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Hi John, yes this does describe how the C&S would have doubled the hill over Kenosha pass both Eastbound and Westbound.
We also know that this was not the usual routine, as freights typically ran through between Como and Denver.
During the early 1980's, Todd Hackett, John Coker and I were able to spend some time with a man named George Thiede and his wife in Denver. Thiede had worked as a hostler in Como in the later years. Both he and his wife told us how they would look toward Kenosha around 5PM, because they could see headlights from the engines as the helpers were cut off and headed downgrade to Como. So just managing the long climb to Kenosha took almost all day under normal conditions.
But as we can all imagine, such things as a mechanical failure or bad weather could have required doubling the hill at times. A locomotive failure on the West End could even have required one of the East End locomotives to replace it, as there were two high passes to contend with to Leadville.
Coal loads could have required doubling if they were over tonnage at Kenosha. Bucking snow would probably be the most common reason.
We could probably think of a number of other reasons this would have been done. In early times they probably tried all kinds of things to pin down the most efficient ways to do things.
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