There are more than a few steam locomotives sitting in parks across Japan, enjoying their retirement.

I wanted to acknowledge the ones I happen across for all their hard work, so I started the Static Life Steam Locomotives Project, SLSL for short.

^{_{A map of the Static Life Steam Locomotives & more about the project is here.}}

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The “degoichi” name is essentially just D51 in Japanese: ‘de’ is ‘D’, ‘go’ is ‘5’ and ‘ichi’ is ‘1’. The D51 locomotives are the most ubiquitous park residents in Japan.

This particular D51 lives in Hamadera Park, in Sakai, in Osaka. It was one of Japan’s first public parks and has seen quite a lot of history in its time – the statue in the above pictures with the Russian on it?

That’s because this park was a prison camp for Russian prisoners of war during the Russo-Japanese war. There’s a lot more on the history of the park over at Kansai Odyssey.

D51-469 isn’t as glamorous as our previous two entries in the Static Life Steam Locomotive project, but that doesn’t mean that it didn’t have a gloriously active life ferrying cargo and people about Japan.

The information board explains that this D51 came out of the Omiya factory in Saitama in January, 1941 (Showa 15). It worked all over Japan, until its final trip to the Kiitanabe Depot in Wakayama Prefecture in August, 1972 (Showa 46.)

During these 31 years of service, D51-469 travelled 2,020,212 kilometres, which the sign explains is the equivalent of going around the earth 50 times.

That’s a lot of rail.

Here’s a breakdown of the details about this train, taken from the 国鉄D51形蒸気機関車 entry at wikipedia.

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TYPE D51 (2-8-2 locomotive)

Built by the Japanese Government Railways (JGR), the Japanese National Railways (JNR), and Kawasaki Heavy Industries Rolling Stock Company, Kisha Seizo, Hitachi, Nippon Sharyo, Mitsubishi, and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries from 1936 to 1945 and 1950 to 1951.

Axis arrangement : 1D1
Gauge : 1,067mm
full length : 19,730mm
Overall height : 3,980mm
Locomotive weight : 78.37t (operation maintenance)
Tender weight : 47.40t (operation maintenance)
Gross weight : 125.77t
Driving wheel diameter :1,400mm
Axis load : 14.30t
Number of cylinders : Single 2-cylinder
Cylinder (diameter x stroke) : 550mm x 660mm
Valve device : Walschaert style
Boiler pressure : 14.0 kg f / cm² (1.373 MPa; 199.1 psi) (when first introduced)
15.0 kg f / cm² (1.471 MPa; 213.4 psi) (all cars afterthe war)
Boiler water capacity : 6.0m³

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You can visit D51-469 here.