Thanks for all the update.
I have thought about this all day and the impact that it is going to have. I am hopeful. I operated a small railroad (Scale) that was based out of Sant Claus House here in North Pole, Ak. It took all the best of 6 years of my life, but the folks flocked to it during the summers. Everyone wanted to ride Santa's train. The most amazing thing I found was that all the young kids wanted to know if I had a Thomas the Tank engine!
I wished that I had. But you know the cool thing about it, these folks became steady customers once they found how much they enjoyed it. And a few of them have become railfans.
[My son and I where at a freinds house today. While there they played with his Thomas and Friends for three hours (Makes a dad proud!!) And his freind loves trains to. We have to admit it, we all started out somewhere liking trains.]
In the restoration of our Porter, we had young people come out, skilled craftsman and professionals who all wanted to help. If this isn't one of the greatest PR tools railroading could find, I don't know what is.
If I was one getting behind this operation, I would want to capitalize on it for all it worth. Bring out the historical groups, the preservation folks, the museums and volunter groups who need the influx of youth and adults. Let them set up their displays and recruiting booths. Trains are something you can get your hands on and when you have restored a locomotive or a peice of rolling stock, rebuilt that depot or what have you, those folks are going to take great pride in being part of that. And they will be back!
So anyway, it might not be faithful to the narrow gauge history, but it will be a great tool to get them started. I wish them the best.
Art
