Road-rail vehicles are very widely used by modern railroad companies for maintenance and inspection work. They are commonly known as hi-rail vehicles, from highway and railway, also often spelled as ‘hyrail’. Hyrail vehicles are converted from many types of regular road vehicles, including pickup trucks, SUVs, crane and flatbed trucks, excavator equipment, and many more. Small retractable rail wheels are…

It was sold to the Southern Pacific Transportation Company of California which operated the car in its Maintenance of Way Department (Inventory No. E1492). The car was donated to the ORM by Bob Flaherty in 2016. Information on this motor car was provided by the Martin County, MN, Historical Society.

It was operated by the Denver & Ft. Worth RR.

Sometime prior to the 1970’s it was donated to the Oklahoma State Fairgrounds. In June of 2015 it was donated to the Oklahoma Railway Museum. It has been restored by Museum volunteers.

It belonged initially to the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad (CRI&P). The car then went to the North Central Oklahoma Railway and finally to the Oklahoma Railway Museum. The winch mechanism is not original, but is fairly typical of modifications made by the CRI&P RR.

While the date of construction is not known, the company produced velocipedes as early as the 1880s. Powered by hand and foot, it was used by rail maintenance workers on the St Louis & San Francisco Railway (FRISCO) for track inspection and repair. At 140 pounds it was light enough to be swung off the…

Most have four rubber-tired road wheels, four small retractable rail wheels, and couplers mounted on each end. They are used by rail customers as an alternative to switcher locomotives as they are cheaper and more flexible. Since they have road wheels a railcar mover can go around railcars in the way or travel several tracks…

It was used by the Missouri Pacific RR as an “idler car” for a crane (such as OGE No. 2299) when in transit. It may have been used with the small “Burro” cranes built by the Cullen-Friestedt Company of Chicago. The car was donated to the ORM by the Union Pacific RR.

The car was painted green and used by M-K-T’s operating department for track inspections between 1973 and 1988. After the Katy was acquired by Union Pacific in 1988, this car was no longer needed and was set to be given to the city of Denison, TX, for display. However, due to delays, it was instead…