W.W.&F. Discussion Forum

WW&F Railway Museum Discussion => Whimsical Weirdness and Foolery => Topic started by: Jason M Lamontagne on November 23, 2020, 01:59:57 PM

Title: A Fictional Day
Post by: Jason M Lamontagne on November 23, 2020, 01:59:57 PM
I wrote this a couple of years ago, just for fun.  It's not meant as the "one" answer- it's just an exercise in thinking through one possible answer.  I never really knew what to do with it, but now as it becomes out of date, I figure I'll put it here before it's totally dated and irrelevant.  Happy reading...

Jason
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: John McNamara on November 23, 2020, 03:16:46 PM
Great stuff! I especially like the part about stopping southbound at Trout Brook Station:

"The conductor steps into the station for a minute - I suspect he’s asking for another coach at Sheepscot, as we always pick up passengers there."

I'm happy to hear that magneto telephone service continues into the fictional future and look forward to helping make that future real.

-John M
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Graham Buxton on November 24, 2020, 02:04:36 AM
As Jason notes, "Its a fictional day", ;) so some parts have not occurred yet, but  they could.
.
The sucessful partnership with SeaLyon Farm (Pumpkin trains etc) is rather remarkable in this context, as we have  paying  passengers riding to TOM for a 'horse' transfer to  SeaLyon  Farm when they could simply more easily just drive  directly to SeaLyon Farm.  Clearly, those passengers are riding for the experience, not the destination. As the planned facilities at TOM come to fruition, I believe we will see more of that.


While I am not a Facebook fan,  this  is hard to beat ...

(https://i.postimg.cc/7LLQrXGR/SeaLyon.png)
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Allan Fisher on November 24, 2020, 02:27:36 AM
Your story is beautiful! Never stop dreaming, Jason. I haven't.
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Wayne Laepple on November 24, 2020, 09:26:56 AM
That's a great pre-Thanksgiving story! Well done, Jason.
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Bill Baskerville on November 24, 2020, 12:16:40 PM
Jason, you have created a great vision of possibilities.  Perhaps not all of them will be realized, but some will.  It is a great look into the future of potential realizations.  It is not lost on me that you are also a good writer.
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Jason M Lamontagne on November 24, 2020, 05:10:45 PM
Thanks all... fun to think in these terms.  Imagination run amok..  and yes, of course there's a mag phone in that station, John!
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: John Kokas on November 24, 2020, 05:19:41 PM
I was thinking about iron bridge replacement.  With the state taking out 1/2 the GTW in Portland, could the swing bridge be reused ???
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Jeff Schumaker on November 24, 2020, 05:28:26 PM
Nicely done, Jason. I could easily picture the train on its northbound and southbound trips.

Jeff S.
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Bill Baskerville on November 24, 2020, 05:36:40 PM
I was thinking about iron bridge replacement.  With the state taking out 1/2 the GTW in Portland, could the swing bridge be reused ???
John,  Now there's a clever idea.....
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Bob Holmes on November 24, 2020, 07:10:25 PM
Thanks Jason, never knew that you were also a writer/dreamer.  That's a good thing...
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: Bill Reidy on November 24, 2020, 07:38:37 PM
I was thinking about iron bridge replacement.  With the state taking out 1/2 the GTW in Portland, could the swing bridge be reused ???
John,  Now there's a clever idea.....

As long as we don't park it in our Sheepscot parking lot.  The cleanup has been terrific, proving less is certainly more.  ::)

I think Jason's story captures our restored railway's spirit very well.  Thanks for sharing it.
Title: Re: A Fictional Day
Post by: James Patten on November 24, 2020, 08:13:20 PM
"Just another of 14,000 photos on that poor...phone". 

By that time, the "phone" and camera will probably be an implant, but it will get uploaded automatically to our Instragram (or whatever platform is popular in 2060) account and will be responsible for at least a half dozen of those riders.

But...we can't reuse the swing bridge, because "we took the harder path and built this bridge exactly as the original".