If they were to consider contracting out some of the excursions, there is no reason why it could not be done a la carte, either. The park could maintain control over yard demonstrations and the Steamtown Limited, with longer trips offered through a third party with different motive power. Heck, they could even charge the operator a rental fee for use of the locomotive. To ensure asset protection they could make it part of the contract that a park employee must be present in the cab.

I have a feeling that this may be where things are headed regardless, with the ELDCPS, the LWVRHS, or the new friends-of group acting as a contractor. It would be a better arrangement since the proceeds would almost certainly be reinvested in NE rail and not pocketed by an operator. You would certainly want these trips to at least be run through the same entity to maintain continuity of where to purchase tickets, save on advertisement costs, etc.

@Dave: I believe that file, which is actually only the summary of the CIP is 17MB. If yu aren't on Cable or FIOS, grab a coffee or a beer, its going to be a while.


@ Alexander

First of all, as they say, this isn't about you. It's about one man's personal jihad against Steamtown, which always amounts to the same thing: Steamtown sucks, and the solution is a private operator. The question remains why should you or I believe that person. This is how (as somebody that's occasionally involved in these sorts of evaluations professionally, I would summarize my thoughts as follows:).

Proposer: Involved with public excursions, principally in 1960's and 1970's. Has not demonstrated any method for producing sustainable operations. Known conflicts with railroad operating managers. Recent efforts (YRX and GBX) haven't gotten off the ground.

Proposal: Asserts that alienating NPS responsibilities to a private owner is to produce fantastic economies of operation. Without explanation, asserts that substantial improvement is to be brought about by having private operator receive 3.0m of 5.6m annual operating budget as a subsidy, but has not defined the scope of services, or goals and expectations of the services. Does not seem to encompass that Steamtown is not only responsible for locomotives and rolling stock, but over fifty acres of land and buildings. Doesn't appear to understand that the NPS is not a private enterprise.


"In other words, with that brusque abruptness, you've just lost this potential supporter. And by everyone else's standards, I was sitting on the sidelines just watching the arguments with no firm decision either way."

As a potential supporter, why didn't you join the group's facebook page?


"I might suggest a change in PR spokespersons."


I'm nobody's PR person. I'm here just like my adversary, a private citizen with a bone to chew. Nobody in their right mind would have me as a PR person, there's no off switch, filters or gray areas. I admire Mike Ditka (especially as a player) and think Alan Alda is a wuss. In what I do, its useful to cut to the quick, to be relentless, brutal, exacting, but its decidedly not the right equipment for any sort of public outreach. PR people are Santa Claus. I'm more like the real St. Nick who legend has it punched Arius.


@6-18003


There are no economies to be achieved with a private contractor running excursions. The vast majority of excursions are staffed with a majority of volunteers. Free labor is an insurmountable cost advantage. Diesel fuel or coal costs the same either way. Paid employees cost money, might want RR retirement and a BLET/UTU chapter.

Historically, we have many examples of situations where the public sector provided things better than the private sector could, where the private sector provided things better than the public sector could, and where both sectors performed inefficiently and abysmally. Why would a private operator, who has the requirement of making a profit, be able to provide better programming at lower cost than a public operator who doesn't need to profit so all income can be put back in to providing programming? On the other hand, what's to motivate the public operator if there's no profit to be made? I think we've been sold a bill of goods by the Chicago School about the only motivation for action being economic gain - we as individuals are far more complex and so our organizations are also, compoundedly complex since they comprise the complexity of each individual involved. Why does providing health care through the middleman of profit driven insurance companies work better than just eliminating them and providing health care at the lowest cost? Probably because of philosophy more than reality, since we create our realities based on our philosophies. And, we have an easier time of justification when we can easily measure tangible things than when we have a loose concept of causes and effects in an intangible but none the less real set of complexities than do and don't impact.......

Which leaves me with pragmatism and empiricism to fall back on as a reactive but flexible way to try to deal with it all - the trick is to untie hands so flexibility can happen fast. Neither public or private corporate sector cultures like fast and flexible.

This is going to be interesting to watch.

Overall, no, but when broken down by party, maybe. It could be a useful tool to creatively cleave more funding off of the block through allocation. But as I said, the best of both worlds may be for the non-profits to act under the same freedoms as Xanterra and to reinvest proceeds in both the park and the NE rail environment as a whole. Where the NPS may have strict rules on how ticket revenue may be spent, the non-profit will not, and could funnel money towards projects such as improving the Tobyhanna wye.

?

"It could be a useful tool to creatively cleave more funding off of the block through allocation."

You see, this is where my relentless, brutal and exacting nature is advantage. I have no compunction about calling pseudojargon for what it is, the directed exhalation of gaseous products of combustion. If there are no economies to be achieved, there's nothing to "cleave" off the "block".


“could funnel money towards projects such as improving the Tobyhanna wye.”

What is this obsession with the Tobyhanna wye? The Tobyhanna Wye is not in need of “improvement”. As BIGJIM4LIFE explained, the issue with the inability to use it is that there’s a propane plant there and even when it’s not occupied, the issue is steam, open fire, cinders, propane...

I am guessing you do not have a background in corporate accounting practices.

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=%2 ... e+block%22

"No results found"

"I am guessing you do not have a background in corporate accounting practices."

MBA, CPA, CGMA, presently in FP&A. Prior experience in private and public sector auditing, general accounting and cash management/treasury. Financial IT background includes software acceptance testing and ERP implementation and testing.

Experienced in government accounting, private accounting, including a short stint in the big 4.

And you?

Sigh. The sanders are empty and the tracks ahead look slick, so I will be pulling onto a siding for the remainder of this thread. Anyone who wants to PM me please feel free.

This was brought to my attention not too long ago. Why Tobyhanna? Why not something like near Gouldsboro, PA?



To what do my wandering eyes should appear?



Looks like there used to be a wye there...now there's nothing there but trees and the remnants of the old ROW...



"Milepost 114.75 - This area, once known as Summit was the site of the Lehigh wye where most pusher and helper locomotives dropped off and returned to Scranton. The tower closed on March 12, 1954. " (as seen at http://www.nps.gov/dewa/learn/historycu ... wEXLOG.pdf)

Is that a feasible alternative? (Thanks to my source who pointed this out to me)

@bigjim4life:

You obviously have a talent for cartographic analysis and a dedication to making productive suggestions. Join us on facebook now and the group when we settle membership issues. Of course if your talents extend to obtaining the properties in question, even better.

@Dave:

“Historically, we have many examples of situations where the public sector provided things better than the private sector could, where the private sector provided things better than the public sector could, and where both sectors performed inefficiently and abysmally. Why would a private operator, who has the requirement of making a profit, be able to provide better programming at lower cost than a public operator who doesn't need to profit so all income can be put back in to providing programming? On the other hand, what's to motivate the public operator if there's no profit to be made? I think we've been sold a bill of goods by the Chicago School about the only motivation for action being economic gain - we as individuals are far more complex and so our organizations are also, compoundedly complex since they comprise the complexity of each individual involved. Why does providing health care through the middleman of profit driven insurance companies work better than just eliminating them and providing health care at the lowest cost?”

I’m sorry Dave, even though I agree in principal that we aren’t merely homo economicus but I’m going to have to largely say this is the same sort of thinking Ross is engaging in, reducing a specific problem to a right vs. left political recipe, even after acknowledging that partial agreement. And although it isn’t the totality some assert, it is more far substantial and pervasive than others admit. Economics needs models to instruct and predict, so we have the Econ 101 Guns vs. Butter, but as Nassim Taleb has written when you think your models are completely accurate representations of reality, you are engaging in the ludic fallacy.

Profit is not evil and it isn’t the deadweight loss you seem to imply. In the ordinary world, the profit motive allows for the right products to be produced, in the right quantities and with attention to the costs of production. At the risk of venturing far afield, you ask we should have healthcare from the middleman of “profit driven insurance companies” as if public sector bureaucrats aren’t profit driven middlemen. I strongly recommend Messrs. Buchanan and Tullock to your reading list (much better than de Chardin and his casuistry). Instead, I ask why we insist on treating all of healthcare an insurable risk when it is not. Most costs are insignificant and in the control of the insured. I’m not a geezer, but I remember my Mother taking me to the doctor and paying with President Jackson. The problem is contemporary political debate is consumed with creative financing that comports with political doctrines, rather than making the consumer sovereign.

There are some things I want removed from profit considerations, for example policing, because the cop on the beat is supposed to be maintaining law and order, not maximizing citation revenue, which is now significant enough to be a segregated line item on some municipal CAFRS. I don’t like police hiding to “catch” speeders, rather than being openly visible referees of the rules of the road. It produces a perverse and hostile relationship the thin blue line doesn't need. I recently has a discussion with a city officer who told me that he thinks overly aggressive municipal traffic policing is creating distrust of the police, especially among people whose only interaction with police is an occasional or even single traffic ticket and who might otherwise be FOP contributors. He understands police are the face of the municipality, and bear the resentment that should be directed at mayors and commissioners.

The reason Steamtown isn’t appropriate for a private operator is because a true profit seeking enterprise is not only responsible for profit and loss on the income statement, but also the capital accounts on the balance sheet. Separating the two produces a conflict.


Consider the designated operator of a railroad, who doesn’t own the right of way. They simply don’t have the same incentive to maintain a manicured right of way, the same way Norfolk Southern does. In some cases, this is necessary, but it is a compromise from the ideal.

If running excursions were an enterprise liable to profitable operation, there'd be no need for the 21st Century Steam Program and FWHRS wouldn't be a tax exempt 501c3.

It took me years of contemplation and experience (that I never heard in my undergraduate or graduate level courses) to understand the essential purpose of government. That purpose is to be there tomorrow, largely unperturbed. Any “designated operator” of Steamtown would inherently face a conflict on minimizing capital expenditures because they have no ownership interest in the physical plant and no ability to sell or abandon based on circumstances.

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not here - but I am a part of the group already and will join up once membership comes online. Sadly, my talents don't extend to property acquisitions (not even close). :(

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not here - but I am a part of the group already and will join up once membership comes online. Sadly, my talents don't extend to property acquisitions (not even close). :(

Absolutely sincere. You've offered more bona fide attempts at productive suggestions in this thread than some have offered in over a decade here.

@6-18003

"Anyone who wants to PM me please feel free."

Done. It seems you might find my sum total knowledge of poker helpful.

You're welcome.

You lost me right there, Ross. I visited Steamtown for the first time ever not too long ago. While it wasn't in winter yet (it was near the end of September), it would have been outside the normal 'summertime' visit that many people take in peak times.
I couldn't imagine getting up there and finding the place closed, especially for cost-saving measures. We went on a week day, so I was okay with knowing there were no train rides even if they'd been running steam, but finding the place closed? My fit would have been epic.

Thanks for a thoughtful response, Supe. I didn't say everything you think I said, but didn't make myself clear due to shortening and simplifying what is an endless set of varying conditions - and I completely agree that profits aren't always a waste of resources, but we usually don't think of them as such even when they could arguably be so - and it's worth looking at it from that perspective as well as the usual. I also think that where many economists go awry is applying a model that isn't appropriate - even when conditions are confusing they seem to want to apply a model of some sort, so they grab what seems convenient instead of saying "I have no idea." I recently read a book about that, can't recall the economists name, but it was very convincing. And, I tried specifically not to frame it in political but in other terms - it is difficult to mentally separate them, I know....... especially in the current climate and with elections coming soon. I am concerned about what the result of 50 years of educating economists has led to in terms of a creation of an assumed norm according to Friedman forcing all consideration into that framework and requiring repudiation before other ideas are equally considered. Me, I like Keynes better - I think he was less dogmatic, but then it was a simpler time. I'll check out the guys you recommend.