I have been working on a consist of Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad equipment from various manufacturers who have CVSR's exact cars. The biggest problem for me was finding a model of the Pennsylvania 21 roomette "Inn" series cars which became coaches for Penn Central, MARC Rail, and now on the CVSR. Thanks to tips from some of you here, Union Station Products car sides and wraps were suggested. I bought some wraps for the car type from USP and with some advice and warnings from some of you who experienced working with these I have 2 cars nearly completed. It was a very tense and at times nearly lost project. But fighting near catastrophe during the application of these wraps paid off with a decent representation of CVSR's "Metro" coaches. CVSR calls these "metro" coaches because they were purchased by Akron Metro Transit with the intent to run Akron area commuter rail. When this never happened they leased the cars to CVSR and were marked with a Metro logo on the cars. In recent years Akron Metro donated the fleet of cars to the CVSR. CVSR did operate Akron to Canton service for years but was suspended due to deteriorating track conditions not within the national park, and no longer maintained by Metro. Anyway, I chose "Spirit of Summit," and "Siegfried Buerling" as my O scale CVSR Metro cars. Siegfried Buerling was the key founder of the CVSR, he rightfully credits others as well, but truly Mr. Buerling had the tenacity to get Chessie System to turn over their rails for CVSR service and eventual national park ownership of the track.
Back to the cars though. The Buerling car I used some Lionel windows that fit but were not perfect in results. Both cars still need details added and some work on windows. Thanks to Scale City Designs for the open steps that are correct for the car. I am not completely happy with the results but overall they accomplished the goal of adding a couple "Metro" cars to my CVSR consist. The Siegfried Buerling car was redone by CVSR and lost its "Metro" logo so it does not appear on that car. I honored the "Spirit of Summit " car as Summit County and Metro Transit made these mainstay coaches possible for CVSR. Without Siegfried Buerling it is safe to say CVSR may never have happened.
