Look, I get that D&S had to do
something after that crazy fire situation they got blamed for (which like many of you, I wouldn't bet my left that they caused) but I get this uneasy feeling that before we all know it, the D&S will be like the Grand Canyon was; a line that was mostly steam, then one day it was diesels most days with steam only on special occasions.
Part of the appeal of D&S and C&TS is that they're time capsules of the D&RGW, with steam long after it vanished from Class 1 lines.
There's nothing any of us can do about that, but it's a scary thing to me. Like a good (older) friend of mine told me when I was a teen, ride them when you can, because you never know when it'll end.
jcpatten Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> > Someone approached me and asked if I'd be willing to take pictures of the steam engine for him as they'd forgotten their camera, which I said I'd be glad to do. He then made the mistake of telling me he was hoping to get the railroad to stop running steam because of the pollution. I told him then that nobody there that day would be willing to help him.>>>
That's so odd because the
exact same thing happened to me at Strasburg in 2015. The guy told me he was putting together a 'packet' to the state to have steam locomotive banned in PA. He was actually a real putz about it, too. He didn't ask me to take some photos for him so much as he declared I would do so. I never suffered fools even as a kid, according to my mother. I looked him up and down in that slowly condescending way NCOs look at a 2nd LT when they say something stupid, a look I deservedly got more than a few times as a butter bar in the Army and said, "You do get that
anyone here is either going to be a fan of these things or the very least brought here by someone who is, right?"
he just stood there in befuddlement. I sneered, "good luck getting anyone here to help you with that," and walked away. I got to the other end of the platform and saw him staring at the ground, his brain apparently short circuited by the revelation. He walked back to the parking lot near the old PRR switch tower and I didn't see him again after that.
-Lee
Flickr photo set of my On30 layout