Blame paperwork for holding up the move that was to have commenced at 2 a.m. Wednesday. Two trucks with flatbed trailers were to have hauled the 160,000-pound cars from downtown Stillwater to a siding in Bayport. But since contracts with various parties involved have not been signed, the rail cars still sit near the depot on north end of Stillwater.
"It was supposed to work," said David Paradeau, owner of the famed train. "We are still working out the details. Hopefully, the move will take place."
Paradeau is optimistic that contracts will be signed and the train can leave the station. Plans call for trucks to haul the Zephyr's six dining coaches and two locomotives down Main Street and Hwy. 95 to Bayport, where they will be loaded onto rail cars and stored until Paradeau finds a buyer.
Paradeau has been looking for somebody to buy the dinner train. He shut down the popular attraction and sold his 5.9-mile railroad corridor to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources last year for $4.25 million. The corridor will be transformed into the Browns Creek State Trail, connecting to the Gateway State Trail west of Stillwater in the city of Grant.
TIM HARLOW
