Steam & Excursion > Story: Durango train faces tough questions going forward (Durango

Story in the Durango Herald this morning about the D&S and its future in the wake of the Durango Fire: https://durangoherald.com/articles/228774-durango-train-faces-tough-questions-going-forward

Posted from iPhone

Would a bear trap help their system ? With todays rain would neat to see them resume operations for sunday, but firefighters may need the tracks.

Sign me up to ride the first solar powered train. The attraction of the railway is steam, not some diesel our other type of powered train. How many fires did the railway set back in the day? Steam ran all over the country by the thousands daily. How many fires did they cause? Were operations suspended pending an investigation?

Fires were more frequent and less severe, now we have been suppressing for so long when it does go it really goes. And a benefit of all the suppression is overgrown forests and pine beetle disease, less healthier trees due to crowding, and natural cycles being quashed.

dan Wrote:
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> Fires were more frequent and less severe, now we
> have been suppressing for so long when it does go
> it really goes. And a benefit of all the
> suppression is overgrown forests and pine beetle
> disease, less healthier trees due to crowding,
> and natural cycles being quashed.

Whether the railroad continues to exist or not, the area probably needs controlled burns whenever it goes a decade without a fire.

it is tough in a tourist economy with homes encroaching everywhere, selective logging sometimes helps.

Florida has regular burn overs on a schedule. People hate it, but it clears the brush and loud growth.

Like people building homes in volcano park,and being upset when lava flows...

Posted from Android

andersonb109 Wrote:
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> Sign me up to ride the first solar powered train.
> The attraction of the railway is steam, not some
> diesel our other type of powered train. How many
> fires did the railway set back in the day? Steam
> ran all over the country by the thousands daily.
> How many fires did they cause? Were operations
> suspended pending an investigation?

There were continual small fires in areas like Sherman Hill. This took care of any build-up of combustible material along the tracks. Where oil was used, seldom if any fires. But that was then and this is now. With all the development, no tree cutting, warmer and drier climate, burning coal just isn't going to work, especially taking into account local poilitics. And the D&S is just one of many attractions in the Durango area. Should it be shut down, the town will survive. Tough on those who lose jobs though.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/16/18 14:48 by utwazoo.

>Would a bear trap help their system?
>With todays rain would neat to see them resume operations for sunday.

The D&S tried bear trap stacks a few years ago and decided that the water spray system was more effective.
1" of rain isn't going to stop a raging forest fire. It may help quiet it down a bit and give the fire fighters a bit more time to work on containment lines but it's going back to being hot and dry by Monday or Tuesday. Today's Durango Herald has a quote from fire fighters that "Because of the area’s drought conditions, a “slow and steady” rain is needed for two weeks or more to drastically impact the fire. The Monsoons are their best hope.

Michael Allen



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/16/18 15:41 by Shay47.

andersonb109 Wrote:
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> Sign me up to ride the first solar powered train.

The Pennsylvania Trolley Museum uses solar energy to generate some (much?) of the electricity needed to run its trolleys.

> The attraction of the railway is steam, not some
> diesel our other type of powered train. How many
> fires did the railway set back in the day? Steam
> ran all over the country by the thousands daily.
> How many fires did they cause? Were operations
> suspended pending an investigation?

You forgot to ask another important question. Were droughts during the steam era as severe as what that part of Colorado is currently experiencing. I'm not sure about the answer. There were extended droughts "back in the day" but this year's drought seems to be one of the most severe.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/16/18 15:45 by RuleG.

a bear trap water spray hybrid then

Double head both train without increasing the one engine train as that would eliminate the need to fire heavy and send out sparks. Use the diesel to tow the train from Hermosa to Rockwood which was the bad section near homes that could burn on the grade. Much less chance of any fire in the canyon above high bridge and only one development on that section through to Silverton. Run slower and fire lighter using two engines. Buy engines from Colombia.

2 others have made very excellent posts in other threads about how forest fire fighting and suppression is done in the world, and here in the US, today.

People, stop and think about it. A forest is a living thing. Trees and brush grow, die, reproduce, grow, die etc and so on.

What exactly do you think is going to happen over time? A ten foot thick carpet of dead and decaying vegetation?

Mother nature has done just fine for the last several thousands of years in controlling how things grow and such. In forests, that is done with occasional fires.

But now for the last 100 years, we human beings have determined that forest fires are bbbaaaddd. They must be stopped. Guess what is happening? All that fuel builds and builds. Then of course we build more and more into areas that are forested.

Exactly what do you think is going to happen at some point?

Droughts are normal in the US West, and can last many years. Paleoclimatology uses tree rings, ice cores, lake sediments, etc., to determine annual past precipitation over thousands of uyears. Scientists have learned that the US West has suffered long periods of drought ans well as huge floods.

So the bad drought that Colorado is now enduring is very, very sad in its effects on people and nature, including Colorado's beautiful forests, but it is not at all unusual. I hope the firefighters continue to make progress on this awful fire, which is now at 34,161 acres, but is 25% contained -- good job, everyone involved!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/16/18 21:20 by Margaret_SP_fan.

And railroaders on pump and motor cars cleared vegetation alongside the tracks in the old days.

Victor A. Baird
http://www.erstwhilepublications.com


jst3751 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> 2 others have made very excellent posts in other
> threads about how forest fire fighting and
> suppression is done in the world, and here in the
> US, today.
>
> People, stop and think about it. A forest is a
> living thing. Trees and brush grow, die,
> reproduce, grow, die etc and so on.
>
> What exactly do you think is going to happen over
> time? A ten foot thick carpet of dead and decaying
> vegetation?
>
> Mother nature has done just fine for the last
> several thousands of years in controlling how
> things grow and such. In forests, that is done
> with occasional fires.
>
> But now for the last 100 years, we human beings
> have determined that forest fires are bbbaaaddd.
> They must be stopped. Guess what is happening? All
> that fuel builds and builds. Then of course we
> build more and more into areas that are forested.
>
> Exactly what do you think is going to happen at
> some point?

dan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Fires were more frequent and less severe, now we
> have been suppressing for so long when it does go
> it really goes. And a benefit of all the
> suppression is overgrown forests and pine beetle
> disease, less healthier trees due to crowding,
> and natural cycles being quashed.


With people building in the woods its kind of a problem to let things happen any more without trying to put them out. That's why what many of you people think should happen but with lives in the way doesn't work. Lots have changed since those days of let it burn and there is no turning back to the old ways now. But with better management that would help such as selective cutting in all forests, getting rid of the bug dead trees among others. But the educated types want to do it different than the old ways of many years ago.

andersonb109 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sign me up to ride the first solar powered train.
> The attraction of the railway is steam, not some
> diesel our other type of powered train. How many
> fires did the railway set back in the day? Steam
> ran all over the country by the thousands daily.
> How many fires did they cause? Were operations
> suspended pending an investigation?


Many fires were started by steam as shown in the pictures and told in the story of that snow slide on the NP in the cascade mountains of WA state. The fires caused by the railroad took all of the timber and brush off of the slope above the rail as shown in pictures and noted in the text.

BAB Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> andersonb109 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Sign me up to ride the first solar powered
> train.
> > The attraction of the railway is steam, not
> some
> > diesel our other type of powered train. How
> many
> > fires did the railway set back in the day?
> Steam
> > ran all over the country by the thousands
> daily.
> > How many fires did they cause? Were operations
> > suspended pending an investigation?
>
>
> Many fires were started by steam as shown in the
> pictures and told in the story of that snow slide
> on the NP in the cascade mountains of WA state.
> The fires caused by the railroad took all of the
> timber and brush off of the slope above the rail
> as shown in pictures and noted in the text.

You are teferring to Martin Burwash’s great book, Vis Major, about the tragedy at Wellington in 1910. A must read !
C

Carol Voss
Bakersfield, CA

The Sierra Nevada forests in California have become overgrown with second and third generation growth and brush over the years creating a perfect horizontal and vertical fuel ladder for wildfire spread. In 2013 the Tuolumne watershed lost about 25% of its total area to the "Rim Fire" which is the largest wildfire in the Sierra's history at about 250,000 acres. It now takes the U.S. Forest Service about one year longer to plan, process and implement a timber harvest that it did for the United States to prevail in WWII. There are endless administrative and legal challenged brought by some well meaning but poorly informed environmental groups as well as a hard core of anti anything groups like the Center for Biological Diversity.

The Congress has struggled to pass legislation allowing more fuel thinning projects, getting funding for those projects and improving the onerous National Environmental Policy Act process to winnow down alternative project analysis. Still, the debate goes on in DC. It is unclear when we will have another wildfire such as the infamous "Big Burn" (read the book), but one is coming. It is equally unclear just how many acres of watersheds will have to be destroyed by these increasingly intense burns and how many people will have to die both fighting these blazes as well as simply being in the way of the burn.

This is a huge national policy issue which spotlights the disconnect between the science supporting less dense forests, and the reintroduction of control burns when the landscape is prepared for them. Our problem here is California is the Air Resources Board will not allow control burns most of the time due to air quality concerns, but then when a large wildfire burns for a month and fills the air with much more pollutants (black carbon emissions in particular) they shrug and say "...act of God."

While this cannot be solved over night, if we want to maintain healthy forests, capable of sustainability, we must have more effective leadership and management in our federal reservation lands (USFS, BLM, NPS) as well as complimentary private forest land holdings.

John

John --
Thank you very, very much for your well-reasoned and very informative post, which should be required reading for everyone, political and business leaders and the general public. We all need excellent leaders who are smartand experienced and practical -- not stubbornly ignorant or ideologues.