From some of the recent threads here when it comes to where tourist train operations should be, there has been one thing that has come through....Location! Location! Location! And yet, from what I have read concerning the poor maintenance of ex-CP 4-6-2 # 1278 and the description of some of the Gettysburg Railroads other equipment, it seems that the road did not have the monies to keep its equipment well maintained. But isn't the Gettysburg battlefield area considered a prime tourist site? And shouldn't GRR's passenger carrying numbers have been very good? Or am I missing something here?

Les

I think Wayne Laepple would be better able to answer this question than anybody else on this list.

My queston: would Gettysburg RR have been successful if it had replicated real 1860 era rolling stock and included a reenactment of some sort?

dave

In my short, non-steam tenure at Gettysburg, the greatest problem seemed to be that the train was just one of many attractions. We tried a number of ways to promote it, but we never quite got it right. In addition, the station was on the opposite side of town from the majority of other attractions. Admittedly, however, we didn't have the budget to do major advertising. My primary interest was in growing the freight traffic. I found the tourist trains to be a distraction.

I was told by some of the previous operator's employees that they used to keep piling on the coal while the engine was sitting at the station so that potential customers could see the plume rising into the air. They also blew the whistle a lot. We weren't able to do either with F-units or Geeps.

Personally, I was always put off by the shabby appearance of the equipment, sloppy operating practices and the general junkiness of the property before I went to work there. I had ridden the line on a couple of Iron Horse Rambles, and I rode the train once or twice in the late 1970s, but after that, I decided to stay out of shrapnel range.

Whether the operation would work with replica 1860s equipment and regular re-enactments I hesitate to guess. A 4-4-0 or 4-6-0 would have a tough time with the grades with a train that would pay for itself and the expense of staging daily or even weekend re-enactments would be prohibitive, I would think. The Gettysburg & Harrisburg line wasn't even there when the battle took place, and was in fact built at least partially to transport visitors to the battlefield in the late 1880s.

The question really becomes, would a well-presented excursion operation (just for the sake of argument, all-1800s-replica equipment on the same line/location, a Strasburg/Grand Canyon-caliber operation, with appropriate roadways, parking lots, etc.) succeed?

The Gettysburg market is a strange one. There are a lot of history-minded tourists, true, but a lot of said visitors are extremely focused on the battlefield history, some with a bit of myopia/autism that makes railfans look broad-minded. How many of us have ever gone to Strasburg, for example, and visited nothing else in the county except the railroad and the RR Museum? (Mmmmmm, Pizza City......)

On the other hand, Gettysburg is surrounded by a huge amount of pure touristy shlock, from antique stores to Civil War book stores to fudge shoppes, and obviously a LOT of folks show up, drive around the battlefield, find there isn't a tower to climb any more, and then set out in search of other things to do. The Gettysburg RR location does suffer from an out-of-the-way location on the "wrong side of the tracks" in the "wrong" part of town; but if large degrees of money and a minimal amount of public works (a few signs, a widened street, etc.) were applied, there would certainly be the chance of a Napa Valley Wine Train-style operation being successful.

Off-topic but relevant: Gettysburg has had two brewpubs in the modern age. One was a storefront right downtown, quirky cafeteria-style service, but decent food and quite good beer. The other was set up on the outskirts of town in a renovated barn that had allegedly served as a battle field hospital during the famed conflict. The beer they make is possibly THE worst brewpub beer served in the East, if not the nation--if it were a tourist railroad, it'd be run with a 36" Crown Metal steamer that had been dieselized with a motor in the tender and a special-effects smudge pot in the funnel stack, pulling re-gauged PCC bodies with benches. There are craft beer professionals that have only half-jokingly threatened to literally burn the place down, or at least bomb the brewing equipment, for the bad reputation it gives craft beer, but we can't bring ourselves to burn a historic building.

The downtown location closed about two years ago--they couldn't make a go of it in the competitive tourist restaurant market. The barn location is still in business, abetted by numerous contracts with tour bus lines.

There's a lesson in here somewhere. Unfortunately.

A question for Wayne or Linn or anyone knowledgeable about this:

A while back I noticed on an old Reading Co. map a spur south from Gettysburg. It sort of stuck in my mind and eventually I ran across this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gettysburg_Battlefield

In 1884, the Gettysburg and Harrisburg Railroad completed construction of a spur that ran from the town, over the field of Pickett's Charge, and to the eastern side of Little Round Top. The railroad purchased 13 acres (53,000 m²) of land at the terminus and established Round Top Park. The park hosted a pavilion, two wells with pumps, a full kitchen, a photography studio, and several other buildings. It was a popular tourist destination, but soon fell prey to problems that included alcohol abuse, prostitution, and gambling. In 1896, the railroad sold its property to the Gettysburg National Military Park Commission, but Round Top Park was not removed immediately. In 1913, a casino was added. During this period, its popularity increased with the number of visitors able to reach the battlefield by automobile. The train tracks were finally removed in 1939 and the pavilions and the dance hall were torn down.

I'm having a hard time visualizing where the roadbed would have been. My best guess is that it passed between the Seminary and the western edge of downtown, then continued along a route that is now Hancock and Sedgewick Avenues. Has anyone ever researched this or gone hunting for the roadbed?

JAC

Reminds me of what I noticed around Lancaster and Strasburg this last autunm. I had been there about a dozen years ago. There seemed to be many evening theatre venues in that area. Probably developed to give the tourists on the bus tours a place to go during the evening. It just seemed like so much shlock.

I much more enjoyed the drive I took on Sunday afternoon by the old two-lane roads toward Philadelpia and then toward Reading. This was through much more rural country with many farms owned by the "plain people."

Well, unless your name is Walt Disney and you have a day one grand opening of an attraction essentially 100% complete, stand on its own, and widely and effectively publicized - it will take some time to get yourself known and a visitor base established - no matter what your location.

Most of the operations and museums we have been discussing begin on a wish and prayer, hoping for revenues to build to where they can in the future add facilities, spruce up equipment, expand operations and finally become self sufficient.

Unfortunately the capital is rarely available at startup and than CAN be a recipe for failure. As good as word of mouth recommendations can be, the opposite word of mouth bad experience can be the kiss of death.

In my opinion a nicely done site with a handcar ride MAY have a better chance of success than any grander notion poorly executed. In lieu of a long ride in Pullman cars, a clean building with some static exhibits or a model train layout may attract more visitors.

You could have a site that might take 2-3 days to see everything, but my guess is that most visitors/families spend only 2-3 hours at most, including a ride, snacking, etc. Seems to me that is about what Strasburg offers exceptionally well and what many of the rest of us may be missing. Anybody have any numbers on how long a visitor stays at any operation, per visit?

That info might be hard to generate, but a sampling could be obtained by selected or random handout of a time stamped coupon at entry which would be redeemed by the visitor at exit for a trinket, and then time stamped the second time.


Bob Kutella

I think a lack of investment in marketing hinders the Gettysburg Scenic Railroad. While many organizations consider marketing an expense, in reality it is a long-term investment needed to contribute to the viability of the operation.

While having an operation located in a tourist district can be beneficial, it also has its drawbacks. Every business in the area is in competition for the same tourist dollars. Each attraction needs to "spread the word" about its operation so tourists will allocate their dollars accordingly. This is extremely expensive: tv spots, radio spots, billboards (as much as they are disliked), flyers in hotels (both in the lobby and in the individual rooms), flyers at competing attractions (yes, you must reciprocate the favor), flyers at campgrounds (an often over-looked target), restaurants (both fast-food and table-service venues) and the list goes on and on. As I mentioned earlier, this costs a lot of money. It is a cost that is often not included in the financial plans of most "tourist" railroads. -- Ray

As much as I have to apply skepticism to the veracity of unattributed information on Wikipedia, this is even more detail than Thomas Taber III's "Railroads of Pennsylvania Encyclopedia and Atlas" manages to provide.

From other Civil War sites:
"However, as I later learned, the Electric Railway did not begin operation until 1893, four years after Farley made the comment. That same map also shows a spur of the Gettysburg and Harrisburg Railroad which ends behind Little Round Top. A station was situated near the intersection of the Wheatfield and Taneytown Roads, and operated between 1884 and 1916. The track crossed the Wheatfield Road about 280 feet from the Taneytown Road and some 560 feet from Sykes Ave. "

During my tenure at Gettysburg, when I was responsible for both passenger and freight operations, we had a fairly extensive marketing activity. We had billboards in all four directions, an extensive (and expensive) flyer distribution activity, a crawler on local cable TV, and even a couple of folks in bib overalls and striped caps walking the streets, hading out fliers and discount coupons.

We also had access to data compiled by the tourist promotion folks, who showed us that the average visitor was in town for less than one day. They were generally on their way to or from Lancaster County, Washington, D.C. or New York City. They did the battlefield tour, got something to eat, shopped a little, and climbed back into their van or motorhome and got on the road again.

On our part, we tried having a Civil War expert commentator on the train, we scheduled several re-enactment battles (in a trackside field where no shots were ever fired), we tried dinner trains and evening trains. Other than the re-enactment trains, usually mostly patronized by people from the Harrisburg-York-Lancaster area, we rarely were strained for capacity. The bottom line, in my opinion, is that we were doomed from the start -- but it was my job to try to make a go of it with the limited resources I had at my disposal. If the truth was told, I doubt the Cornell family ever made a nickel, either.

Even if you're located within a proven tourist destination there's no garuntee of success as so well explained by Mr. Laepple above.
We had a similiar experience in Victoria,BC with the Pacific Wilderness operation. Our depot was about 2 long blocks beyond the end of the traditional tourist area and try as we did it proved extremely difficult to get sufficient numbers to come that last 2 blocks. In addition we learned that similiar to the Gettysburg explanation above, most of the tourists to Victoria(about 3.5 million/year) were pre-committed to what they were going to do with their time in town and unless our train ride was a part of that pre-planning our chances of getting them aboard for a 2.5 hour train experience were not good.
We did all the things mentioned above plus cross promotions with hotels, whale watch operators etc., which helped some but couldn't fill the trains.
I guess the real lesson from both Gettysburg and Victoria is that to succeed the train ride needs to be an integral part of the visitor experience in a particular market and located geographically so it can't be missed!
Ross Rowland

In September 2004 the wife and I helped our middle child move to Rochester NY for a masters program. We had exactly one week to drive from Provo, UT to Rochester, NY and back. (Had to smile at the 'shock' on the car rental agent's face as she checked the car back in with over 3800 miles on it). Finding our way down to Lancaster PA we spent a full day at Strasburg and the closing two hours at RMPA. The next morning found us "dashing" over to Gettysburg to spend the morning on the self-guided audio tour of the battlefield, walking around downtown for an hour and then by 1:00pm getting on the road for the next night's stop in Ohio -- so our experience much as described above.

Secondly, my Fridays this year have been spent as conductor of the day train here at Heber. By far, the majority of out-of-state riders have been here in Utah for a winter ski vacation--typically finding themselves all "skied out" and looking for something different to do before their flight back home on Saturday or Sunday. And there are the variants of this--for example, the (non-skier) grandmother and grandfather that accompany the kids and grandkids on their "ski vacation" and decide to take the family on a train ride, etc. This example re-enforcing the idea that those near "destination" resorts can more easily draw off and market to those individuals staying in the area for multiple nights.

just some thoughts

sc 'doc' lewis

We must be clairvoyant or something. That, or a Washington Post reporter lurks in this forum.

Today's Washington Post has a lengthy article on the very syndromes we've been discussing here:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/21/AR2006032101458.html

"For many of its 2 million or so visitors each year, what's largely been missing from the Gettysburg experience is, well, Gettysburg. A visit to the Civil War's most hallowed town has typically included a stop at the National Park Service visitor center on Steinwehr Avenue a few miles from the city center, an audio driving tour through 20 square miles of rolling battlefield, and maybe a guided walk around the Peach Orchard, Little Round Top or another of the marquee scenes of bloody devastation out in the countryside.

As for the well-preserved antebellum downtown itself? In spite of its role in the clash of armies, all that many battlefield visitors have seen of Gettysburg proper is a glimpse through the car window on their way to Hershey Park.

"The Steinwehr Avenue end of town has traditionally been the more visitor-oriented," said Stephanie McSherry, a Gettysburg native and manager of the James Gettys Hotel. "The downtown gets overlooked by a lot of visitors. But it also has a rich history that just hasn't been interpreted very often."

But now the town that involuntarily surrendered its name to American history is asserting itself a bit. A new series of guided downtown walks, modeled on the popular licensed battlefield tours, seeks to reveal the "civilian experience" of those three days of horror and carnage in July 1863. The long-neglected downtown rail depot where Abraham Lincoln arrived to deliver his famous address has been restored and will reopen next month as a towncentric interpretive center; a few blocks away, the Wills House, where Lincoln polished his final draft, is also undergoing a renovation. And perhaps most ambitiously, the Majestic, a grand vaudeville-era theater, reopened in November after a $16 million restoration as an 850-seat performing arts center and twin-screen repertory movie house. Among its live offerings will be a summer-long staging of "For the Glory: The Civil War at Gettysburg," a Broadway musical with a professional cast."

More at the link; registration may be required.