RBMN Acquires $2MM Industrial Complex
Written by Marybeth Luczak, Executive Editor
Reading & Northern Railroad (RBMN)—Railway Age’s four-time Regional Railroad of the Year (2002, 2011, 2015, 2020)—is Pennsylvania’s largest privately owned railroad.
The Reading & Northern Railroad (RBMN) has purchased a 10-acre industrial complex in Carbon County, Pa., to use for equipment maintenance and repair as well as storage, Railway Age’s four-time Regional Railroad of the Year reported on April 21.
A former campus of the Kovatch fire truck company in the Nesquehoning Borough was purchased for $2 million from KME, which acquired Kovatch six years ago, according to RBMN. Under the agreement, KME will lease the complex’s nine buildings to complete the last of the fire trucks being built there.
The complex is located in the center of RBMN’s 400-mile rail system that runs from Reading, Pa., in the south to Hazleton, Scranton and Mehoopany in the north (see map below). Specifically, it is alongside the 19-mile rail line that RBMN purchased in 2021 from Carbon County and connects the regional railroad’s Reading and Lehigh divisions; RBMN previously had operating rights over that segment for more than 20 years.
Some of the complex’s nine buildings include heavy crane systems capable of lifting equipment of varying weights, according to the railroad.
“We anticipate locating important parts of our freight and passenger operations in Nesquehoning, which sits in such a perfect location for our railroad and our employees,” RBMN Founder and Owner/CEO Andy Muller Jr. said. “We now will have the room to grow our equipment maintenance and repair facilities as well as providing much needed storage. With over 1,600 freight cars and our ever-growing passenger fleet, which now consists of 47 cars, plus over 70 motor vehicles and countless number of other equipment for our track department and other departments, we were running out of space to keep our equipment well maintained.”
RBMN, Muller added, “is growing by leaps and bounds. In fact, we believe we will be enjoying double-digit carload and revenue growth for years to come fueled in large part by the increasing worldwide demand for Pennsylvania anthracite coal.”
In related developments, following an extensive, $2.4 million overhaul, RBMN is returning Reading Class T-1 4-8-4 Northern 2102 to the rails with four “Iron Horse Rambles” round-trip excursions.
