More heritage stock moves to safety in the Ukraine
FOLLOWING urgent advice from the Ukraine government, which has moved its own railway rolling stock away from the border with Russia’s ally Belarus, fearing further invasions from the north, the volunteers of the Korostiv Railway Museum have had to do likewise.
They were storing three diesel locomotives, a trolley, and other artefacts at a narrow gauge site in Antonivka, all of which have been urgently loaded onto lorries and moved to their little base in the Carpathian mountains, which has now become grossly overcrowded.
I visited Korostiv in July, a beautiful site surrounded by wooded hills. Originally the location of a forestry railway, removed many years ago, it offers the potential for a lovely ride up into the hills.
However, the small reconstructed site, gradually being extended, is now packed with the rest of the collection – other than the little steam engine saved from the Russians (as described in issue 293) that is now being dismantled in Ternopil, 125 miles to the east. Ukraine, like many former Soviet republics, has no tradition of volunteering and the idea of preserving a narrow gauge railway is incomprehensible to many locals.
However, assisted by an Austrian, Wolfram Wendelin, over many years, a group of enthusiasts have started a tourist line from scratch.
Just like so many British lines, they started by trying to save whatever they could, long before they had a line to run stock on. Fortunately they had somewhere to take their collection to – even if it’s now somewhat overcrowded, and once they have paid for the transport they have to build new track and some kind of protective shelter.
The positive side is that Korostiv is in the countryside, a popular tourist area but with few problems of vandalism or theft, but winters are cold and harsh in the Carpathians.
These people are doing what it takes to save these objects, some of which have survived through at least one world war only, to find themselves in the middle of another major conflict.