DECEMBER 2024—-GEORGIA ROAD TO LAUNCH HERITAGE STEAM PROGRAM AHEAD OF 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF RAILROAD AND U.S. SEMIQUINCENTENNIAL

President and CEO Stephen J. Greenwood revealed the first official details of the upcoming launch of the Georgia Road Heritage Steam Program at the close of his Christmas “town hall” video conference on Wednesday, December 18th, 2024. The announcement came at the end of formal remarks as he thanked employees, customers and stakeholders for another record year of growth. He noted that Georgia Road would celebrate 25 years of continuing service in 2026 with yearlong events to kick off during the Holiday Season of 2025.

The crown jewel of the celebration would be the operational return of the long storied Central of Georgia K-Class Type 4-8-4 built by Lima Locomotive Works in 1943 during World War II. The unit was one of eight new dual service locomotives used primarily to work heavy passenger trains in the 1940s from Birmingham, AL to the CofGA hub at Albany, GA and Atlanta, GA with to Macon, GA bearing names like the Seminole and Flamingo. The engines, numbered 451-458, were nicknamed “Big Apples” by engine crews on the western end of the railroad. Due of the War Production Board’s restriction on design of new steam engines, the Big Apples were patterned after Southern Pacific Type 4-8-4 Class GS-4 units. All were pulled from service in 1953 and presumed scrapped soon after.

A vague urban legend in steam enthusiast circles purported one of the “Big Apple” locomotives was actually saved from scrapping and held by a private collector under lock and key in an industrial building somewhere around Montgomery, AL. No concrete information ever surfaced about the steamer until 2018 when Georgia Road was contacted by the family of a wealthy but reclusive industrialist turned excentric collector who lived just south of Birmingham, AL. Georgia Road was, at the time, quietly searching for and looking to acquire a large steam locomotive directly linked to one of its steam era predecessor railroads as public relations tool and living history public relations campaign. The family was interested in transferring ownership of a partially restored large steam locomotive long held secretly by their recently deceased patriarch. To the shock of Georgia Road representatives sent to survey the hidden steamer, they found a complete and partially restored Central of Georgia Big Apple that was thought to be scrapped nearly 75 years earlier. Inside the non-descript warehouse they also found stores of parts from roster mates who were parted out prior to scrapping. The collector spent years collecting stores and information on the locomotive which he affectionately called “Miss Scarlett”. His family and all but a very small circle of friends thought the reference was to a lifelong mistress. Only after his will was read, was the truth revealed about his “Miss Scarlett.” Family members figured the name was a code name to keep anyone from discovering what he considered his secret treasure. As an avid fan of author Margaret Michell, the industrialist likely pulled the nickname from the pages of Margaret Mitchell’s Gone With the Wind, a best-selling novel and Academy Award winning motion picture. In addition, the fact that the steamer ran the old CofGA Atlanta, GA to Macon, Georgia main line that ran through the setting of the novel was likely a determining factor of the nickname “Miss Scarlett.” His final wish was to see that his “Miss Scarlett” would be placed in “properly equipped hands to appreciate and treat her like the true lady she is.”

Georgia Road officials immediately jumped at the opportunity to acquire the locomotive and parts supply, along with many of the antique steam era tools he collected to restore and maintain it. The decision was made to disassemble the locomotive and ship it to the Manley Locomotive and Car Shops (MLCS) inside Georgia Road’s sprawling Fred M Dale Classification Yard in Birmingham, AL. The irony of this move was the MLCS was the renamed home of the original Southern Railway Steam program which Norfolk Southern RR (NS) gutted in the early 2000s and shut down. When Georgia Road bought Norris Yard from NS a few years earlier in the 2000s as NS sought to reduce excess hump yard capacity, the underutilized yard and near empty building was given a new life after being relegated for reduced operations and storage under NS. Georgia Road summarily re-named the yard and the facility in memoriam to Georgia Road’s first CEO, Fred Manley Dale who was the driving force in the formation of the Georgia Road in the 1990s. The yard became the Fred M. Dale Yard and Terminal, and the locomotive service building carried his middle name as the Manley Locomotive and Car Shops.

The MLCS shops were configured for running maintenance of the Georgia Road locomotive and railcar fleet. The balance of excess space was used to maintain and store the Georgia Road business and OCS fleet. With some remnants of the former Southern Steam Program still in place, Georgia Road executives figured there was no better place to locate a Heritage Steam Program centered around their recently acquired “Miss Scarlett”. They watched keenly as Union Pacific Railroad (UP) revitalized its Steam program after the COVID-19 Pandemic and managed to reverse much of the ill will it drew from customers and fans alike due to its draconian and failed Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR) tactics which pitched the UP into a near static mire. Back-to-back runs of its Challenger and later Big Boy steamers for system tours and public relations events set the railroad and railfan world on its ear as there was excitement in the air for the first time in years.

The Big Apple was quietly disassembled and shipped to MLCS where it would slowly be restored from the literal ground up. Georgia Road reached out to the Heart of Dixie Railroad Museum (HOD) for assistance to re-create a program they participated in during the Southern Steam Program in the 1970s through the 1990s. Interestingly enough, the existence of the Big Apple remained a closely held secret, so only a few of the HOD organizers and volunteers knew exactly what locomotive would be featured. Those actually working on the restoration were held to secrecy and after a couple of years, the Big Apple disappeared into obscurity. By early 2024, Georgia Road executives decided the roll out of “Miss Scarlett” would be a perfect way to highlight various planned events and celebrations starting in 2025 and ending in mid-2027 around the Silver Anniversary of the Georgia Road. The nation would be celebrating its 250th signing of the Declaration of Independence in 2026 also, allowing more potential exposure for the Georgia Road Heritage Steam Program, now referred to as Operation Scarlett. As work progressed into late 2024, it was obvious the best kept secret in the halls of the Georgia Road corporate headquarters was becoming hard to contain. The purchase of an ex ATSF fuel oil tender and its subsequent open shipment by rail to Stephens Railcar was impossible to contain. Rather than having the steam program exposed by some random railfan taking pictures by happenstance, the decision was made to introduce the new Georgia Road Heritage Steam Program at the CEO’s Christmas “town hall” Meeting and Address in late 2024.

The announcement by Greenwood would be the first official recognition of the implementation of the Heritage Steam Program. A paint diagram concept followed by the physical appearance of a newly acquired former ATSF fuel oil tender the week prior to his Christmas address would be a clandestine harbinger of his announcement. It showed up at the Stephens Railcar John Tyler Locomotive Shops (JTLS) in early December and unceremoniously began restoration and conversion into an auxiliary water tender for the Heritage Steam consist. At the time of Greenwood’s address, the star of the program in the form of the last pre-war Central of Georgia Big Apple nicknamed Miss Scarlett was noticeably absent. Greenwood assured listeners that 2025 would be full of surprises and good tidings. For now, a few press releases and random concepts and shop pictures are all that is available.

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18DEC2024 545PM EST RELEASE

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JULY 2024—-GEORGIA ROAD TO UPDATE LOCOMOTIVE AND RAILCAR SCHEME TO REFLECT NEW SLOGAN AND WEBSITE

President and CEO Stephen J. Greenwood unveiled the new “Driving Forward” paint scheme and renewed company focus during the mid-year stakeholders address in early July 2024. The slogan and new paint were introduced as a reflection of the determination of Georgia Road to continue advancing its place as a cutting-edge railroad transportation system into the uncertain economic landscape of the next few decades. This was the first major change in the standard scheme introduced when Georgia Road started operations in April 1996. The Georgia Road standard scheme has remained relatively unchanged for full length of its over 20-year existence. Barring several commemorative schemes and the branded Eagle Flyer variation, the standard paint scheme and colors have remained unchanged with the exception of the winged nose treatment appearing on wide cab units after 2006. Georgia Road determined that the time for refocusing the Georgia Road brand was right due to a changing railroad industry landscape dotted with mainstreaming of AI induced automation, continued of dividend driven Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR), stringent EPA emissions and evolving Mexican-USA-Canada manufacturing supply chains.

Greenwood was quoted in his state of the business address, “We stand at a true crossroads for American rail transportation. Our focus must be re-imagined in order to preserve our place as an industry leader in rail innovation and novel services. In addition, we must prepare ourselves to drive forward into these changing economic times. Too many of our partners and competitors struggle to balance growth and PSR driven return on investment while at the same time preserving the colossal task of maintaining the infrastructure and labor necessary to successfully run a railroad. We have a history of creating novel new services aimed at giving our customers value added options. Examples include the QuickSilver Optima RoadRailer express and LTL services linking regional areas to large central city hubs. Our MexXpress Service was truly ahead of its time, looking to capitalize on traffic moving out of Mexico to the USA and Canada as globalization failures give way to continental supply chains. We added fleets of autorack cars to support our OEM assembly plants, rebuilt our timber and lumber segment to better serve a market most other Class One railroads have neglected or even ignored. We have strengthened out subsidiary railroads such as the new Gateway System centered in the Midwest and Rio Pacifico in Mexico. We even took the holding company Georgia Road Transportation private in order to remain solidly in control of business on our terms instead of those dictated by short term activist stakeholders. We must redouble our efforts to find new traffic and diversify our market segments. Where some are stepping backward to balance these current industry expectations, Georgia Road is “Driving Forward” to meet new challenges proactively and directly, instead of following the industry for cues that typically do not add value to Georgia Road and its customers and stakeholders. “

The new “Driving Forward” locomotive scheme replaces the backslash white stripe with a forward-facing arrow, a symbol of the determination to surge forward in all markets and services. Gone is the old “Driven to Service” slogan which had become a Georgia Road standard. replaced with the website address which makes anything adorned with the new slogan a reminder of what is required of Georgia Road and its people. Even the rectangular logo sports a new burgundy bounding box to capture attention. The railcar fleet will display the new slogan and website address along with attractive additional paint highlights to emphasize its world wide web presence. Many of these changes are subtle, driving forward the company image rather than changing it completely.

The first locomotives to wear the new scheme will be new SD70ACe emissions credit units and new WABTEC-GE ES44-T4 units to be delivered in late 2024 and 2025. Brand new autorack railcars and unit grain hoppers earmarked for growing MexXpress Service will deliver over the next two years. All other locomotives and rolling stock will receive the new “Driving Forward” paint scheme as they are cycled through major rebuild or repairs. Georgia Road plans to have a significant amount of equipment with updated paint by the 25th Anniversary of the company in 2026.

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8JULY2024 545AM EST RELEASE

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Note—special thanks to Damon Curtis for “Driving Forward” locomotive paint specification drawing