Abandoned train engine listed on Kijiji for $25,000

For sale: Train engine; tracks not included.

A long dormantyet fully functional train engine can be yours for $25,000, plus the cost of shipping.

The engine sits on about 15 metres of track on the site of the shuttered Tembec paper mill in Pine Falls.

It's an unusualitemamong the many ads for furniture, cars and garage salesonbuy-and-sell website Kijiji.

Noel Chartierwas hired on contractby the train's owners,NRI Global Inc., tosell it.

"The challenge is, with the tracks being gone, it's landlocked. Makes it a little harder to sell, a little more expensive to move," Chartiertold Up to Speed host Ismaila Alfa on Monday.

Chartier hasfieldedabout five "serious" calls in response to the ad, including one from a business owner who wants to use theengine as an advertisementin front of his business. Another caller wants to put the engine to work, Chartier said.

A B.C.-based museum also started a Go Fund Me campaign to buy the enginebut that "didn't pan out," he said.

The price has already dropped $5,000, according to the online ad.

The buyer would have to movethe approximately90- to 110-tonnetrain off the property.

That would entail hiring a crane, removing the train wheelsand hoisting the engine onto a special low-bed trailer, Chartier said. From there, the owner could move it to the closest set of tracks and drive it, or haul it via highways to its final destination, he said.

Tembecclosedthe mill in 2010and later put it up for sale. The railway ties andtracks, except the 15-metre section the engine sits on, were broken down and sold for recycling.

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• Pine Falls mill sale dead

The engine should still runbut over the years, thieves havetargeted the train.

"It was running when it was parked. We've had a little bit of a problem with vandalism," Chartier said.

"I guess there's value in copper wiring and somebodydid a fair amount of damage to it just cutting the wires, but apparently it's still runable."

The engine is worth about $25,000 in scrap metal,Chartiersaid. If it doesn't sell, it will likely be broken down into pieces for recycling, except for the engine and generator, he said.

"A couple of guys [blow]torching, it won't take long to put that into small pieces, and it will be a piece of history that's going to bemaybe turned into train tracks."