could see and hear vintage equipment in operating condition. The proposed museum also would offer excursions.
“Static displays are like a car without an engine,” said Fussell. “Would you rather look at a beautiful 1940s car or would you like to be able to hear its engine as if it were driving down the road?”
Brown said the heritage foundation is “making the rounds” with city agencies and has hired a consultant to help. But there is no firm timeline for moving the roundhouse or opening the museum.
Rail bug since 1998 Fussell’s fascination with trains started in 1998, when a friend invited him to “chase a train.” That meant driving down the Columbia River Gorge keeping pace with an excursion by the old SP 4449.
The bug hit him hard enough that even before graduation from high school he moved to an apartment near Union Station so he could hear and see trains pass through. He also installed an Web camera aimed at the tracks so others can see them, too.
Fussell traveled to Indianapolis last summer to propose purchasing No. 231 from Amtrak. “I don’t think they took me very seriously at first,” he said. But Amtrak representatives warmed to the idea of the locomotive going to a museum.
Then Fussell, who works for TriMet, had to find the money. Working the Internet, he found an East Coast rail fan who offered a $20,000 loan at no interest. Fussell hopes to repay the loan from contributions.
“Chris is just crazy enough that nobody told him he couldn’t do it,” Brown said of the Amtrak deal. “He just said, ‘I’m going to do it.’ For a person of any age it would be a tremendous undertaking.”
Brown said he is pleased to see younger people such as Fussell step up for the next adventures in rail historic preservation. “It doesn’t end with us,” he said. “We’re just a chapter in a book.”