The Old Colony & Newport Railway work train approaches four 'P70' passenger cars that have been left on the Newport Secondary line for years.

8/22/2007 - From the Newport Daily News - "Donald G. Elbert, executive director of the Old Colony & Newport Railway, said the cars began service in Pennsylvania in 1927. The Rhode Island Department of Transportation bought them about 50 years later and used them to provide commuter service from Westerly to Providence, and Providence to Boston, for about two years. When the federal funding for that project ran out in 1978, the cars were stored at Quonset Point, Elbert said.

The Old Colony & Newport Railway formed in 1979 and, shortly thereafter, sought to lease the railway cars from DOT to provide commuter service between Newport and Fall River, Mass., he said. The nonprofit railway used some of the cars until 1985, when it replaced the heavy-weight steel coaches with the lighter, wooden cars it currently operates, Elbert said.

Area rail service was confined to Aquidneck Island after a barge hit and severely damaged the Sakonnet River Railroad Bridge in 1987, he said. 'At that time the cars were marooned on the island," Elbert said. "There's no way to get the them off'."

- M. Catherine Callahan
Newport Daily News

Photographed by Peter Martin, December 10, 2006.
Added to the photo archive by Peter Martin, December 17, 2006.
Railroad: Old Colony & Newport Railway.

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