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Re: Another article about the West Oak. Diesel Shop demolition
Author: OPRRMS
Date: 10-06-2010 - 10:14
R Ruiz Wrote:
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> snip <
> The building continued to be in use until 2007.
> Preservation groups are not particularly
> pro-active and generally respond when there is a
> known threat. As long as the building continued
> to be in use by the Union Pacific, there was no
> reason to intervene. From a preservation
> perspective, the highest and best use of a
> historic structure is in its own location being
> used for what it was designed for. I raised flags
> with a number of people when I became aware the
> UPRR had stopped using the facility, but it was
> not until Oakland Heritage Alliance was notified
> of UPRR's renewed intent to demolish the building
> that anyone swung into action.
I'm afraid you've been misinformed. Easy to understand, if you've relied on what was in the Examiner and Chronicle articles.
Union Pacific stopped using the building for shop work long before 2007. By then, locomotives were only allowed inside the building on one track (17, the middle of the five tracks) and the function of the building was to provide strorage space for parts and supplies for work that was done on the service tracks and "Siberia" - the local name for the locomotive ready tracks.
What happened in 2007 was that a delegation of mechanical department officials from Omaha toured the diesel shop facility, and the result (well, one of the results) was that because the the building's lack of use and concern over its structural integrity Mike Hughes, the local MMM (Manager of Mechanical Maintenance) was told to move everything of value out of the building and then fence off access to it. This took about two weeks to complete. Ever since then, locomotives have been allowed to be parked outside the building on 17 Track and 15 Track, but no one was supposed to go inside it.
Shop work in the building was actually curtailed by the SP in the early 1990s, as a result of a dwindling need for yard and local units to be maintained there.
In any event, whether one uses the 2001 or 2007 date, that still left ample time for preservationists and railbuff groups to negotiate with UP for the retrieval of artifacts. Anyone who didn't believe that UP was no longer going to eventually demolish the building was sadly naive - "asleep at the switch," if you will.
> UPRR counsel offered that interested organizations
> could recover items from the building prior to
> demolition, and that a tour would be arranged to
> see the building and identify relevant items. At
> the tour, we were reassured that demolition was
> not imminent and further communication would take
> place. After the tour, several messages were sent
> to UPRR and ignored. One week later the building
> was demolished without any further communication
> from the railroad.
I suspect that someone from the railroad came to the realization that if the building wasn't taken down immediately, preservation groups might have delayed the work like before. Keep in mind that a demolition contractor had already been hired. Suddenly having to delay or change the work while groups cherry-picked artifacts would've added to the costs of the project.
> They made an offer they did not live up to.
> Perhaps you could suggest they should have just
> razed the building without informing anyone as was
> their apparent right? Perhaps that might have
> been better than pretending to talk with
> preservation organizations in good faith.
Besides having long outlived its usefulness and being in poor condition, it posed a tax and safety liability for UP. Had it been taken down when UP wanted to in 2001 (or when SP wanted to, circa 1990), the area would've been cleaned up by now (you might not be aware that there's major soil and groundwater contamination around and under the site) and a new, replacment building would've been erected that would've provided safe and environmentally friendy jobs - something that would be very beneficial to Oakland on so many levels.
-------------------------------------------------------
> snip <
> The building continued to be in use until 2007.
> Preservation groups are not particularly
> pro-active and generally respond when there is a
> known threat. As long as the building continued
> to be in use by the Union Pacific, there was no
> reason to intervene. From a preservation
> perspective, the highest and best use of a
> historic structure is in its own location being
> used for what it was designed for. I raised flags
> with a number of people when I became aware the
> UPRR had stopped using the facility, but it was
> not until Oakland Heritage Alliance was notified
> of UPRR's renewed intent to demolish the building
> that anyone swung into action.
I'm afraid you've been misinformed. Easy to understand, if you've relied on what was in the Examiner and Chronicle articles.
Union Pacific stopped using the building for shop work long before 2007. By then, locomotives were only allowed inside the building on one track (17, the middle of the five tracks) and the function of the building was to provide strorage space for parts and supplies for work that was done on the service tracks and "Siberia" - the local name for the locomotive ready tracks.
What happened in 2007 was that a delegation of mechanical department officials from Omaha toured the diesel shop facility, and the result (well, one of the results) was that because the the building's lack of use and concern over its structural integrity Mike Hughes, the local MMM (Manager of Mechanical Maintenance) was told to move everything of value out of the building and then fence off access to it. This took about two weeks to complete. Ever since then, locomotives have been allowed to be parked outside the building on 17 Track and 15 Track, but no one was supposed to go inside it.
Shop work in the building was actually curtailed by the SP in the early 1990s, as a result of a dwindling need for yard and local units to be maintained there.
In any event, whether one uses the 2001 or 2007 date, that still left ample time for preservationists and railbuff groups to negotiate with UP for the retrieval of artifacts. Anyone who didn't believe that UP was no longer going to eventually demolish the building was sadly naive - "asleep at the switch," if you will.
> UPRR counsel offered that interested organizations
> could recover items from the building prior to
> demolition, and that a tour would be arranged to
> see the building and identify relevant items. At
> the tour, we were reassured that demolition was
> not imminent and further communication would take
> place. After the tour, several messages were sent
> to UPRR and ignored. One week later the building
> was demolished without any further communication
> from the railroad.
I suspect that someone from the railroad came to the realization that if the building wasn't taken down immediately, preservation groups might have delayed the work like before. Keep in mind that a demolition contractor had already been hired. Suddenly having to delay or change the work while groups cherry-picked artifacts would've added to the costs of the project.
> They made an offer they did not live up to.
> Perhaps you could suggest they should have just
> razed the building without informing anyone as was
> their apparent right? Perhaps that might have
> been better than pretending to talk with
> preservation organizations in good faith.
Besides having long outlived its usefulness and being in poor condition, it posed a tax and safety liability for UP. Had it been taken down when UP wanted to in 2001 (or when SP wanted to, circa 1990), the area would've been cleaned up by now (you might not be aware that there's major soil and groundwater contamination around and under the site) and a new, replacment building would've been erected that would've provided safe and environmentally friendy jobs - something that would be very beneficial to Oakland on so many levels.
