A converted locomotive with 24 self-pour taps is parking in NoDa next month

A freight railroad is about to park a bar in NoDa. Aberdeen Carolina & Western Railway plans to bring Engine Room 87, a magenta-painted locomotive it converted into a self-pour tap lounge, to 409 East 35th Street starting in October, Axios Charlotte reported Wednesday, with a free open house scheduled for October 22 from 4 to 7 p.m.

The setup includes a 24-tap self-pour bar built into the locomotive, an indoor bar car and a rooftop deck, and the railroad has said full vintage passenger train rides from the site are expected to follow in the spring of 2027, according to the report.

What Engine Room 87 is

The bar is a real locomotive. The railroad’s own materials describe it as an open-air bar car with self-pour taps, built in-house from a scrapped engine. Axios reported that the unit was formerly CSX 656, a General Electric AC6000CW from the late 1990s, before ACWR bought it and rebuilt it as a lounge. The railroad has run it for the past two seasons in the Sandhills, first beside The Cradle golf course at Pinehurst and this summer in downtown Aberdeen, where the company also launched a Christmas train, The Pilot reported in June.

Self-pour means what it says. Guests get a card or wristband, pour their own beer, wine or cider from a wall of taps and pay by the ounce, a format several Charlotte bars already use. Putting the wall inside a locomotive is the part that has not been done here.

The railroad behind it

ACWR is a short-line freight railroad headquartered in Candor, in Montgomery County, founded in 1987 when Robert Menzies bought a small North Carolina branch line, Axios reported. It operates roughly 140 to 150 miles of track through the Sandhills and Piedmont and leases a line from Norfolk Southern that runs between Charlotte and Gulf, in Chatham County, which is how its tracks come to pass through NoDa. It describes itself as the largest privately held freight railroad in the state, and its regular business is hauling forest and agricultural products.

The entertainment side grew out of that Charlotte connection. In September 2022 the railroad quietly parked a restored magenta passenger train on a new set of tracks on 36th Street between the Industrious coworking offices and the retail strip that holds Figo and Jeni’s, Axios reported at the time. The company’s president, Jennifer White, said then that the stay was a test run for corporate events and private parties, and that the goal was to book enough events to leave the train in Charlotte permanently.

White told WCNC that the company wanted to bring a unique experience to Charlotte, and that NoDa was trendy and the tracks ran right through it. A restored E-unit locomotive, ACWR 103, made a debut excursion run from Candor toward Charlotte in what the railroad called the NoDa Express, with railfans lining the crossings to photograph it.

What to expect

The October plan is a bar first and a train later. The open house is meant, in the words of company representative Hayley Coleman Forgo as reported by Axios, as a little appetizer: a chance for people to try the space and tell the railroad what they would like to see. The company has said it will use that feedback to shape programming. A few things are already known:

• The address, 409 East 35th Street, is about two blocks from the 36th Street light rail station, so the bar is reachable without a car.
• The open house on Wednesday, October 22, runs from 4 to 7 p.m. and is free.
• Once the full fleet returns to Charlotte for regular service, the railroad plans holiday and themed trips, including a Christmas train to Mint Hill, according to Axios.
• In Pinehurst the company already runs murder mystery rides, brunch trains, a dinner ride it calls A Journey in Time and Christmas excursions, which suggests the Charlotte menu of trips.
• The railroad’s site already offers the NoDa train as a wedding and private event venue.

The neighborhood context helps explain the bet. NoDa’s 36th Street corridor has filled in with breweries, restaurants and the Amélie’s flagship since the Blue Line extension opened in 2018, and the light rail stop puts the rail siding at 35th Street within a short walk of most of it. The railroad’s 2022 test parked its passenger cars a block away on 36th, so the company has already watched how the neighborhood responds to a train it can walk up to. The difference this time is a product the public can use without booking a private event.

Why it matters

NoDa has spent a decade turning its industrial edges into places to drink, and the rail line through the neighborhood has always been the one piece of that industry still working. A freight railroad deciding the line is also worth something as hospitality is a new kind of reuse, and it comes with an unusual promise: the same tracks that bring the bar could, by 2027, carry paying passengers out of the neighborhood on a vintage train.

Whether that happens depends on bookings, as White said in 2022. The 2023 target for a permanent train came and went. The bar arriving in October is the railroad’s second attempt to make Charlotte a permanent stop, and the open house is the public’s first chance to see whether a locomotive makes a good place to have a beer.

Know something about this story? Send it to us through our contact form.