Would you believe we are still operating dry hopper toilets on our trains? We have dry sinks too. We put a big copper jug of water in the WC room so you can pour some in the sink to wash your hands.

Everybody's got an opinion, and that particular opinion is a punch-drunk meander through unrelated ADA laws, mostly relating to architecture.

Generally the law breaks down as follows:

- Except for four states, the only thing a person can sue you for is to fix it. They can't get punitive damages, they can't even get legal fees. Unless you offend the judge by being reckless.

- You must do what is easy. Nothing exempts you from that. e.g. if you could have easily gotten an ADA porta-john instead of a regular for the baggage car.

- You are exempt from any need to modify historic passenger coaches older than 30 years old whose manufacturers are defunct.

- If you use the shell of a historic coach, and do something totally new with it, all bets are off.

Part morbid curiosity and part abundance of caution, which 4 states are those?

The Durango & Silverton used RV toilets. During the winter the cars were kept watered with a small space heater in each car, blowing warm air into both bathrooms (on either side of the aisle, the doors were opened out into a V shape so the hot air was split into both restrooms). This kept the fresh water tank and any water in the restroom pipes and toilet from freezing.

The problem was the waste holding tanks. They had to be emptied every afternoon or else they'd freeze. The railroad has a dump station on the balloon loop and the train is dumped one car at a time as it's turned. When it was really cold they'd even freeze during our run to Cascade Canyon and back. I spent my Christmas Eve 2015 helping thaw and dump our train using five gallon buckets of hot water.

In Silverton season the same task is done midday by a contractor on the wye in Silverton, and are not dumped in Durango. He also adds packets of Inca Gold powdered toilet deodorant. No problem with smell even though the cars sit overnight having been used on the way down.

New Hope & Ivyland has installed locomotive chemical toilets in 3 coaches, their parlor car, and tool-open-air car. The restrooms use no water and have hand sanitizer dispensers and fold-down baby-changing tables.

In my opinion the best train toilets use regular home type toilets. Some are available with very low water flow. Children can use them with no problems unlike some of the old railroad dry hopper toilets. Children also have problems flushing foot operated wet hopper toilets.

From distant memory, New York, Pennsylvania, Florida and California.

It's the same issue. The Federal ADA is about *access*, and has penalties appropriate to promoting *access*. These states also have anti-discrimination laws with penalties appropriate for intentional acts of discrimination. Those outlaw discrimination against the disabled, and the yardstick they use is compliance with Federal ADA.

It's a rather ham-handed standard for *intent*, certainly installing a toilet paper roll 3/4 inch too high or sloping a ramp at 8.2 percent is not the black-hearted act of a bigoted deplorable. And I suspect if you actually got in front of a judge and made that argument, he'd agree that the state laws are not intended for honest mistake.

You'll never get that set in case law, though, because there'll never be an ADA case that goes to appeal for that particular point. Most unjust ADA suits are from ADA trolls, who are doing much worse than that.