Re: (erielack) Va Museum woes

["Tim Stuy" <njmidland_@_verizon.net>]

I have been sent quite a few articles in the last week about the VMT.  It
appears that a lot of equipment has been "forgotten".  Pretty mcuh
everything that is outside is in the forgotten category.  In addition to the
SDP45, there are several neat Alcos, a couple of important passenger cars
and a Wabash E8 that are near the point of no return.

Tim

On 8/2/06, Tupaczewski, Paul R (Paul) <paultup_@_lucent.com> wrote:
>
> This doesn't bode well for their EL SDP45.... :(
>
>
> Museum in a crisis, leader says
> The transportation museum needs money, volunteers and support, its new
> director says.
> Kevin Kittredge
> The Virginia Museum of Transportation, which lost part of its roof and
> changed directors in the space of one tumultuous week, is a museum in
> crisis, new executive director Bev Fitzpatrick said.
> Fitzpatrick, who took over the helm of the troubled museum from former
> executive director Bob Dills after a storm ripped off part of its new roof
> July 19, said the museum needs money, volunteers and support.
> "Is it going to kill us? No, it's not." But Fitzpatrick also said, "We're
> not well-heeled. We don't have an endowment. We need help."
> Although the roof was insured, museum officials fear some related costs
> may not be covered. They learned on Friday that lost revenues will not be
> reimbursed, Fitzpatrick said. The museum has been closed since the storm
> hit. He also said despite the damage to the museum's roof, the majority of
> its collections and rolling stock can still be seen safely, and the museum
> hopes to reopen those areas to the public soon.
> Also this week, the president of the roofing company that installed the
> museum's roof a year ago vigorously defended the company's work.
> The roof work was never approved by city building officials, and
> encapsulated asbestos was found underneath. Fitzpatrick said the asbestos
> cleanup could begin Monday.
> Scott Moore, president of Portsmouth-based Roofing and Restoration Inc.,
> said the new museum roof was built to design specifications from Spectrum
> Design of Roanoke and approved by the museum.
> The design called for a new roof to be constructed over the existing roof,
> and for the asbestos to be left where it was.
> "They elected to encapsulate. That is a normal procedure when you're
> dealing with roofs and asbestos," Moore said.
> Moore also said the replacement roof was so firmly attached to the
> original roof that when the wind came, it pulled up the original roof, and
> theirs with it. "It's very obvious the original roof system came up with
> ours," he said.
> Moore noted that several other buildings downtown had roof damage.
> At least four other downtown buildings were damaged in the storm. It blew
> out a window at the Roanoke Higher Education Center, spurring some employees
> to leave offices and take refuge in hallways, said executive director Tom
> McKeon.
> Valley Boiler at 701 Salem Ave. S.W. was heavily damaged, and half of it
> will have to be rebuilt, said co-owner Nani Jarrell. "We think our building
> shifted. It was a heck of a wind."
> Hunter Merrill, who owns Mountain Roofing at Shenandoah Avenue and Fifth
> Street, said part of his building's roof also blew off. "From inside the
> building you can see blue sky right now," he said late Friday afternoon.
> Anyone who argues the museum's roof came off because it was installed
> improperly is wasting their energy, he said.
> "I don't care what was on the building, it was coming off," Merrill said.
> The Roanoke Times building was damaged by blowing debris from the
> transportation museum roof. Wind also lifted the soffit off the skywalk to
> the press building, said production director Chip Harris. He called the
> damage "minimal."
> Earlier news reports have noted the transportation museum's roof work was
> never approved by a city building official.
> Deputy building commissioner Neil Holland said state law requires an
> inspection. Asked if the lack of a final inspection could have an impact on
> the insurance settlement, he said, "It leaves a door open. I'm sure they're
> finding out."
> Moore said they never sought approval from the city's building inspectors
> for the roof because the roof architects, Spectrum Design, and manufacturer,
> Firestone Building Products, are the real experts. Both approved the final
> installation after numerous inspections, he said, and Firestone issued a
> warranty. He said the museum itself asked a building official to come to the
> site, for unknown reasons, and the official did not approve the work then
> because it was not complete.
> Moore also said a lack of approval from a building official will have no
> impact on the insurance settlement.
> "There's no sense in pointing fingers at people," he said. "This was a
> daggone natural disaster."
> Spectrum Design architect Bill Huber said if the new roof was to blame, it
> should have peeled away by itself without taking the old roof with it. He
> also said installing a new roof over an old one is a preferred practice with
> museums, because taking the old roof off first would leave the contents of
> the museum temporarily vulnerable to weather.
> The transportation museum also lost its executive director in the wake of
> the storm. Dills resigned the same day a Roanoke television station aired a
> report on alleged financial improprieties at the museum. Museum board
> president Tom Cox said he has no evidence of wrongdoing on Dills' part, and
> the museum will continue to employ him as a consultant.
> Dills has said he is battling depression and multiple sclerosis, and had
> planned to step down by the end of the year.
> Dills said in a phone message last week that leaving early "seems like the
> best thing to do. I do want to put my health in front of everything. I think
> Bev Fitzpatrick will do a good job there."
> Cox said he wished people would stop throwing stones and start pitching
> in.
> "The unfortunate thing in the whole mix is that this is all boiling down
> to a lot of rock throwing and minutiae when the museum is in the midst of a
> catastrophe," he said.
> Fitzpatrick, a city council member and one-time president of the museum
> board, noted the original transportation museum at Wasena Park was ruined in
> the flood in 1985. But the museum survived that crisis to move to its
> current location, and has grown enormously since then.
> "We absolutely believe we'll continue our progress. Our goal should be to
> be the best transportation museum on the East Coast," Fitzpatrick said.
>
>
> _____________________
> Paul R. Tupaczewski
> IMS NAR/CaLA Implementation and Delivery
> Lucent Technologies
> 67 Whippany Road, Room 15D-116
> Whippany, NJ 07981
> Phone: 973-386-4966
> Fax: 973-386-4147
> Cell: 973-650-5871
>
>
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