Stuart,
I am all for a recreation of a San Juan. But if you are looking for making this work on the C&TS then all you have is the RPO's.
No baggage car
No Closed Vestibule Coaches
No Parlor Cars
That is a lot of compromise
As I mentioned before, the D&S has (4) Vestibule Coaches (1) Parlor Car (2) Long RPO's (66 is restored to serviceable condition) bringing the D&S only a few gallons of Pullman Green and some gold lettering away from a real San Juan.
Of course they are missing the Baggage car.
I was part of a team that researched all of this and presented it to the D&S a few years back. They understand what they have. With the renewed interest in re-painting their equipment for railfan in the past few years, I would think the D&S is the clear choice for this re-creation. Maybe a few letters from some readers of this board will help. We even proposed they could charge a certain amour per rider to cover the cost of the train being a little shorter and the cost of the paint.
Be honest - who where would not want to shell out a few extra bucks to ride on nothing but authentic San Juan Equipment behind a K-28? Hell yes I would. Even the 482 was assigned to San Juan Service for a while, we pointed all that out as well.
Kevin Cook