Ross,

With all due respect, your math doesn't add up. For the sake of argument, let's say you operated two trains at full capacity (400 passengers) year-round (365 days), that's still 25%+ less than your estimate (only 146,000 passengers). Are your numbers realistic or is there something we are missing?

Thanks.

It's doubtful that that year around 7 day per week operations would be practical. Winter weather in PA can get very ugly, to where travel by car can be decidedly unhealthy. Also, just because you offer the trains doesn't mean that you can force people to ride. I believe that my former employer's annual average seat availability to tickets sold ratio was close to 4 to 1.

You're right, there's now a hip coffee shop/laundromat right in Orbisonia.

https://www.jenkiesjoint.com/

Looks neat. Thanks for the tip, Ed. I'll have to check it out next time I go to the EBT.

-Philip Marshall

I think Mr. Rowland's numbers are very realistic.

Consider just the EBT's traditional Rockhill to the Picnic Grove and back run - the EBT could do five of those runs in a day with just a single trainset, assuming departures at 10 AM, Noon, 2 PM, 4 PM and a dinner or evening trip.

200 passengers per trip times 5 runs a day is 1000 passengers a day.... again just on the Rockhill Furnace to the Grove turns.

Next assume that the EBT were to emulate the D&SNG's off-season (Cascade Canyon) schedule of just running 4 days a week (Thurs thru Sunday) and the EBT were to do that for 40 weeks of the year. Here's the math:

(1000 passengers a day) x (4 days a week) x (40 weeks) == 160,000 passengers a year just on the Orbisonia turn.

Obviously you're not going to sell out every seat every time, but if you fill 75% of all the seats then you end up carrying 120,000 passengers while running just 4 days a week, 9 months of the year.

But in Mr. Rowland's post, he indicates that long term plans are for just the five cars (single trainset) on this extended trackage.

75 percent capacity is a good goal, but lofty. Anybody else have ridership stats for the top tourist railroads?

I wonder if its realistic to say that you could sustain 1000 passengers per day on the short run. Seems like the railroad folded once, with steam in operation and running short trips. I think the longer, scenic ride is what will help draw interest, but I wouldn't bank on running trips at full capacity - save for some weekends, events, and fall colors.

Now tally the brewpubs. One in Huntingdon, one in Altoona, used to be one outside Lewistown.......

My impression of why they stopped running the last time was no operating steam, plus ineffective marketing, especially for bus groups, which is the bread-and-butter for most attractions midweek. Once they get most of the longer route reopened there will be a synergy effect, where people will come to ride both ways on successive days, probably adding in a ride on the trolley as well, maybe take a shop tour, and stay for dinner at a new local eatery that will open to cater to the renewed tourist trade. I think there is hope for most of that. Hope I live to see some of it.

Agreed on most points here. I think there is a distinct opportunity to boost tourism of the region through synergy. One clarification, EBT No. 15 was only 6 years into her 1472 when the EBT shut down in Dec 2011. Not saying it wasn't tired and in need of work, but steam was still in operation.

That being said, can anyone help me with the math? How do we achieve the raiload's goal of 200,000 annual passengers (conveyed by Ross above) with the 5-car trainset in the small, but bucolic Rockhill Furnace? According to the Durango & Silverton's fact sheet that I have handy (albeit outdated from 2017), "In 2017, 156,910 passengers rode the D&SNGRR's regular excursion trains, and an additional 40,000 guests rode special event trains." That's just shy of 200,000 passengers total for the flagship tourist railroad in the US.

Simple.

You acknowledge the estimate both suffers from "bad math" and comes from someone with a propensity to exaggerate to a degree.

I doubt you could get 200K there in ridership without either a cruise ship terminal or a gigantic eroded hole in the ground at one end.

I’m going to have to agree that the estimates are pretty lofty. Tourist railroads with that kind of ridership have one or several factors that contribute to ridership around that mark: fantastic scenery, great location, and/or accompanying tourist attractions. While the EBT is certainly not too far from several metro areas in terms of a days drive, it’s kinda out in the middle of nowhere, and I’m not sure what to expect with the scenery on the southern portion of the line past Saltillo. The D&S in a normal pre pandemic year was hardly getting yearly riders above that.

Also, 31 miles? Is there something I’m missing here?

Annual visitations for the Allegheny Portage Railroad NHS, 38 miles northwest of Orbisonia:

2013 107,977
2014 172,883
2015 168,433
2016 189,371
2017 201,837
2018 189,047
2019 189,189
2020 136,029
2021 187,919

My pleasure! I'm looking forward to checking it out myself. Hopefully they're ready!

A few things

1. That distance you’re thinking of must be as the crow flies, according to Google maps. If I type in the distance between the EBTRR and the Allegheny Portage Railroad NHS, it says at a minimum it takes 60 something miles and a trip of about an hour and 15 minutes.

2. The Allegheny Portage Railroad has the benefit of being, according to the very same google maps, not even 15 minutes from horseshoe curve, and of course being really close to Altoona.

3. I’m not sure how fair it is to compare visitors to ridership of a train.

Chris,
In addition to the differences pointed out above, the Allegheny Portage Railroad is a National Historic Site with FREE admission and these are visitor numbers.

Jenkie's Joint has pretty good food, but it's not Starbucks -- not even Dunkin.