Ouray-Ironton Electric Railway - What If...

Hello all. I am planning on modeling the three Silverton short lines in a sort of freelanced world, which brings me to this topic...
The Ouray-Ironton Electric railroad, supposed to connect its namesake cities (and in turn, the Ouray branch with the Silverton RR), was proposed in 1892 but work was never begun. The thought of 7% grades, a spiral loop, and even rack-and-pinion technology would make for some delightful modeling possibilities. Of course, because the railroad was never built there is no prototype to draw inspiration from.

So, I have developed theories of my own, and would like to know those of anyone who's interested in chiming in. What would the railroad have been like if it existed? What kind of locomotives would have operated on it? Would operations have been successful? What kind of an impact would it have had on the rest of the narrow gauge? You get the idea. Hopefully folks will find this an interesting discussion.