S.S. United States Facing Eviction

Moose

Moose

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The original Queen Mary and the QE2 survive as commercial businesses in California and Dubai. The original QE met a tragic end in Hong Kong. France was scrapped after a thirty year career as a Norwegian cruise liner.
I have always been surprised that the enterprising US businesses have not found a use for the United States. Rebuilding the old US Lines pier in New York with her alongside would be a fitting fate.
 
uk 75 said:
The original Queen Mary and the QE2 survive as commercial businesses in California and Dubai. The original QE met a tragic end in Hong Kong. France was scrapped after a thirty year career as a Norwegian cruise liner.
I have always been surprised that the enterprising US businesses have not found a use for the United States. Rebuilding the old US Lines pier in New York with her alongside would be a fitting fate.
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The hotel/hospitality industry in the US is a mess right now, the golden age of American hoteliers is long over. The failsons, bean counters, and media personalities that run it now could not be arsed to take on a project like this.
 
It wouldn’t do for me to be President.
I’d declare Martial Law and have anyone with a blowtorch within a mile of her shot on sight.
 
uk 75 said:
The original Queen Mary and the QE2 survive as commercial businesses in California and Dubai. The original QE met a tragic end in Hong Kong. France was scrapped after a thirty year career as a Norwegian cruise liner.
I have always been surprised that the enterprising US businesses have not found a use for the United States. Rebuilding the old US Lines pier in New York with her alongside would be a fitting fate.
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The SS United States had very small and cramped cabins even by the standards of the 1950s. The public spaces were unimpressive as well. It didn’t help that just about interior surface was lined with asbestos, all of which was stripped out in Turkey decades ago. Basically, even when the ship was still dehumidified and carefully mothballed, the ship was inappropriate for any sort of conversion. As far as the Queen Mary, it isn’t commercially viable and is owned by the city of Long Beach. As I recollect, it desperately needs a drydocking, which isn’t financially viable.

The SS France/Norway was a much nicer ship than the United States, with better accommodations, public rooms, etc. Its career was ended by a boiler explosion in Miami. Truth be known though, only a single digit number of original first class cabins were up to modern standards. The old tourist class cabins were unspeakable. As I recollect, the conversion did add an extra aluminum deck and a promenade deck was converted to cabins as well. There even were rather large davit launched lighters forward because the draft was too great for a number of cruise docks and lightering was necessary. None or which was possible for the SS United States even in the 1980s, as the hull was narrow, steel bulkheads precluded modifying cabins and the furnishings, asbestos aside, were spartan and unappealing.
 
 
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From the virtual tour, Savannah looks to be in rather better shape than the SS united States. What the latter would cost to even assess let alone fix up for museum status boggles the mind.
 
A book on the SS United States…presented by an individual currently keeping track of events. He also has some videos of the AMT Enterprise.

 
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Looks like about zero opportunity for restoration now, even with bottomless pockets. What a sad end. I wonder how long she will be viable as a dive site?
 
In hindsight, the SS United States was built with accommodations that were worse than the 1950s competition and running economics that were worse as well. It would have literally been the worst cruise ship imaginable, far worse than the prewar Cunard twins. With a mess of unalterable steel bulkheads on cramped accommodations decks and hideous asbestos fittings, the SS United States could never have become a hotel/museum like the Queen Mary in Long Beach. The ship lacked the length, beam and reserve stability of the newer and far better conceived and fitted out SS France that gained aluminum upper decks and lost an engine room to operate profitably for decades as the SS Norway.

Ships like the United States, France and, even to a lesser extent, the QEII were all taxpayer subsidized national vanity projects. Sadly, the US taxpayers must have spent many tens of millions to dehumidify and berth an unusable ship that spent decades in “mothballs.” After the asbestos was stripped out in Turkey, the SS United States should have been scrapped, as I doubt it had any great value to the USN as even a parts hulk. I question how standard the “aircraft carrier” steam plant was compared to the later Forrestals and Kitty Hawks. I would also imagine that years of hard North Atlantic runs put more wear and stress on the steam plant than the less strenuous patterns of usage of a super carrier.
 
Here's a new video from Historic Travels:


In this video we discuss the sad story of the SS UNITED STATES and why ultimately I think it will be sunk.
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This vessel has America’s name on it—for that reason alone it should have been preserved.
Instead, we get a ballroom in DC most of us will never see.

The death of the big project is not something that should be lauded.

There are certain things nations should do AS nations.

I know….what an antique idea, to today’s youths…
 
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Engineering projects just don’t have a donor class. Katrina was a disaster because folks on one side of the spectrum didn’t like spending on levees for poor folks and wanted tax breaks. Their counterparts wanted social programs but hated levees for Green reasons.

The results were in the form of a disaster far costlier to taxpayers than preparedness…and floodwater that swallowed up cars and sewage was a green disaster in its own right.

The wrong things get cut.

Another case

Updates
View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DF2MzEWOrq8

View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ocB3cX1QCLc
 
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