> Erik,

> That's precisely what the Ohio Central did
> the day before. They ran a trip from
> Dennison to Sugar Creek and back, with no
> hiding of the engine. It was lettered Ohio
> Central and you could shoot it anywhere you
> pleased, except at the shops, which were
> reserved for a tour by the paying customers.
> On the Sunday photo trip, the engine was
> relettered Grand Trunk Western and the
> images were reserved for the paying
> customers, to the extent possible.

> Going back to a point you made in your
> previous post "we need more operations
> like Steamtown or TVRM, where engines can
> romp on a good 20- to 60- mile length of
> track.." I think you've just described
> the Grand Canyon Railway! I would like to
> suggest that the 3751 folks consider sending
> the engine back to Williams for a year as a
> "guest" engine. They have no place
> to run it back in California, but it can
> really do it's thing on the GCRy. I would
> cheerfully pay serious $$ for a photo
> charter out there. In fact, I'd probably do
> it more than once. Just a thought.

It sounds like you are describing the Austin and Texas Central also. We run on 60 miles of track between downtown Austin and Burnet,but primalily between Cedar Park and Burnet,a distance of 33 miles.
If someone wants to send us a locomotive that will operate on our line,we'll entertain the proposal.

Because of our 2% grades,the engine will have to be fairly large to pull 10 car trains here..but small enough to make some of our curves. That leaves out most likely 3751,but includes a host of other engines.......

kbcotton@flash.net

Michael....not many guys are going to pony up $550 a ticket, even for a photo charter. Think about a family of 3 or 4 and thats some serious money! I know a couple of guys who might have considered the trip, but they didn't want to leave the wives out, nor did they want to pay $1100.00.

Other than price the idea has some merit...I would be interested if it were WINTER!!!!
Greg Scholl


sales@gregschollvideo.com

> You say that there were two and a half emty
> first class cars. Was that perhaps two first
> class cars to many that could have been
> replaced with coaches that might have sold
> more tickets? What's the wisdom of filling
> up tonnage capacity on a trip like this with
> overnight compartments for an eight or ten
> hour round trip? Why are we following a
> steam locomotive? To ride an expensive car
> or to see, hear, smell, and feel a steam
> locomotive. The expensive car and it's
> sealed windows could actually detract from
> that experience. There's apprently more
> demand for a different product, and less for
> the one on that trip. How many coach seats
> were empty? That coach might actually
> generate more revenue, even thought the
> price of the seat is less, just because the
> capacity is higher, depending on the
> configuration of the car.

Hi David... I can address the above, regarding passenger coaches on excursions vs. other more "exotic" equipment. The St Louis Chapter trip had 150 First Class seats, priced at twice the price of Coach for the Sept 28 and 29 trip. MANY that ordered those seats said they would NOT accept coach as a substitute. They would skip riding rather than ride "coach". Every trip has about 100 of these people in this market segment. They get out enthusiastically at the runby sites with the rest of the passengers but like to relax in a truly First Class section. We have only about 27FC seats left.

The other thing of "why not more coaches" is availability of (Amtrak Approved) coaches. There are just not that many out there! The economics involving insurance (huge increases) as well as mechanical standards being stricter (read: more costly) have driven many car owners out of business. They cant afford HEP, expensive diesel gen. sets and more lately, new wheels, new couplers, and so on as the standards get more difficult. And many of these aging cars are starting to show side-sill wear (about $40,000 to start) and that is painful to the average car owner.

The answer the Chapter used is to operate some exotic cars as "coaches" and it's open seating on the train. Therefore Chouteau Club (a local diner lounge car) is going to be a souvenir/coach for the purposes of this trip.

The First Class is going to be truly special this time, with a trainset usually used for corporate specials and the like will be the FC. I've seen some people buy FC that had always chased, worked or ridden coach in the past.

In short...in steam trips you have 2 distinct market segments - coach and First Class, and it's great to accomodate both.

About chasers. There are some people that can afford to ride that NEVER ride a trip. These same folks never work on a car or a locomotive or in a museum. Then they are the first in line to whine as to why there are not more trips. I'm sorry, but somebody has to pay the bills and do the work.

In an ideal world, we'd have the $20 tickets and offer loads of trips, but sadly, the reality of economics no longer permits it.

--Janice in St Louis
PS Am including the link to the Chapter in case you want to see the latest updates!

http://www.stlouisnrhs.org
Ladynchips@aol.com

Don't mean to suggest that FC shouldn't be included at all, but that we have to be sensitive to demand. An earlier post suggestted that there were 2 and a half empty first class cars on one of the GCRY guest trips. That's a lot of extra seats, and though you can't always accurately predict ridership, on a train of between ten and twenty cars, that's at least a ten percent goof. Perhaps this is within the margin of error, but I was just suggesting that you shouldn't blame people for not wanting to buy an FC ticket. By the same token, it follows that there's absolutely nothing wrong with providing them to those who want them and can afford them.

Sincerely,
David Ackerman

david_ackerman@yahoo.com