Lackawanna Heavyweight Coaches

Length: 70 feet (21.336 meters)

Weight: 54 tons (108,000 pounds)

Built: Pullman-Standard Co., 1911-192

Rebuilt: American Car & Foundry, 1930

Riveted steel passenger cars carried the traveling public from the World War I era long into the 1970s on some secondary routes. Our fleet of vintage heavyweight passenger cars has a long and varied history, tracing their roots to New Jersey and beyond.Coaches 310, 328, 329, 341, 453, 3204, 3224 and 4301 are suburban coaches built by the Pullman-Standard Co. between 1911 and 1925. The coaches were part of a large fleet originally built for the Delaware, Lackawanna, & Western (DL&W), where they ran in suburban service between Hoboken and northern New Jersey. Originally designed to be hauled by steam locomotives, the coaches were rebuilt in 1930 as “multiple unit trailers” for use in the new electrified zone.

In 1960, the DL&W merged with the Erie Railroad to become the Erie-Lackawanna. Conrail took over the operations of EL in 1976 and continued to operate the vintage cars in daily commuter service. The coaches later became the property of New Jersey Department of Transportation and conveyed to NJ Transit in 1983, and were retired in 1984.

BSRM purchased coaches 328, 329, 341, and 453 from NJT in May 1984. Coach 310 was purchased the following year. Coaches 3204, 3224, and 4301 were used on the Holyoke Heritage Park Railway but were stored in 1995. In 2005, BSRM entered into a long-term lease with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to restore and operate the idle coaches.

DL&W Number	EL Number	BSRM Number	Coach Type	Year Built