Saw this on the Park Trains list:

Regarding your question about the track at Astroworld it looks like it's
headed to the scrap pile. I was at the park last Friday and according to
park officials I was told that is probably what's going to happen to it. If
you're interested in the details: the whole line (an oval 100 feet short of
a mile) was laid with 39 foot sections of 80 lb rail dated 1913 and rolled
in a Tennessee mill (of which I do not know-but some of our Railspot MoW
experts might. Hello Bart, Mr. Pinkerton.?). Throughout the park's history
heavy track maintenance was carried out by local rail contractors during the
winter (i.e. closed) months. Even though I was an engineer we took care of
the minor stuff every morning on the track inspection walk-spike pounding,
flange way clearing & joint tightening. Salvaged ties in good condition
from the Santa Fe were used in the 1980's, chain-sawed to narrow gauge
length, complete with date nails in them from the 1940's, and the tie plates
were standard gauge size torched in half length-wise so just two spikes held
each rail and plate in place. During my five years running the line the
track was smooth with only a couple of low spots. Last week I saw that a
few new standard gauge ties had been laid on the ½ mile section I walked,
but for the most part everything looked the same trackwise as it did during
my last track walking inspection 22 years ago.



As far as the steam locomotive is concerned, despite the erroneous posting
of it's availability on the auction website, it has been sold to another
park. Having seen it up close for probably the last time, despite it's
appearance on the website, it looks like it needs a bit of work. Hopefully
it's just cosmetic. I was surprised to see that the engine number has been
changed to Number 1 when in reality it's really engine Number 2, the second
custom-built 4-4-0 for the park in 1967.



As for Astroworld being an insular operation, yes we were but during my
tenure each of us were regulated, monitored and licensed by city and state
agencies to safely operate moving steam boilers as a safeguard to keep us
from killing ourselves and others around us. Our regulation was a common
conversation topic with licensed stationary boiler operators who visited the
park as guests with their families, and who were surprised we ran so much
pressure on something that actually moved. :-)



I hope this answered your questions.



Regards,

Tom Kline

Houston