An excerpt from a posting on the V&T list about the rebuilding going on there. Sounds like it is being rebuilt to modern highway standards, with not much being left of the line's historic character:I managed to arrive in Carson early enough on Friday afternoon that I could retrace and enlarge upon the Tuesday recon expedition. As a result we decided to go ahead with the Mound House to Gold Hill expedition. We began by driving to Mound House where we drove the grade all the way to the huge (and I mean humongus) aggregate plant which sits on the right of way just below Silver Switch. Can someone from the Northern Nevada Railway group tell us what the deal is with the aggregate plant? As far as I can see it will have to go before the railroad can be built through to Mound House. As usual more and more of the desert landscape has gone the way od development, quarrying, etc. At least half of the right of way between Mound House and Silver Switch is already visually unappealling. The old garbage dump would appear to have been closed, capped and converted into a closed circuit motor speedway. The pile of old tires and the ash pit are however still abundantly on view. Many new roads have been carved out of the sagebrush covered hills.We back tracked to Mound House and then drove to Gold Hill. Most of were amazed in the 1980's when we first saw the fill in Crown Poitn Ravine, and the other ravages of open pit mining at Gold Hill. I never thought that I would wish it would stay that way but the reconstruction effort at the Overman Pit has made a moonscape of the territory between Gold Hill and the Overman Pit. The remains of the Belcher Air Shaft, the Belcher mne shaft, and the original Overman mine shaft have been preserved but everything else has been more or less leveled including the east half of the hillside at the southern of the Croswn Ploint trestler location. The V&T's original cut through that hill is gone. The material went to begin the fill of the Overman pit.A huge earthern embankment has begun to rise near the opening of the Overman Pit. Thus the right of way will be realigned perhaps a couple of hundred feet to the east of where it originally crossed the area of the Overman Pit. The contractor has graded the right of way to about a mile south of the pit. The regrading extends down to the middle of the second large fill south of the point where the Overman Spur departed from the main line. I am sorry to say it would appear that the contract is using highway construction techniques. The new grade is about two traffic lanes wide. Both the fills and the cuts have been resurfaced. Looks just like a relocation of Interstate 80 ! We assume the grade is being widened to allow a road to parallel the railroad track. This would be great for fire protection, rescuing passengers from a broken down train, etc. However all the charm of the original narrow cuts and fills has been destroyed on the section regraded by Granite Construction. Hopefully Capitol Engineering will be able to perserve more of the flavor of the original V&T when they begin work on the remainder of the line to American Flat.Two vehicles of more intrepid explorers managed to get their vehicles through the same cut which we had to reopen some years ago and made it to the north portal of the American Flat tunnel which has been opened at the top. They report the tunnel caved about 10 feet in front the portal blockage.The remainder of the group drove to Silver City and used the American Canyon road to access the right of way. We drove to Silver Switch were we were relieved to see that the switch, the turntable spur and the turntable pit are still there although time has taken its toll. The overburden pile from the aggregate plant has reached the edge of the turntable pit and a few large boulders have rolled all the way into the pit. The question is whether the aggregate plant people know their proximity to the artifact or have just not got around to piling rock on it yet.