You're grown adults. Act like it.

It's sickening to see people resort to badgering each other on this forum. I may have my disagreements with the moderators, but after seeing the posts on the Deleted Post rypn section I am firmly in their camp.

It's has been said that more preservation initiatives have been derailed by bickering than by a lack of knowledge or funds. Looking at the sheer amount of ad hominem attacks here goes a long way to confirming that.

My three year old nephew has more civility than some posters here.

I would just like to see the rules applied fairly. One thread regarding a lawsuit was locked due to "speculation". Yet another one is full of speculation and is still ongoing.

I abhor double standards. If we are to have rules then apply them fairly. And BTW, "speculation" is at the very essence of human interactions. Banning it would eliminate 90% of the posts here.

Ummm an accident speculation can lead to discussion about safety and safety practices. I don't think the same kind of value can be argued about a lawsuit. Lawsuits could end up causeing accusations and he said she said remarks and maybe even lawyers getting involved.

IMO, there is an 800-pound gorilla in the room that nobody wants to recognize, much less honestly discuss.

There are people out there in the restoration field who should not be. There, I said it!

There are a lot of reasons for this. Fortunately, and again IMO, they are very few and far between, but the damage they do to the overall preservation field is enormous.

Some of these people have the best of intentions but have neither business sense nor business ethics. Some have both of those attributes but don't have skills or experience. A few have none of the above.

IMO, this is one reason why so many projects get started with high hopes and then die an agonizing, expensive death. Too many such projects are unrealistic from the get-go: No place to run it; nothing to pull with it; nobody and no place to work on it; too many similar operations within reasonable distance; no demonstrated demand for it.

Some are simply starry-eyed and unrealistic; their enthusiasm governs. These are the people who want to start a steam railroad in the middle of nowhere or across the street from an established steam railroad, thus bringing both down. Admittedly, some do succeed (to an extent) such as C&TS and NN. Most limp along, assuming they ever get anything running, until they run out of money. Then there is the "if we restore it, they will come" crowd. These are similar to the ones who believe "if we restore it, the big XYZ Mega Railroad will HAVE to let us run it, or risk looking bad." How has that worked out?

As unbelievable as it may seem, there are some outright crooks and charlatans in this business. These include but are not limited to, those who do very expensive but terrible work, that has to be done over correctly and at even greater expense. There are a few who start up a relatively hopeless project, fan the flames of enthusiasm and fund raising, spend every dime, then leave for the next victim.

Whatever happened to the old fashioned idea of vetting? Why is is so difficult to pick up the phone or fire up the email and talk to prior customers? Why is it that no one asks if customer A is happy or customer B curses the ground the contractor walks on and won't allow him back on the property? Is it really impossible to find out what successful projects a contractor can point to? Or if he has any?

And why is it that a couple of contractors seem to exist for little other reason than to sabotage other contractors in any way they can?

If I am looking for a contractor to do an expensive make-over on my Victorian-era home, I am not going to just hire the guy listed first in the Yellow Pages. Nor am I not going to check with his previous customers before I sign anything. Maybe because it's MY money, not donations.

If I am looking for a contractor to do a restoration on a locomotive with OPM, I will probably look askance at the guy who can either provide no references that I can check, or has only a short list of languishing, unfinished projects he can point to.

Think about it. The snake-oil salesman did not go extinct.

Some of this is parallel to hiring anyone today. You can verify previous employement and not much more. Why? Because expressing a [negative] opinion about a previous employee/contractor/vendor can reward you with a lawsuit, one that can simply be avoided by saying nothing.

I was involved in being sued by a once well known railroad contractor. It did get settled out of court, but one of the conditions was a gag order, thus freeing the contractor from me telling others to avoid them.