Locomotive at Ngardmau State

From the Report: "The following report summarizes the restoration project activities undertaken by some Ngardmau State young men and women to restore a registered site laying in the interior of Ngardmau State. The site is the remains of an old Japanese era Railroad Tracks and Locomotive engines, Site No. B:NR-5:12, laying in the forest below the Waterfall side of the Compact Road. The trail from the Waterfall Parking Area to the Waterfall descend east to intersect the Railroad Tracks below at the level ground, and continues on north following the tracks running north-south. The physical work of the site began on August 8, 2008. Two women and eight men from Ngardmau State were hired by the state to undertake the restoration project. The project entailed clearing of overgrowth on the tracks in the vicinity of the turn to the Waterfall following the tracks that runs north to end at a locomotive engine. The workers used hand tools such as machetes, chainsaw, weed cutters, sickles, and rakes to cut and clear trees, vines, and thickets of underbrush to expose the site that has been abandoned for over sixty years. It took them a total of twenty hard working days to complete this tedious and tiresome restoration work. In some areas along the tracks they cleared debris blocking water drains and exposed portions of buried tracks. Along the tracks close to the locomotive engine are a couple of grottos on the sloped sides of the tracks. A portion of the tracks in this area is covered with the landslide and the workers built steps across it to make it more accessible for the visitors to the site. At the end of the restoration project the workers built a couple of wooden benches at the site in the vicinity of abandoned locomotive for the visitors to visit the site." Project funding was provided in part by a Historic Preservation Fund grant to the Palau Historic Preservation Office, Bureau of Arts and Culture, Ministry of Community and Cultural Affairs, administered by the Pacific West Regional Office, National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior.

Locomotive at Ngardmau State

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