Opening Days For Colorado Railroads This Summer

Here's an alphabetical listing of Colorado's scenic and tourist railroads and the scheduled date of beginning summer operation schedules.

• Cripple Creek & Victor Narrow-Gauge Railroad - May 19th
• Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad - May 24th
• Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad - Already open, May 3rd begin service to Silverton
• Georgetown Loop Railroad - May 24th
• Leadville, Colorado & Southern - May 24th
• Manitou & Pikes Peak Cog Railway - Already Open, May 17th begin summer schedule
• Platte Valley Trolley - TBA
• Rio Grande Scenic Railroad - May 24th
• Royal Gorge Route Railroad - Already Open, May 24th begin daily summer schedule
• Ski Train, summer - TBA

Please contact the railroads via their web sites for more information or to book tickets. The announced dates have already been added to the Colorado Railroads Calendar.

Man Allegedly Throws Chair At Train, Lands In County Jail

Blogger is slow this morning, probably a slashdot effect. If you can read this on the site, it may be letting up. You can avoid this aggravation by signing up for the feed by e-mail (use the form at the end of this post) or by adding it to your feed reader.

---

Sunday morning, in Arvada, 28-year-old Alan Cardenas of Aurora was accused of throwing a chair at a passing train. The train was either on the BNSF branch to Golden or the UP Moffat Tunnel main line near the point where the two lines diverge. The initial report of a rifle being fired at a train prompted police to close down the area, including a portion of Sheridan Boulevard just north of I-76. The police interviewed the man and later arrested him when they found debris of a chair next to the tracks.

There is no reported indication which train was involved (freight, Ski Train or Amtrak) or whether the chair was actually thrown or placed in the path of the train. The charge against Cardenas is throwing missiles and also endangering public transportation.

9News.com

---

Enter your email address to subscribe:

by FeedBurner

Ski Areas of Today Served By Rails of Long Ago

There's only a few practical routes through the Colorado Rocky Mountains, and railroads were among the first to locate and use them. Hardscrabble wagon roads gave way to steel wheel on steel rail in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, guaranteeing the towns and services along the routes a good chance at sustainable success. Where rails were pulled up, asphalt was laid down and nearly all the routes have seen continued use with highways. The only notable exception is Rollins Pass, which was put out of service when the Moffat Tunnel opened. Perhaps because of this, Winter Park, which lies at the far end of the tunnel, is the only ski area currently served by a ski train.

It should come as little surprise that a majority of Colorado ski areas are sited near present day railroads or ghost railroads that have long been silent. Here's a listing of ski areas and the railroad grades that run nearby.

• Arapahoe Basin - only a few miles separates the highest ski area in Colorado from the highest railroad in Colorado*, the Argentine Central. What's a few mountain peaks in the way?
• Aspen Snowmass - Back in the day when it was a mining town, Aspen was served by both the Rio Grande and the Colorado Midland. Only last year were the rails of this branch finally and completely removed
• Beaver Creek - On the dormant Tennessee Pass route of the old D&RGW between Minturn and Dotsero
• Breckenridge - On the old Colorado & Southern over Boreas Pass
• Copper Mountain - On the Blue River arm of the Denver & Rio Grande over Fremont Pass
• Crested Butte - A former mining town once served by the narrow gauge Gunnison branch of the D&RGW
• Loveland - A few miles from the end of track for the Colorado & Southern's effort to reach Leadville by way of Georgetown
• Monarch - The old Monarch branch to the quarry below the ski area was removed in the mid-1980s
• Purgatory (a.k.a. Durango Mountain, a.k.a. Flaming Gates of Hell - a direct translation of "Purgatory" in some languages) - The legendary Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad runs over the same rails that the Rio Grande laid over 125 years ago. Now if the resort could just pick a name...
• Ski Cooper - This little ski area somehow manages to survive a remote location and competition from larger resorts. Its the nearest area to Camp Hale, the original camp of the 10th Mountain Division (skiing soldiers--biathalon anyone?) whose soldiers returned from WWII to Colorado to jump-start the state's ski industry. It also sits near the dormant Tennessee Pass line
• Steamboat - On the original route of the Denver & Salt Lake, it is conceivable that a charter excursion could reach this fabled resort town, if it can dodge all the coal trains on the Craig branch
  
• Telluride - Theatrically pronounced by the conductors of the Rio Grande Southern, "T'-Hell-You-Ride," this mining town earned a reputation long before the skiers made it a premier resort. Why not go a little further and visit Pandora?
  
• Vail - Just around the corner from Minturn and Rio Grande's Tennessee Pass, this resort is one beautiful, legendary experience
• Winter Park - The only resort served by the Ski Train, it has been long viewed as Denver's best source for packed powder, known to corrupt eastern skiers even in bad years
  

* The Argentine Central was the highest adhesion-worked railroad in Colorado, what most people would call a railroad. The highest railroad was and remains the Cog Wheel Route of the Manitou & Pikes Peak Railway

Spring Preparations Continue For 2007 Season

The condition of tourist and scenic railroads across the state has been something of speculation lately. Specifically, a cloud hangs over the Georgetown Loop railroad operated by the state historical society and Railstar. After a season which most would describe as lackluster in 2006, their featured star, Colorado & Southern engine No. 9, needed repairs after only a few months in operation. It’s uncertain whether it was the heavy grades of the loop, the large passenger loads or the fatigue brought by mechanical efforts to compensate for the grades and loads. What is certain is that No. 9 will not be in operation on opening day 2007. Their remaining steam engine, Colorado & Southern No. 12 is questionable for the 2007 season as well. Repair work must be done before the engine is serviceable. It could be that the Georgetown Loop will be without regular steam for a considerable part of the season. The diesels they have secured are likely up to the task, but as evidenced in Durango and elsewhere, diesels just don’t draw the fans that steam does.

Meanwhile, the San Luis & Rio Grande has promised that the engine they purchased, Southern Pacific 1744, will be running over La Veta Pass this summer. SP 1744, a Baldwin 2-6-0, has a storied past, along with a troubled second life as an excursion steamer. The engine will be trucked in hopefully at the end of this month.

Opening Days:

• Monday, May 7th - Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge begins summer runs to Silverton
  
• Saturday, May 26th
• Cumbres and Toltec Scenic
  
• Leadville, Colorado & Southern
• UPDATED: Friday, June 15th - Georgetown Loop
• Saturday, June 30th – Ski Train summer excursions to Winter Park

A (Sort of) Familiar Face

Update: as of 2/16, the regular motive power (F40s) are back on point, not that they look all that bad either.

---

Kevin Morgan of coloradorailfan.com captured the photo below along with several others near Tunnel 1 on the Moffat Route. The Ski Train is powering it's way up to Winter Park along the Front Range of Denver using 2 of it's 3 F40PHs along with Union Pacific engine 1989, the Rio Grande unit of UP's heritage series. Ski Train F40PH unit 289 was down due to a bad bearing, opening the roster for UP to put a (sort of) familiar face in a very beautiful place.

The UP1989 was unveiled in June 2006 at the North Yard facilities in Denver to a crowd of enthusiastic rail veterans and railfans.

Kevin Morgan, Photographer

These pictures of the Ski Train by Kevin Morgan are poster-worthy. Take a look. Click on the photos to visit ColoradoRailfan.com