Re: The C&S Coal Chutes: Four bins? Six Bins? Eight Bins? Twelve Bins?

Posted by Jim Courtney on
URL: http://c-sng-discussion-forum.254.s1.nabble.com/The-C-S-Coal-Chutes-Pine-Como-Dickey-Pitkin-and-almost-Breckenridge-tp4269p4314.html

Thanks for all the additional information, Mike, and for sharing another photo of your Dickey coal trestle.

The reponse to my original post has been quite gratifying.  I've had many a question about the C&S coal trestles, that I've wondered about for thirty years, and many have been answered by you folks in less than 72 hours.

Now let's fine tune the history a bit further, if we can.

The new C&S managment built the coal trestles at Schwanders (8-pockets) in 1900 and at Pitkin (6 pockets) in 1901.  They were strategically well located to coal all the helpers stationed on both sides of Alpine Tunnel (Schwanders also serviced eastbound helpers over Trout Creek Pass).  They turned out to be bad investments, as the Trumbull management could not foresee the coming CB&Q ownership and the abandonment of both the Alpine and Trout Creek lines in a mere decade.

But when did the coaling trestles at those two stations cease to function?

Specifically:

1. Did the Chalk Creek Mixed run, from Buena Vista to Romeley/Hancock, continue to coal its locomotive at the Schwanders pockets or was coaling done by hand in Buena Vista?

2. After the D&RG assumed operation of the Gunnison to Pitkin segment (in the swap for its Blue River branch), did the D&RG use the coaling trestle at Pikin?  Would it be prototypically correct to coal D&RG C-16s at the Pitkin coal bins in the 1920s?