Joseph, Dominic and Olivia DeMonte, from Massachusetts, Arrived With Their Mother Ashley Around Noon for Their First Ride on the Polar Express at 2:45 pm.
Three Year old David Graves, is Excited About his First Ever Ride on the Polar Express in Portland. He Hails from southern New Hampshire.
Logan, 7, and his Sister Oceania, 3, Write Letters to Santa at the Polar Express Today. They Arrived with Their Mother Kristen Brousseau, from Massachusetts with the DeMonte Family Around Noon Today for the 2:45 pm Polar Express Ride.
Families began arriving at the Polar Express headquarters at the Ocean Gateway building on the Portland waterfront around noon today – in preparation for the annual magical train journey that is the largest fundraiser for the Maine Narrow Gauge Railroad & Museum. Some wore pajamas. Some didn’t. It’s optional.
Among those arriving for the 2:45 pm ride were Ashley De Monte, with her three children in the abpve left photo. Ashley said she made her reservations for the event in late August of this year. “These events sell out really quickly,” she said. With Ashley was Kristen Brousseau, with her two children Logan, 7, and Oceania, 3, in the below right photo.
Kristen said that last year she had taken her children to the Polar Express on Cape Cod. But this year she decided to try a new place. The location of the Polar Express on the waterfront was especially appealing to Kristen and her two childen, Logan and Oceania. Both families are from Manchester-by-the Sea, Massachusetts.
But for the first time ever, this year’s Polar Express will be running minus Steam Engine # 7 – an iconic part of the journey in past years. According to several sources at the Polar Express, the next door almost ten acre luxury Portland Portside Development Company, tore down the structure that housed Steam Engine # 7 next to the Museum tracks. That action left antique Steam Engine # 7 unprotected from the winter weather. So, the Museum was forced to move the engine from Portand to another Maine location where it can be sheltered and protected from the changing climate..
Portland Foreside is home to the award winning “TWELVE” restaurant and the exclusive Four Points Marina on the East End waterfront.
There are nine (9) cars in the annual Polar Express with each car carrying 30 passengers said Eli Wabnitz, Station Master for the Polar Express this afternoon. Three of the nine cars are occupied today with 75 tickets sold for the opening day. “It starts out slowly, but the day after Thanksgiving, the number of riders explodes,” he said. Last year the Portland Polar Express won the coveted Silver Bell Award for the most improved Polar Express. There are sixty-five (65) similar events across the country; With only four of them using steam – or maybe that is now three of them using steam.
The Maine Narrow Gauge Railroad & Museum is the former Edaville Railroad, in South Carver, Massachusetts. When a dispute arose between the property owner of the cranberery plantation and the mini- railroad owners, wealthy Cape Elizabeth resident, Phineas Sprague, Jr. stepped in and formed a group of rail buffs that brought much of the mini-railroad back to its State of Origin. That huge parade of historic, volunteer trucks owners and drivers returning the mini-railroad happened in the early 1990s. The rest is history!
The fundraiser runs from Sunday, November 16 until December 27, 2025. There is a gift shop with items perfect for stocking stuffers.
As one of the original volunteers at the Museum back in 1992, this LWL did much writing about it for the in-house newsletter – based on first-hand knowledge of it. Some of those posts include: September 11, 2021,January 17, 2011, July 30, 2019, August 4, 2014, April 3, 2014 and December 9, 2023.
Good fences make good neighbors, but maybe good redevelopments don’t!