Re: K-37 #496? - Scrapped

Keep in mind too that, by 1955, the narrow gauge empire had seen several abandonments in the previous six years, and traffic was diminishing. The need for maintaining the roster of narrow gauge steamers to the same operational level was hard to justify, at least to the bean-counters in Denver. As a result, when a locomotive required repairs that were far more expensive than the usual rebuild costs, the locomotive was scrapped.
Thus, when 485 dumped into the turntable pit, and 496 came up lame with a cracked boiler, it was clear to management that the narrow gauge could operate quite easily with two fewer locomotives. If the pipe trains hadn't come along a few years later to give the Alamosa-Farmington section a new lease on life, chances are that a lot more of the 480's and 490's would have disappeared long before 1968.