Although the Roanoke area is not yet home to an operating excursion railroad, for the past several years there have been rail oriented special events at the holidays. On Saturday, Dec 6th, Santa arrived by rail at the O. Winston Link Museum, aboard a freshly repainted NS caboose. There were about 400 or so attendees. This was the 4th year of "Santa by Rail". As a follow up event, on the 13th the Roanoke Chapter NRHS hosted it's second annual Christmas open house at our maintenance facility. We operated nine 2/3 mi. round trips over our trackage in the Roanoke Industrial Center (the old American Viscose plant). It wasn't exactly the "Polar Express" but we advertised the trips as the "Candy Kane Shifter" and gave all the younger passengers a treat when they disembarked.
This was a low key event. Advertising was limited to flyers handed out at "Santa by Rail" and posted at VMT and a few area businesses. The trips were free but donations were accepted. We hauled 302 passengers, covered the fuel costs, fed the crew, and generated a lot of good will (not to mention sore muscles from lifting little ones onto the caboose)
Next operations will probably be for a tour group in late January.