Arch Tram passes inspection, will reopen today

The Gateway Arch is back in business, in time for the Columbus Day holiday. The tram system that carries visitors to the top of the 630-foot monument--the nation's tallest--passed an inspection Friday. It will open today. "We're back up to 80 percent of full electric power, which we feel is sufficient to operate the tram and reopen some of the lobby attractions," said Arch Superintendent Gary Easton. He added that reserve generators could power the single tram that operates during the fall season in case the main switch should fail.

The tram and the museum-theater complex underneath have been closed since a freak fire broke out in the main electrical panel 12 days ago. The Arch and lobby reopen at 9 a.m. today, several weeks earlier than originally predicted. One of the theaters, the gift shop and restrooms have been cleaned of smoke fallout and will be open.

A National Park Service ranger passed on the good news Friday to visitors Lou and Rose Gaudio of Kenosha, Wis., who had come down with a convention group by bus from the Airport Marriott Hotel only to find the Arch cordoned off with yellow tape.

"They didn't tell us about the fire," said her husband, Lou, who was in the city for a reunion of the World War II 387th Air Force Bomber Group. While a cadre of rangers and interpretive guides manned teepee and campfire exhibits and talked to visitors outside on the park grounds, a small army of contract workers and other park employees were inside cleaning, wiping, vacuuming, ripping up carpet and generally getting the place back in shape.

Diana Pappas, a conservator with Steamatic restoration service, was gingerly vacuuming soot ash from Tom, Teddy and other Mount Rushmore outcroppings on the large terra cotta mural on the north lobby wall that compares the Arch in scale with our park service monuments.

"This is a slow, all-day job," said Pappas, taking down her nose-and-mouth mask. Today, she would be moving into the still-closed Museum of Westward Expansion for a thorough cleaning of the manifold exhibits, explanatory panels and polyurethane-wrapped figures of frontiersmen, American Indian tribes-men and wild animals.

Easton expects to reopen other attractions in stages. The museum probably could reopen by midweek, he said, albeit on a bare concrete floor minus the carpeting that was being removed Friday. The 10-year-old carpeting, trampled by the 3.5 million visitors each year, was going to be replaced later this year anyway and has been figured in the $425,000 cost of fire repairs. The 38-year-old main electrical panel is being rebuilt with the latest components and safeguards, Easton said.

Officials hope it will prevent a repeat of the September 28 human-error accident in which an ungrounded chain struck the AmerenUE main line.

The Tucker Theater, which shows a film on the Arch's construction, was freshly deodorized and ready for today's reopening. The Odyssey Theater, which shows "The Great American West" film on a huge screen, requires much more electric power and will be the last to reopen.

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