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| KIngston Trip Report: Good news, Bad news, Agnews (1480508) | |||
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KIngston Trip Report: Good news, Bad news, Agnews |
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Posted by IRTRedbirdR33 on Sun Jul 8 11:24:51 2018 Kingston Trip Report: Good News, Bad news, Agnews I was in Kingston, New York on Saturday, July 7, 2018. The Trolley Museum of New York has made many improvements to their property. There is now a partially enclosed shelter at the museum station. There is also a portable wheelchair lift which is necessary if the Gas motor car is used. The primary car is Johnstown Traction no. 358 built in 1925 by the Saint Louis Car Company. She has been converted to run with a gasoline engine. The following cars were on display outside the museum; Lo-V Motor 5600, R-4 825, R-16 6398, PATH PA-1C 143, R-3 flat car F401, Doodlebug 120 and a few others. Q-Type 1602A has been moved inside the museum building to protect her from the elements. The motorman couldn’t have been nicer. He had come in to do some work in the shop but was diverted to operations. There were only two other staff members on duty, a very nice lady who worked in the gift shop and a young man who worked as flagman on the trolley. They have a serve shortage of volunteers. This summer hasn’t been kind to the museum. The brutal heat of recent weeks limited attendance. They only had about six paid visitors on all of Independence Day. The folks next store at Rip Van Winkle cruises voiced similar sentiments. I will digress from my main topic here to make some observations. There seems to be a slow motion recession going on, at least here in the Hudson Valley. Toy’s R Us has closed. Bon-ton’s Department store is going out of business and gas has risen to about three dollars a gallon. Many of the local restaurants have seem a ten to twenty percent drop off in customers. No one is pushing the crisis button yet but there are a few clouds on the horizon. I mention this because it affects the amount of discretionary money that folks have to spend. This impacts places that depend on tourist dollars especially the trolley and train museums. The entire waterfront area of Rondout seemed to be less busy then it should have been for the second weekend in July. Well they say that digression is good for the soul but I will return to my trip report. The trolley line extends from Rondout Landing to Kingston Point. It a great ride with nice views of the Hudson and Amtrak trains on the east shore. If you plan a trip to Kingston don’t forget to include the Catskill Mountain Railroad in your itinerary. Larry, RedbirdR33 |
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