By Doug Hallett
dhallett@guelphtribune.ca

Efforts to restore Guelph’s historic steam locomotive are in jeopardy unless restoration workers are allowed onto CN’s railway property near the downtown train station, says a member of the restoration committee set up by city council in 2002.

“We’re dead on the tracks right now. We can’t get to the north side to restore it,” says Bruce Lowe.

That’s because Canadian National steam locomotive 6167, which was moved across the tracks in the summer of 2010 to get it out of the way of a new transportation centre being built on Carden Street, now is only seven inches away from a railway fence that was built since then to stop people from crossing the tracks.

City officials have been told no one will be allowed onto the rail lands to work on that side of the locomotive, which CN donated to Guelph in 1967. This means full restoration may not be possible until 2015, when GO Transit is expected to build a new platform at the train station and the fence is removed in that area, says Bill Klein, the city’s supervisor of corporate building maintenance.

The rail lands are owned by CN and leased by other railway companies.

“We were threatened with a charge of trespassing if we take the fence down, move it or stand on their property,” Lowe said in an interview late last week.

A city staff report that went to council in late November says that “despite numerous attempts,” the city’s engineering department has been “unable to secure permission of the rail operator to allow the committee access to the rail lands to finish the restoration.”

Klein said he doesn’t know who actually refused the permission. That’s because the city’s request for access went through a contracting company that has been rebuilding the railway bridge over Wyndham Street and moving some tracks for the recent arrival of GO trains, as well as building the new transportation centre on Carden.

Waiting until 2015 to finish the restoration isn’t a realistic option, said Lowe, who is one of four members of the Locomotive 6167 Restoration Committee and also a member of the Guelph Historical Railway Association. “Our volunteers will be gone, our committee will be disbanded” by then, he warned, noting the advanced age of some of the steam railway buffs involved in the restoration effort.

Work must resume as soon as possible, “while we have the help and while we have the knowledge,” Lowe said. The expertise his committee currently has includes a couple of non-Guelphites who have previous experience with a historic locomotive in Toronto. They are both “totally turned off” by the situation, he said.

Access to the rail lands needs to be granted quickly, so train parts currently lying on the ground next to the locomotive and behind a fence can be reinstalled as soon as possible, Lowe said. These parts include compressor tanks, piping and steam domes that were taken off the locomotive so that asbestos located under the boiler jackets of the engine could be removed.

Lowe was also critical of city officials for moving the locomotive in June 2010 to a spot that he says is too close to the train station and the railway tracks. It’s potentially a major tourist attraction for Guelph, and where it is now “is not good for viewing and photography,” he said. “It should have been much closer to Allan’s Bridge,” where there’s a better viewing area and more parking.

“I lay the blame for this mess squarely on the city engineering department,” Lowe said.

Klein, one of three city officials who have been working with the Locomotive 6167 Restoration Committee, said he doesn’t think the restoration effort will fall apart because of the anticipated long delay in finishing it.

“I don’t get that feeling,” he said in an interview Friday. “I don’t think the committee members will bail on it.”

“We might take a bit of a hit on the completion date, but it’s still going to happen,” he said.

Klein said he isn’t concerned about the locomotive deteriorating if completion of the restoration is delayed to 2015. Special paint has stabilized the condition of the locomotive, and two-part epoxy paint already applied to the train’s underside means “there is no way that thing is going to rust for a while,” he said.

A final coat of special paint will be applied in the spring to the rest of the locomotive, including the north side of it near the fence, Klein said. The contractor that’s been hired to do restoration work “will use ropes and slings over the top from the south side” of the locomotive to paint the north side, he said.

As for the spot where the locomotive sits after 43 years spent near the now-demolished Greyhound station, Klein said it can be moved again if that’s what the community wants.

Whether it stays where it is or is moved again, he said, “it is an important piece of heritage and we are going to maintain it.”

The locomotive is being treated as a historical “artifact” that just happens not to reside in a museum, and the city has been tapping the curatorial expertise of Guelph Museums staff for the project, Klein said.

It cost the city $275,000 to have the 682,950-pound train moved to the south side of the tracks by crane and flatbed trailer in 2010.

CN steam locomotive 6167 was built in Montreal in 1940 and was less than 20 years old when the conversion of CN’s fleet to diesel engines was completed in 1959. It spent most of its active life hauling freight and passenger trains in the area of Moncton, N.B., for a total of about 1,250,000 miles of regular service. It also transported many soldiers from as far west as Winnipeg to Halifax to be shipped overseas during World War Two, Lowe said, noting that this makes the locomotive special to him. In recognition of this part of its history, the locomotive now points east towards Halifax, he noted.

A July 1960 tourist trip to Niagara Falls was the start of its life as a tourist icon before it was donated to the City of Guelph during Canada’s centennial year.