Photo by Thinh D. Nguyen
Click to enlarge photos.By Jon Gillooly
Marietta Daily Journal Staff Writer
MARIETTA - The city's code enforcement department has cited the owner of the rusted Pullman railroad dining car, which has sat next to the Marietta Welcome Center by Mill Street since the 1970s, with a code violation.
The owner has 60 days to "repair or demolish" the car, or be issued with a citation for municipal court.
In a letter addressed to the car's owner, Dr. Arva O. Lumpkin of Smyrna, dated July 21, Code Enforcement Officer Garry Thomas ordered Lumpkin to remove the trash and debris under the train car and repair the doors on both ends of the car.
The letter follows a July 17 open records request from the Marietta Daily Journal requesting all correspondence between the city and Lumpkin within the last 45 days.
Reached by the Journal Wednesday, an angry Lumpkin, who is a dentist at Vinings Center for Dentistry, said she has had to deal with the "same kind of foolishness" before, referring to the city's 2002 effort to unsuccessfully ask CSX railroad to remove the car.
Although Lumpkin owns the rail car, she has a month-to-month lease from CSX on the property where it sits. She also owns the building next to the car that was formerly the Depot Restaurant, but is currently home to five businesses, including Cool Beans Coffee Shop.
Mayor Bill Dunaway said restaurateur Bill Swearingen brought the dining car to Marietta and used it as a dining room in the 1970s and 1980s, but the restaurant has been closed for more than two decades.
Asked what she plans to do about the code violation, Lumpkin refused to say.
"I have not received any written information from anyone. It is all hearsay," she said, adding, "How can the council move something that belongs to someone else?"
Lumpkin said the last time she saw the rail car was Monday.
"Yes, it looks bad," she admitted.
Yet Lumpkin also said she is being "demonized" by the Journal for reporting how DMDA member Carey Cox believes the dining car is a safety hazard.
Cox was recently quoted as saying: "We go there quite a bit and pass it with my kids, and I have to pass it, and I have to put them on my right side so they don't touch it and have to get a tetanus shot. It is rusted and falling apart, and I do see vagrants' bags underneath it."
Marietta's code enforcement chief Judy Garrett said Lumpkin visited her office Monday about a July 8 letter sent to Lumpkin for another code violation, this one related to the broken sign attached to the building above the rail car. Garrett gave Lumpkin an extension to take down the sign when Lumpkin said she was bidding the job out, Garrett said.
During that Monday meeting, Garrett told Lumpkin to expect to receive another report about the railcar itself.
"She indicated she would work with us on repairing the train car," Garrett said.
Lumpkin, however, won't say what she plans to do.
"I do not know what the problems are. I am cooperative, but I can't make an assessment on what needs to be done until I have all the facts," she said.
Asked when she expects to have all the facts, she said, "I have no idea."
Councilman Van Pearlberg brought the issue of repairing or scrapping the rail car up at a June 26 council meeting.
Dunaway said he prefers to see Lumpkin repair the car, rather than have the city declare it a public nuisance and possibly go to court. Dunaway cited the city's March 2007 ongoing lawsuit against Waleed Jaraysi and his half built, three-story nightclub near South Marietta Parkway and Interstate 75 as a reason to stay out of court.
"The court's move slow," Dunaway said.
Council member Grif Chalfant also said he would like to see the car repaired rather than scrapped.
Pearlberg said scenes from Gone with the Wind could be painted on the car in conjunction with the city's Gone with the Wind museum.
jgillooly@mdjonline.com
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Posted Comments
This has gone on long enough. Give her 30 days to clean up the property. If she doesn't do it, contract to have it done and bill her. This is one of the main entrances to the Square and it is a disgrace.
I would like to see the car repaired and painted red again. I think it adds a lot of character and is a fun and unusual element when you approach the square. I'm glad they are taking down the broken Cormier sign, it's irrelevant and should have been gone long ago. I think they should put up a new sign for Cool Beans; though. Having our own coffee roaster on the square is one of its greatest assets, and makes us (Marietta) look cool. But please!!! don't paint a mural of Gone With The Wind on the side of the rail car; that would look so stupid!!! We've already seen enough tacky murals around Marietta. Let it just be a rail car! Have some class---don't allow another embarrasing thing like Roy Barnes' 10 Commandments stained glass wall. I pity the people at the art museum who have to endure looking at that ugly piece of garbage every day. You can look at Van Perlberg's house at Christmas and you'll know what good design sense he has. Not!
We should load up all the homeless vagrants that hang out in the Marietta Square on the railcar and hook it to the next Westbound train going to San Francisco. (Solve two of Marietta's problems at once).
What a fiasco! My husband and I are planning on a visit to Marietta this Fall. He has been looking forward to touring my native Georgia. I've been singing praises about the area. Please...stop vascillating, people, improve it or move it!
In response to the comment made by "Rail Lover", so, you are the grinch that stole Christmas! First you have a problem with "Gone With the Wind", then you have a problem with the Ten Commandments and Christmas. From just reading your short comment it was plain for all to see that you are a miserable soul!
Goldstein's "Cuthbertson's building" is no better looking than the railcar, nor are any of a number of dumps on Hedges Street, West Dixie Avenue and Gramling Street. I cannot grasp why someone supposedly so civic minded is so brazen in his do nothing approach to this building on the Square and just lets that property sit looking like an eyesore. That particular piece is reminiscient of the numerous decrepit and tacky looking properties in downtown Atlanta selling junk like incense and freedom wigs, in the same neighborhood where respectable people once took their families and shopped. Why not have one of the crack reporters for the MDJ investigate the ownership of the dumps across the street from the conference center and list out their names, occupations and pictures in the MDJ?
Of course painting a "Gone With the Wind" mural would look pretty dumb. I'm a fan of the movie and I also have nothing against the Ten Commandments, but that stained glass thing looks like it was done by a 5 year old. Are the taxpayers supposed to pay to fix it up? No, they don't even own it. Can the city just snap its fingers to make it go away? No. Property owners are protected by due process. If you have no patience for the rule of law, I think they may have an opening for you down in Club Gitmo.
I hink it needs to be brought "up to par" and kept!. also think some of this is political- you have to "know Joe" to get any fairness out of the Marietta City Council.
I found your post funny, but a bit presumptuous, since you know nothing about me yet are quick to judge. I am a fan GWTW when it is where it belongs: on a screen, and not on the side of a rail car. Since I can quote most of the dialogue by heart and know the film shot for shot, I can say that your assumption is hasty and misguided. I am also a Christian, and unlike some self-professed Christians, I actually use the commandments as a template to live by. If you had bothered to think before typing, you would realize that I was not criticizing the commandments, just bad art, which another poster has also pointed out. As for Mr. Perlberg, I believe he is a man of most excellent humor and would be the first to admit that his Christmas decorations are blatantly over-the-top, on purpose. I enjoy seeing his yard every year and look forward to what new heights he will achieve. My own house is bathed in lights at Christmas; it is one of my favorite holidays! But as the other reader agreed, having a GWTW mural painted on the side of the railcar would look tacky. So, in a nutshell MLS, I am not a miserable soul, but by your negative interpretation of my character, I would say that you only need to look in the mirror to find one. (And if this was written by Mr. Perlberg, forgive me--I underestimated your sense of humor!) :-)
The rail car DOES add character, but it does need to be fixed up. There could be a fundraiser and we could all contribute to fix it up, even though Dr. Lumpkin would still own it. Just like The Strand!
How can the city of Marietta levy a fine on a railcar that sits on CSX property? As far as I know they cannot. Someone should let them know.
if anyone has the owner's contact info or can give them my email address, i would appreciate it. if they arent going to fix that rail car then i am interested in buying it. i will have it relocated to my property and restored. i dont want to see a piece of history destroyed. onthegoroadside@yahoo.com thanks