Re: Documentation on DRGW NG abandonment proceedings

Sharrod Wrote:
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> I suppose some of you have this right at your
> fingertips. Where can I find a nice, detailed
> documentation of the finances and arguments for
> abandonment of the DRGW NG? I suppose this
> document would also have detailed traffic figures
> for a few years and some forecast of future
> traffic flows.

1) Colorado RR Museum offered in the recent past, and may still offer, reprints of D&RGW's 1938 Branchline Report and 1949 Narrow Gauge Report, both of which go into exhaustive detail.

2) If there is a designated Federal Depository Library (think I've got the title correct) near you they may have copies of the bound volumes of ICC Reports. The local University library here is one and they have an (incomplete, dang it) collection. Abandonment hearings are recorded in the volumes labeled Finance Reports in red on the spine, starting in the mid-1920's. One problem with these, by later years an increasing number of cases were disposed of without printed reports. To give you an idea of the difference, when D&SL decided to finally rip up the line over Rollins Pass(1936), there was a report published. Most of the lines abandoned in the late 1940's and early 1950's, no such luck. However the proposed sale of the Silverton in 1960, the abandonment of the Antonito-Durango-Farmington lines and the eventual sale of the Silverton in 1980, are all covered. [If you are patient and would like such, I can pull together & send a list of at least some volume/page numbers for various lines of interest and also some lines that were, AFAIK, disposed without report] Somewhere there have to thick, dusty files with the examiners reports and the rest that these reports are based on but, AFAIK, they aren't online of generally available.

3) Also available in ICC Reports, Valuation Reports (Black letters on spines, 1920's mostly) and various rate cases, which I have just started to explore after all these years.

Hank

PS. I really, really want to get back to going through those ICC reports but I'm lacking the money for the photocopier right now BTW, Federal Publications are NOT under copy-write so anybody who wants to go look these up and put copies on the web, have at it! If I ever get a scanner, I plan to.