What place spent $13 million to renovate the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad (DL&W) station and transform it into a Hilton hotel?
When Scranton agreed to take on Steamtown, U.S.A., it was estimated that the museum and excursion business would attract 200,000 to 400,000 visitors to the city every year.  In anticipation of this economic boon, the city and a private developer spent $13 million to renovate the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad (DL&W) station and transform it into a Hilton hotel, at a time when the unemployment rate in the city was 13 percent.  Only 60,000 visitors showed up at Steamtown in 1987, and the 1988 excursions were canceled. After only three years, it was $2.2 million in debt and facing bankruptcy. Part of the problem was the cost of restoration of the new property and the deteriorating equipment. In addition, while the tourists in Vermont had enjoyed the sights of cornfields, farms, covered bridges, a waterfall and a gorge on a Steamtown excursion, the Scranton trip to Moscow, Pennsylvania, cut through one of the nation's largest junkyards, an eyesore described by Ralph Nader as "the eighth wonder of the world".In 1986, the U.S. House of Representatives, under the urging of Scranton native, Representative Joseph M. McDade, voted to approve the spending of $8 million to study the collection and to begin the process of making it a National Historic Site. By 1995, Steamtown was acquired and developed by the National Park Service (NPS) at a total cost of $66 million, and opened as Steamtown National Historic Site the same year. In preparation for its acquisition of the collection, the NPS had conducted historical research during 1987 and 1988 on the equipment that still remained in the foundation's possession. This research was used for a Scope of Collections Statement for Steamtown National Historic Site and was published in 1991 under the title Steamtown Special History Study. Aside from providing concise histories of the equipment, the report also made recommendations as to whether or not each piece belonged in the now government-funded collection. Historical significance to the United States was a criterion of the recommendations. Many of the pieces of equipment that did not meet the report's recommendations were sold or traded for pieces that had historical significance to the DL&W grounds on which the site is located.
Scranton