Friends Accomplishments 2000 - 2011

FRIENDS’ ACCOMPLISHMENTS
2000‐2011

During the past eleven years, the Friends have:

• Constructed a car restoration facility in Antonito, Colorado, and a satellite work site in Colorado Springs  to provide for the more delicate and long-term restoration of the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad’s (C&STRR)  most  historic assets

• Acquired and converted to electronic images the priceless Richard L. Dorman Narrow
  Gauge Photographic Collection, an historic asset containing some 30,000 photos of
  the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad (predecessor to the C&TSRR) and the Rio Grande
  Southern Railroad

• Rehabilitated almost every major structure on the railroad’s property in Colorado and
  New Mexico

• Added over 20 historic cars to the living museum through donation and purchase

• Taken the lead in achieving the designation of the C&TSRR as a nationally significant site on the National Register of Historic Places and in developing the nomination for the railroad as a National Historic Landmark (estimated to be approved by CY 2012)

• Stabilized and rehabilitated a significant portion of the historic freight and maintenance-of-way cars

• Developed the initial plans for the Railroad Visitor Center in Chama, NM (completion estimated in five years)

• Completed a Master Interpretive Plan for the entire 64 miles of the railroad

• Provided volunteer docents on each train to interpret the history and scenic beauty of the railroad and the region

• Funded and oversaw the $1 million restoration to operating condition of the locomotive 463, one of only two surviving locomotives of its type and the only one now running on its original territory

• Restored and maintained all of the mile markers, whistle boards and other track side signage along the 64 mile right-of-way.