After observing trains on the Namboku line of Sendai City Subway, I visited Sendai West Park in the city center. My target was a steam locomotive Unit 1 of the Class C60 (hereafter C60 1) preserved in the park.
Let's take a quick look at the Class C60. It is a 4-6-4 (Whyte notation) type steam locomotive that has a tender attached. The C60 was originally developed as the Class C59 by the Ministry of Railways in 1941, but converted to the Class C60 later. What was the background of C60’s appearance? The Class C59 was originally developed for pulling express trains on trunk lines; however, many trunk lines were electrified in 1950’s. So, they had to move to local lines, but problem of the local lines was their weak load bearing. The heavy axle load of the C59 had to be decreased for operation on the local lines. For that purpose, 4-6-2 axis arrangement on the C59 was converted to 4-6-4 on the C60… one trailing axle was added.
C60 1 was originally built in 1941 at Hitachi Kasado Factory under the name of C59 27. It was then converted to C60 1 by the Japanese National Railways Hamamatsu Factory in 1953. After operating for 15 years as C60 1, it was retired from the track in 1968, and moved to Sendai West Park. It’s an extra rare SL, because it is the only preserved C60 in Japan. I would like to thank everyone involved in preserving C60 1 in Sendai City.
