Some of my thoughts on this Rotary adventure. Having witness 1991, 1993, and 1997 I have seen what it takes to do these. In 1991 they ran to Cumbres the first day. The Friends had a charter run the second day, and after Cumbres they followed the OY. I bought a ticket and my brother rode that. It was a way to make a donation. In 1993 there was no special, but we had a charter running after the rotary ran. So they gained some revenue for that. The GM at the time(1993) was Joe Vigil. One day I was sitting in his truck talking to him, and he threw out some cost figures. He said he figured it cost the RR $10,000 dollars a day, so it ran 4 days, thus $40K. That was in 1993 dollars. Each of those three runs was to clear the railroad and ran in early May. The road was clear for driving as it had been plowed for some time. It was great to be able to follow the progress and some would do hiking to get glimpses and pics in the remote areas. But let me tell you it was a hard slog through the snow. I wouldn't do it today!
So lets look at 2020 with the OY. Running out of Antonito will be tough on the participants having to walk ahead of the Rotary each time. Also we are talking 150 people which will not only be hard walking but it will take a lot of time to herd that many folks to the shot and back aboard the train, or chase train! So I personally think the idea of doing it out of Chama works well for the health of the patrons, and for safety. Sure it would be great if anyone could witness the Rotary, but as I mentioned above it takes a lot of cash to run it. I have heard prices may be as high as $1,000-$1,200.00. So this will remove a lot of folks right away. So lets say you have 150 patrons at $1,000 each. Thats 150K to play with. Costs will be a lot for 2 days, which is really more like 5-7 days with all the prep involved and crews. The expenses, many hidden, will be quite a bit, and of course they hope to turn a profit for all the efforts going into it. You have the train crew which is 4-5 on the Rotary, 3 engines with 2 crew each, plus brakemen, and Conductor. But because its a Rotary run you also will have section men to do many tasks as required, like clearing switches, and any other issues. There will be bus costs, and many employees will be back to handle customer needs. Meals may be included, or snacks during the day. There might be assistance from the state or local service departments (police and Fire), and a host of other expenses.
My point is that if this OY trip costs the railroad $100K to operate, and they make $40-50K they deserve it. Now, imagine if they are opening the railroad and have to spend 3-4 days with OY, and the cost is $100K to do that. At best they might make $10K back from selling a chase train the second day. So that's a 90K loss. As someone else mentioned they can open the railroad with dozers and engines far cheaper, and with less risk than running the Rotary to open the RR.
I know a lot of folks might not want to travel during that time of year anyway. When we did the trips in the 90's I drove and we had pleasant spring conditions. That might be an issue in Feb-March. I know most of these guys fly though, so perhaps not a big deal. Unfortunately we cannot have more than one Rotary OY event. I suspect once this is plowed, it will not need the OY again before the season starts. As someone else suggested doing one in 2021 might be a way to resolve the problem of folks getting to see it that don't get to in 2020.
Anyway food for thought, to understand the logistics of all this!
Greg