A recent news item quotes Strasburg RailRoad as saying that they had no freight traffic in 2008, and now traffic is booming. I know freight was handled in the 1980's. Why was 2008 a slow year? Economy related?

Was 2008 a slow year - or was it instead, simply, that things fell into place in 2009 which led to much higher volumes in 2010 and beyond?

/Mitch

I think it would be safe to say; as with any well run railroad, a dedicated focus on their freight business started talking place.

There are many tourist railroads out there where there is freight potential, but they lack the personnel or know how to attract customers, let alone, manage the operations of the business.

Strasburg has the person and the drive for both their tourist and freight operations, in which they provide top notch service to both - they invest in their customers first, providing a good service at a respectable cost, then mechanics (technical and physical) of it..... then they focus on the "paint chip colors".

Too many operations have it the other way around.

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