Re: Non-Sequiturianism on the Narrow Gauge . . .

Jerry474 Wrote:
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> Was this a "serious" charter? No D&RGW lettering.
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> [attachment 75100 _8503770.jpg]

Hi Jerry,

The rotary event was definitely serious, but not really a charter. The 2020 Rotary run was an event designed and sold entirely by the railroad. They decided and announced how the equipment would be lettered, the running schedule and the size of the photo lines. Potential customers had the option to decide if the product was something they wanted to see at a price that made sense to them.....and of course for most of us, the answer was YES. I think that if a poll was taken among the 150 customers, a majority probably would have preferred D&RGW lettering on the equipment, but seeing the rotary actually operate was far more important to everyone.

With a true charter, the railroad works for the charter operator and the operator negotiates all of the details in advance and gets a contract. The operator then sells the tickets directly to their clients and writes the (BIG) check to the railroad. The key advantages of these are usually more authenticity, and smaller photo lines, enabling more spots and more photo angles. They also cost more and require a lot of planning and negotiations. Obviously, if it were possible to do a rotary charter, the operator would likely request that the equipment be lettered for the legacy railroad. In this case, given all of the logistics involved in running OY, a private charter would have been almost prohibitively expensive. It would have required a Hollywood budget.

Please understand, I am in no way denigrating photography events organized by the railroads themselves. As indicated in my previous post, I have attended many of these, including numerous events on the DSNG with Eureka & 315. Many times, they are less expensive than private charters. As with the rotary, some of them offer things you can never see otherwise, and you have to overlook any historical inaccuracies that come with the territory. In other cases, such events may not be as attractive to me personally, but that's more because the proposed group sizes are too large to permit stops at locations I'd like to photograph, or because the events are single-day, and it just doesn't make sense for me to fly across the country for a lightning short event. I can't imagine not attending an event because of the equipment lettering......but it is definitely a nice-to-have.

/Kevin Madore