For many years my dream was to be a history teacher. By 1973 my new dream was to carve out a future in the tourist railroad industry. I loved teaching, but I hated the politics of it, so I walked away from my teaching career in Ohio and moved to Chama, NM. The opportunity to work for a tourist railroad owned by two states, regulated by a federal agency, operated by a private company, and closely snoopervised by a group of malevolent railfans determined to undermine said company (OK, you should maybe take that last statement with a grain of salt, or two) seemed like just the way to escape from politics. Now I ask you, how smart was that?
Nancy and I arrived in Chama in early June, set up housekeeping in a kitchenette unit at the Chama Station Lodge across the street from the depot, and went to work for Scenic Railways, Inc., contract operator of the C&TS. By the time I arrived on the scene the challenge of getting the property up and running was pretty well in hand. Scenic Director Fritz Baur was the full time site manager, and President Bob Keller was around during most of the operating season. Fritz was great with behind-the-scenes details, but not really a people person. Bob was a good people person, but was focused more on schmoozing with the movers and shakers. What they needed now was someone to see to the mundane aspects of sales and public relations: initially, the day-to-day staffing and operation of the front office, and establishing and maintaining effective communications with the traveling public on the phone and over the counter; expanding in time to include involvement in local and state tourism promotion efforts, tour packaging, that sort of thing.
The Schedule
After experimenting with a variety of trip and schedule formats during the first couple of seasons, Scenic had settled on regular round trips between Chama and Antonito: a six-and-a-half-hour one way trip by train with a one-and-a-half hour return by bus. This schedule format was adopted primarily, I think, because of unrealistic expectations that grew out of the early “save the railroad” efforts, not because it made good operating, business or economic sense for the fledging tourist railroad.
According to the 1973 edition of the Steam Passenger Service Directory, C&TS trains ran Friday through Monday from May 25 through October 14, and also on Tuesdays and Wednesdays in July and August. The fare was $14 per adult and $5 per child through age 12. I believe that we also ran some Moonlight Specials to Osier behind the Pineapple.
There was one train per operating day, departing from opposite terminals at 10am on alternate days. Busses departed from the other terminal at 8am. The busses then returned to their originating terminal to pick up passengers who started the trip on the train. Thus, every passenger on every train could enjoy the entire railroad. Passengers in a hurry sometimes arranged for their car to be ferried from one terminal to another by an off-duty Scenic employee, for an additional fee privately arranged. The drivers flagged the grade crossings between Chama and Cumbres during the bus deadhead move.
Scenic ran a speeder ahead of each train to watch for track problems, and a fire patrol behind each train. The speeder operators were based in Chama and deadheaded back and forth in a bus or the company station wagon, or laid over in Antonito.
Pre-1973, Scenic contracted with local school bus operators in Chama to provide the alternate bus service, but this had problems. First, the busses were, well, school busses. Second, their availability was not always guaranteed, especially when the C&TS schedule overlapped the school year. So Scenic committed to purchase six brand new IH glorified 45 passenger school busses, customized for the intended service. The new busses and the drivers were based in Antonito. The busses would overnight at the next morning’s departure terminal and the Company provided a station wagon for the driver deadhead trip to and from Antonito.
The Staff
To the best of my recollection Scenic had about three dozen people on the payroll in 1973, distributed as follows:
Antonito: 5 bus drivers, 1 bus driver/mechanic; 3 or 4 depot staff; 2 to 4 custodians/train cleaners; and Swede Johnson (terminal manager, I think). Total about a dozen.
Chama: 2 in the shop; 3 engine crew; 3 train crew; 2 to 4 custodians/train cleaners; 2 speeder patrol; 4 or 5 track gang; 5 depot staff; Fritz. Total about two dozen. I could be a little low on engine and train crews, especially during the six-day per week operation.
Durango ticket office: 2 agents.
Food service on the train and at Osier was subcontracted.
Gary Getman, one of the trainmen, ran the souvenir shop in the baggage room at the Chama depot before train departure.
Of course we wore many hats. Train crews would work in the shop on non-operating days; shop crews would run the helper engines when we double headed; speeder operators would help in the shop, do grounds keeping or whatever was needed; depot staff and management would also sometimes help clean the trains or restrooms, direct traffic and such.
The Train
The basic train consisted of eleven cars with a total of 270 seats. The snack car was in the center of the train. There was a 22-seat restroom equipped excursion boxcar (XBC) (whatever you want to call it) on either side of the snack car. Then three 32-seat XBC’s each way, then another 22-seat restroom car on each end. This was considered to be the maximum tonnage for one K-36 on the 4% grade out of Chama. The open gon was kept at Cumbres. Note that the total seating capacity of the six company busses was also 270. Thus, theoretically, we could totally fill the train from one terminal and take everyone back by bus. This would have meant one-half round trip per day per bus instead of one-and-one-half trips. More economical, but of course not practical. The next best option was an equal number of departures from each terminal, and we
did strive for that.
We had a pretty sophisticated reservation system for those preautomated days which, I believe, was designed by Fritz. Like most things Fritz, it was very efficient. It was pretty darn hard to double book seats or over book trains, although not totally impossible. IIRC, Martha McKinley was in charge of the Chama ticket office with Ceci Martinez and Georgie (?) assisting. My wife joined that crew for the summer. Antonito also had a ticket office that was competently staffed although I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t remember the names of any of the ladies over there. Again IIRC, a block of seats was assigned to Antonito and once either side came close to filling their block there would be a lot of communication between the two until the basic train was filled. Once it became apparent that the basic train
would fill we would start adding cars, but we also kept an eye on “train pairs”. For example if a basic train departing from Chama was filling up significantly faster than the following day’s departure from Antonito, we would do our best to encourage people to ride the next day rather than add cars. The goal, of course, was to avoid the extra crew and operating cost of doubleheading. The extra crew cost, really, was lost time in the shop.
Once the decision to add cars
was made we would keep them balanced front and rear until we reached a total of 17 cars, or three additional 32 seat cars on each end. This was considered maximum tonnage for doubleheaded K-36’s out of Chama (one K-36 could handle the 17 cars plus whatever else we could hang on the train between Cumbres and Antonito). As we approached the maximum bus capacity for any departure we would consider
that departure sold out and try to move people to the other departure. “Yes, sir, we still have seats available on the train from Chama on the 10th, but the problem is getting you on a bus return. If you can get to Antonito in time for the 8am bus departure that morning we can accommodate you there.” It was salesmanship, and it required the office staff to be aware of the bookings and also to pay attention to customer needs. If all else failed we would contract with local school bus drivers to accommodate out-of-balance situations, an additional cost we tried to avoid. And of course, during May, September and October the school busses were only available on weekends.
During peak times the ticket agents would also help people find accommodations. In those days lodging in Antonito was virtually nonexistent, and there wasn’t a whole lot of choice in Chama either. It wasn’t uncommon for people to cancel train reservations because they couldn’t find a place to stay in the area, so we stayed in close contact with the local lodges and motels and would sometimes put a customer on hold while we called around to find them a room. In addition we honored special requests whenever possible: blocks of seats for large groups of friends or family members, preferred location in train, scenic side, that sort of thing. We never promised, but always said we would do our best.
Filling the trains efficiently and economically was kinda like playing dimensional chess.
The Patrons
Sources of traffic varied depending on the time of the year and the day of the week. For this discussion I divide the traffic into tourists and locals. Tourists would be those who came to or through the area as part of an extended vacation. They may live close by or far away. Locals are those who live within “easy driving distance” and come primarily to ride the train. IIRC, the bulk of our weekend and fall foliage traffic was local.
The nearest local market is the Los Alamos /Santa Fe/Albuquerque corridor. These folks could easily make it a one day event. They mainly impacted the food service sector of the local economy and were not greatly affected by the scarcity of local accommodations. Another advantage to this market, it is nearly equidistant from either terminal. Once we pointded this out it wasn’t hard to get people into an Antonito departure as needed to balance trains, because everyone got the same trip experience regardless of departure point.
The Denver/Colorado Springs/Pueblo corridor was the larger local population base, but it was just far enough away to make the one day event problematic. I do know though that many people, even from Denver, did do it in one day. However, for most patrons from this corridor it tended to be a weekend outing with Alamosa/Monte Vista as the primary beneficiary (I don’t remember if the Narrow Gauge Motel in Antonito had been built yet). A family of four (two adults, two kids) from this market was looking at a minimum of $50 for the train ride and lunch at Osier, and at least another $50 for gas, food and lodging, making it a harder nut to crack.
The tourists typically came from Texas and the Midwest looking for cool mountains. They were in the area for a few days looking for fun and interesting things to do. They were already booked in at places like Red River, Taos, Fun Valley and South Fork, Pagosa Springs, or the various lodges and campgrounds on the Conejos or in the Chama area. Or they were passing through on their way to or from their destination, and worked the C&TS in as a side trip. These folks tended to ride the weekday trains, as they were travelling on the weekends.
The Challenge
My primary challenge that first year was to learn the system, get to “know the territory,” develop POS strategies that would fill trains while maximizing operating efficiency without alienating potential customers, and then model those strategies to encourage office staff to use them. In 1973 the C&TS was the new kid on the block, an unknown quantity outside of our local markets. Part of the challenge for the office staff was to convince tourists who called or stopped in that they really wanted to gamble a day and fifty bucks or so on us.
I also opened and staffed a ticket office in Durango hoping to take advantage of the fabled standbys that the Silverton Train generated. What we thought was a no-brainer turned out to be a no-go. That office didn’t generate enough revenue to pay the salaries, let alone the rent, utilities and local promotion costs. Just another expensive miscalculation based on the delusional thinking underpinning the C&TS. Well, at least we learned from that one and never repeated it.
Overall, though, it was a good season. I think we carried somewhere around 36,000 passengers, a significant increase over the previous years. The new busses were well received, and the Company had no reason to think that that gamble would not be justified.
But, as they say in the high country, all that glitters ain’t gold. Then as now, the C&TS was cursed by too many unrealistic expectations, too much delusional thinking. Of course, without them the line from Antonito to Chama would be in about the same condition today as is the line from Chama to Durango. But that doesn’t make it any easier for those who have to labor under them.
"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 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 7 time(s). Last edit at 11/22/2011 04:21PM by gothpapa.
