Well said Chris. Sometimes the obvious gets ignored. In my mind it is a no-brainer that the operator needs to have some obligations regarding historic integrity, etc., within the constraints imposed by safety, operating necessity, and economy.
But a prerequisite is for the Commission to take seriously the concept that the railroad is a museum or preserved railway or some such, and not just a tourist attraction. I have no idea of the likelihood of that happening.
During the life of the current Commmission, the primary driver has been economic survival.
But perhaps the railroad has achieved enough stability that it is time for the Commission to revisit the role of the C&TS as a museum, and how best to achieve that piece of its reason for being. The sad reality is as best as I can tell in political terms the whole historic preservation thing has been just window dressing for what is fundamentally a pork barrel project for a group of very poor constituents in both states. This is why the Friends have a BIG lobbying job as the museum wing of the railroad.
The irony is that much of the existing historic integrity of the railroad as a whole (as opposed to individual pieces of equipment and buildings worked on by the Friends) is due to the efforts of the most successful past operator, Kyle Railways, at its own initiative. Yes, it participated in building the non-historic engine house, put in Kyles Kink, and a few other things, but these were done as a result of operating need or necessity. In general Kyle's personnel were into "history" and kept things as Rio Grande as operating realities allowed. It is hard to believe that anything like the silver trim on the 489 would have happened under Kyle's watch.
JBWX
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 09/17/2008 01:42PM by John West.
