hsuthe Wrote:
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> It is nice to see people talking about stuff
> other than the D&RGW.
AMEN! I for one enjoy reading about and seeing photos of the WW&F, the SVRy, the EBT and the many fabulous railroads & locos Across the Pond and in the Antipodes - including the goat-powered one(s). IMHO, even an OCCASIONAL diseasel is more-or-less acceptable (just so long as it is Narrow Gauge).
> However, The D&RGW is among one of
> the most well known railroads for enthusi-
> asts. So I see why the D&RGW is so pop-
> ular on here.
IMHO, it's primarily because the D&RGW was the only Narrow Gauge common carrier still operating by the time many of us who post here were old enough to drive somewhere to see a Narrow Gauge railroad in operation.* Also, by the time many of us were old enough to drive somewhere to see Steam Locomotives in action, the D&RGW was the only Class One railroad in the United States still operating them in freight service on a fairly regular basis - and in a spectacular setting that included steep grades to a 10,000-foot summit which necessitated helper locomotives (and which passed through beautiful forests of aspen and pine, alpine meadows and two (2, count 'em 2) tunnels. Not to mention two REAL roundhouses - with actual working turntables at each end of the line - and not just several classic wooden water towers but two (2, count 'em, 2) huge wooden coaling towers with adjacent sand towers, shops, and other accoutrements of big-time Steam Railroading.
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El Abuelo (muy) Loco
* The S.P. Narrow Gauge was still operating - but mostly with a diseasel - when I first got my driver's license (but not a car), and IIRC the E.B.T. was in limbo then, and WAY too far away even if it was still running. I explored most of the DSP&P/C&S while at William Jackson Palmer's Colorado College in the early sixties, and the RGS on one of my trips home once I had a car, but the D&RGW is a favorite with many of us 'cause we saw it for real AND 'cause much of it is still around today.
