Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 5B: 1974, elephant in the room
| March 03, 2011 09:32PM |
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Unexpectedly finding themselves in an unstable economic environment, Scenic’s directors gave long and careful consideration to the options available for a 1974 operating season, and in the process learned first-hand what it means to bite the bullet. They finally came up with a schedule that seemed workable but made nobody happy. In the end, all felt that it was better than nothing.
The schedule, as it appeared in the 1974 Steam Passenger Service Directory, was:
May 25 through August 1: Six-hour Cumbres/Sublette round trips by diesel powered passenger train, departing Cumbres at 10:30am on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday.
August 3 through October 6: Chama/Antonito round trips, one-way by steam-powered passenger train, one-way by bus, Saturdays and Sundays. Additional operating days would be announced if demand warranted. (I don’t remember what we did about “additional operating days.” I believe that we added two back-to-back weekdays during August, but can’t confirm that from any sources I have.)
Well, OK, not all felt that this was better than nothing. There were some, especially among those afflicted with the dreaded D&RGNG/steam fetish thing, who felt that no operation at all would have been better than this, and there were even a few who thought that Scenic had invented or greatly exaggerated the crisis just so we could defile the C&TS with a diesel. They complained to the Commission and to anyone else in authority who they could buttonhole. But fortunately, more rational and sensible heads prevailed.
The train consisted of #19, an open gon, the snack car, two 22 seat restroom cars and three 32 seat cars, 140 seats total, with a three-man crew. Bite the Bullet was still shooting as the tourist season got under way and the regular engine and train crews (Jim Shawcroft and Richard Braden, Gary Getman and we don’t remember who was brakie) were committed to that, so John Oldberg and I started the season on the Pineapple. John and I, along with Bob Keller and the snack car crew, would drive up to Cumbres about an hour before departure. I would open the ticket office/gift shop in the section house to handle will-calls and last minute sales. The others prepped the train. A few minutes before departure I would join John on the #19 as fireman, with Keller as conductor. Once Bite the Bullet was finished, Richard took over as engineer and Gary as conductor on the Cumbres turn. Jim Shawcroft figured he had turned Richard into a first class engineer by that time, so he returned to his “real job” running the Silverton Train. Someone else was added to the payroll to serve as fireman, but neither Richard nor I can remember who it was.
At this point, John, Bob and I went back to performing our regular duties, but I continued to open the ticket office/gift shop in the section house before departures. Ceci Martinez handled things at the Chama depot and we also had someone on duty in Antonito. Bernie Watts and Doug Chaeney worked in the shop. Max and his crew were on the job also. That was about it, a dozen or so people on the payroll through July, IIRC.
A Cumbres Turn has just returned to Cumbres; John Oldberg pilots the #19 east near Los Pinos Tank as the Bite the Bullet movie train precedes us around the Loop.
The Cumbres Pass departures were well patronized, given the times, and reservations for the later season steam trains started rolling in. Experience prior to the 1974 season showed that patronage normally peaked during August and the fall color season, and that weekend trains were always the best patronized. That, of course, is why we developed the schedule as we did. And it worked out well. In the end there were few empty seats on the scheduled weekend trains, even during the late August/early September shoulder season.
Not only that, we received very positive feedback from people who actually rode the Cumbres trains, many of whom were repeat riders from previous years. They liked the later start, the shorter trip, the chance to enjoy the best and most remote scenery twice, the lack of smoke and cinders in the eye, being almost as clean when they got back as they were when they started out, and not having to ride the busses. And we had few complaints of the “diesel vs. steam” variety from first time riders.
As it turned out, that period from May 25 to August 1, 1974 was the only time we ever made a solid profit on the passenger operation. And we did that with far fewer passengers than during the same time period the previous year. Well, go figure. Payroll and operating costs were minimal. Diesel fuel was easily obtained and still inexpensive. The #19 was in good condition and required little maintenance. It was an easy day: crank up the diesel in the morning, run the trip, shut down the diesel when you get back, clean the train, and go home. The minimal grades and smaller trains were no great challenge for locomotive or rolling stock. There was no bus expense (except for the ongoing payments, of course). Richard recently told me, “I do remember that I enjoyed them (the Cumbres/Sublette trips). They were very relaxing, the engine was smooth riding and not too noisy, with the only major challenge being to make good time while keeping the #2 engine from boiling over! There was a fine art to that – keeping the temperature just below a certain point, beyond which it would just keep rising.”
And we even made money on the steam trains. People often obsess over patronage levels, but the real measure of financial success should be occupancy rate, just as it is in the motel business. Every seat on every train is inventory, and every seat that leaves the station empty is lost inventory. If your break-even is 75% occupancy and you are running at less than that it doesn’t matter how many people you carry, you still lose money; and if you don’t exceed that you will never make money. IIRC, the weekend trains in July and August ran at or above break-even. Many Chama departures were doubleheaded with Bernie and Doug serving as the second engine crew (well, I’m pretty sure about that).
Two projects completed in Chama during the early summer were the conversion of the “Winrock Boxcar” into a souvenir car that would be carried in the train between Cumbres and Antonito, and the conversion of another boxcar into a charter “Parlor Caboose.” Both were ready when steam operations resumed and are seen here on their maiden voyage.
Meanwhile, in Antonito, construction was begun on the new engine house which was built specifically to facilitate the restoration of the #463. Both the engine house and the restoration were financed by a grant awarded through the efforts of Bob Burgraff. Or at least that has always been my understanding.
It’s true that our patronage for the season was way down, but then tourism was down throughout the region that year, so it was very hard to blame that on the diesel or the shorter season. As expected, the traffic from our major out-of-state markets was virtually non-existent during the early summer. Those who did show up and wanted to ride the train rode it.
And this brings us to the “elephant in the room.”
Scenic director Dave Ogle was a professional marketing man, and he was big on “data mining” as we say nowadays. As a result, we had a pretty good handle on the demographics, interests, preferences, and travel pattern of our patrons. Where our patrons came from and where they stayed while in the area was discussed in some detail in “The Patrons” section of Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History Part 3A: 1973, Filling Trains. To recap: the vast majority were just normal ordinary people, not railfans. All of the true – or at least professed – railfans, with their families, who paid to ride the train in any one season, would have maybe filled one of our doubleheaders. The bulk of the weekend and shoulder-season riders were “weekenders” from the Denver-to-Albuquerque corridor. The weekday riders tended to hail from greater distances – Texas, California, and the Midwest. Most were part of that vast herd of tourists who migrate to the area every year, settle into a resort, lodge or campground for a week or two, and then do whatever looks interesting. Fishing and boating, hiking and biking, badminton and bird watching, trail rides and train rides were all part of the mix.
IIRC, the most common complaints about the C&TS were the length and cost of the ride, and the rather boring scenery at the Antonito end of the line. We also received negative feedback about the bus ride, the smoke and cinders on the 4% grade, and the primitive nature of the cars (especially during inclement weather). The diesel powered Cumbres/Sublette turn addressed all of these issues except for the last one.
Anyway, the 1974 season proved to me what I had already figured out intuitively: the C&TS, and who ever tries to operate it, was/is being held back by requirements and expectations rooted in various unrealistic and even delusional assumptions that grew out of the early “save the railroad” efforts. We learned that:
• it is possible to serve the economic interests of the terminal communities while originating and terminating trips at Cumbres – after all, you can’t get there without going through Chama or Antonito;
• it is possible to design, promote and operate service options that meet a variety of customer and company needs. After all, “real” railroads do that all the time;
• it is possible to enjoy a ride over the railroad in a diesel powered train. After all there is more to the C&TS than steam locomotives;
• it is possible for the operator to make money, even in hard economic times, if given the means and opportunity to run trains in a way that makes good operating and business sense. The 1974 season pointed in that direction, but no one had the desire or the influence to go there.
Well, anyway, thanks to Bite the Bullet and the conservative summer operation, Scenic and the C&TS survived 1974, paid off 1973, had enough money in the bank to stumble into another season – and enough coal on hand to support another “Winter Special” if we should decide to do one.
The casual early summer schedule gave us the chance to take a trainman’s holiday in July when we chartered the "Cinco Animas" for a trip to Silverton. Among those I can identify here (with a little help from Richard) are, front left to right: Dave Rusconi, Gary Getman, John Coker, John Oldberg, Richard Braden and Bob Keller; standing left to right: Nancy Butterworth, (?), Gary Breeding, Sissy Watts, Bernie Watts, one of the “Osterwald Boys” and Ross Osborne.
(Richard Braden and Doug Chaeney helped me to "remember" who did what when in the mechanical and operating departments. I hope we got it right.)
"Sometimes he remembers things that never happened and forgets things that did happen!" Mrs. B.
See also:
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 1: Meeting Fritz
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 2: Expectations
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History Part 3A: 1973, Filling Trains
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 3B: 1973, "If the world ended today...."
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 4: OM-74
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 5A: 1974, Biting the Bullet
About the author
Also of interest:
How Many Winter Specials did Scenic Railways operate?
Bite the Bullet Photo Gallery
"Time spent with CATS is never wasted." -- Sigmund Freud
"Nothing endures but change." -- Heraclitus
"C'est le meilleur des mondes possibles." -- Candide
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 03/08/2011 08:53PM by gothpapa.
The schedule, as it appeared in the 1974 Steam Passenger Service Directory, was:
May 25 through August 1: Six-hour Cumbres/Sublette round trips by diesel powered passenger train, departing Cumbres at 10:30am on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday.
August 3 through October 6: Chama/Antonito round trips, one-way by steam-powered passenger train, one-way by bus, Saturdays and Sundays. Additional operating days would be announced if demand warranted. (I don’t remember what we did about “additional operating days.” I believe that we added two back-to-back weekdays during August, but can’t confirm that from any sources I have.)
Well, OK, not all felt that this was better than nothing. There were some, especially among those afflicted with the dreaded D&RGNG/steam fetish thing, who felt that no operation at all would have been better than this, and there were even a few who thought that Scenic had invented or greatly exaggerated the crisis just so we could defile the C&TS with a diesel. They complained to the Commission and to anyone else in authority who they could buttonhole. But fortunately, more rational and sensible heads prevailed.
The train consisted of #19, an open gon, the snack car, two 22 seat restroom cars and three 32 seat cars, 140 seats total, with a three-man crew. Bite the Bullet was still shooting as the tourist season got under way and the regular engine and train crews (Jim Shawcroft and Richard Braden, Gary Getman and we don’t remember who was brakie) were committed to that, so John Oldberg and I started the season on the Pineapple. John and I, along with Bob Keller and the snack car crew, would drive up to Cumbres about an hour before departure. I would open the ticket office/gift shop in the section house to handle will-calls and last minute sales. The others prepped the train. A few minutes before departure I would join John on the #19 as fireman, with Keller as conductor. Once Bite the Bullet was finished, Richard took over as engineer and Gary as conductor on the Cumbres turn. Jim Shawcroft figured he had turned Richard into a first class engineer by that time, so he returned to his “real job” running the Silverton Train. Someone else was added to the payroll to serve as fireman, but neither Richard nor I can remember who it was.
At this point, John, Bob and I went back to performing our regular duties, but I continued to open the ticket office/gift shop in the section house before departures. Ceci Martinez handled things at the Chama depot and we also had someone on duty in Antonito. Bernie Watts and Doug Chaeney worked in the shop. Max and his crew were on the job also. That was about it, a dozen or so people on the payroll through July, IIRC.
The Cumbres Pass departures were well patronized, given the times, and reservations for the later season steam trains started rolling in. Experience prior to the 1974 season showed that patronage normally peaked during August and the fall color season, and that weekend trains were always the best patronized. That, of course, is why we developed the schedule as we did. And it worked out well. In the end there were few empty seats on the scheduled weekend trains, even during the late August/early September shoulder season.
Not only that, we received very positive feedback from people who actually rode the Cumbres trains, many of whom were repeat riders from previous years. They liked the later start, the shorter trip, the chance to enjoy the best and most remote scenery twice, the lack of smoke and cinders in the eye, being almost as clean when they got back as they were when they started out, and not having to ride the busses. And we had few complaints of the “diesel vs. steam” variety from first time riders.
As it turned out, that period from May 25 to August 1, 1974 was the only time we ever made a solid profit on the passenger operation. And we did that with far fewer passengers than during the same time period the previous year. Well, go figure. Payroll and operating costs were minimal. Diesel fuel was easily obtained and still inexpensive. The #19 was in good condition and required little maintenance. It was an easy day: crank up the diesel in the morning, run the trip, shut down the diesel when you get back, clean the train, and go home. The minimal grades and smaller trains were no great challenge for locomotive or rolling stock. There was no bus expense (except for the ongoing payments, of course). Richard recently told me, “I do remember that I enjoyed them (the Cumbres/Sublette trips). They were very relaxing, the engine was smooth riding and not too noisy, with the only major challenge being to make good time while keeping the #2 engine from boiling over! There was a fine art to that – keeping the temperature just below a certain point, beyond which it would just keep rising.”
And we even made money on the steam trains. People often obsess over patronage levels, but the real measure of financial success should be occupancy rate, just as it is in the motel business. Every seat on every train is inventory, and every seat that leaves the station empty is lost inventory. If your break-even is 75% occupancy and you are running at less than that it doesn’t matter how many people you carry, you still lose money; and if you don’t exceed that you will never make money. IIRC, the weekend trains in July and August ran at or above break-even. Many Chama departures were doubleheaded with Bernie and Doug serving as the second engine crew (well, I’m pretty sure about that).
Meanwhile, in Antonito, construction was begun on the new engine house which was built specifically to facilitate the restoration of the #463. Both the engine house and the restoration were financed by a grant awarded through the efforts of Bob Burgraff. Or at least that has always been my understanding.
It’s true that our patronage for the season was way down, but then tourism was down throughout the region that year, so it was very hard to blame that on the diesel or the shorter season. As expected, the traffic from our major out-of-state markets was virtually non-existent during the early summer. Those who did show up and wanted to ride the train rode it.
And this brings us to the “elephant in the room.”
Scenic director Dave Ogle was a professional marketing man, and he was big on “data mining” as we say nowadays. As a result, we had a pretty good handle on the demographics, interests, preferences, and travel pattern of our patrons. Where our patrons came from and where they stayed while in the area was discussed in some detail in “The Patrons” section of Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History Part 3A: 1973, Filling Trains. To recap: the vast majority were just normal ordinary people, not railfans. All of the true – or at least professed – railfans, with their families, who paid to ride the train in any one season, would have maybe filled one of our doubleheaders. The bulk of the weekend and shoulder-season riders were “weekenders” from the Denver-to-Albuquerque corridor. The weekday riders tended to hail from greater distances – Texas, California, and the Midwest. Most were part of that vast herd of tourists who migrate to the area every year, settle into a resort, lodge or campground for a week or two, and then do whatever looks interesting. Fishing and boating, hiking and biking, badminton and bird watching, trail rides and train rides were all part of the mix.
IIRC, the most common complaints about the C&TS were the length and cost of the ride, and the rather boring scenery at the Antonito end of the line. We also received negative feedback about the bus ride, the smoke and cinders on the 4% grade, and the primitive nature of the cars (especially during inclement weather). The diesel powered Cumbres/Sublette turn addressed all of these issues except for the last one.
Anyway, the 1974 season proved to me what I had already figured out intuitively: the C&TS, and who ever tries to operate it, was/is being held back by requirements and expectations rooted in various unrealistic and even delusional assumptions that grew out of the early “save the railroad” efforts. We learned that:
• it is possible to serve the economic interests of the terminal communities while originating and terminating trips at Cumbres – after all, you can’t get there without going through Chama or Antonito;
• it is possible to design, promote and operate service options that meet a variety of customer and company needs. After all, “real” railroads do that all the time;
• it is possible to enjoy a ride over the railroad in a diesel powered train. After all there is more to the C&TS than steam locomotives;
• it is possible for the operator to make money, even in hard economic times, if given the means and opportunity to run trains in a way that makes good operating and business sense. The 1974 season pointed in that direction, but no one had the desire or the influence to go there.
Well, anyway, thanks to Bite the Bullet and the conservative summer operation, Scenic and the C&TS survived 1974, paid off 1973, had enough money in the bank to stumble into another season – and enough coal on hand to support another “Winter Special” if we should decide to do one.
(Richard Braden and Doug Chaeney helped me to "remember" who did what when in the mechanical and operating departments. I hope we got it right.)
"Sometimes he remembers things that never happened and forgets things that did happen!" Mrs. B.
See also:
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 1: Meeting Fritz
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 2: Expectations
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History Part 3A: 1973, Filling Trains
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 3B: 1973, "If the world ended today...."
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 4: OM-74
Scenic and the C&TS, an Oral History, Part 5A: 1974, Biting the Bullet
About the author
Also of interest:
How Many Winter Specials did Scenic Railways operate?
Bite the Bullet Photo Gallery
"Time spent with CATS is never wasted." -- Sigmund Freud
"Nothing endures but change." -- Heraclitus
"C'est le meilleur des mondes possibles." -- Candide
Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 03/08/2011 08:53PM by gothpapa.
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488 stops for water at Los Pinos tank on closing day Oct. 1979. Photo courtesy Don Richter
The NGDF was started by Don Richter and is currently operated in his memory by Nathan Holmes and others. Others who have contributed to the upkeep of this board are (in no particular order): Charles McCandless, Everett Lueck, Ted Wilton, Cole Adams, James Bane, John Moellmer, Jon Bentz, Linn Moedinger, lloyd lehrer, Rod Jensen, John Craft, Steven Forney, Herb Kelsey, Bill Ramaley, Russ Sperry (El Russo Loco), Josh McNeal, John West, Jim Armstrong, Bob Bergstrom, Greg Scholl, Blake Forbes Doug van Veelen and Mark Fuller.