(rshsdepot) Train Hits DURR Depot

["UDRRHS - President" <stevdel_@_prodigy.net>]

    About 9 tonight, a car driven at high speed smashed into the Delaware &
Ulster Rail Ride depot at Arkville, NY - the former Ulster & Delaware RR
freight station, used by the DURR for a passenger station since a runaway
milk truck (of all things) destroyed the original U&D passenger station 25
or 30 years ago.
    Nobody hurt (except maybe the driver, not much), and damage to the
station looks worse (wall and sliding door on Hwy side of ticket office
stove in) than it probably is, probably only a little structural damage
here, but some original 187x fabric definitely lost.
    What impressed me was the DURR responding like a real shortline
railroad -- damb near everyone connected with it was on the scene by the
time I got there 15 minutes after the event, and every one of them working
to help emergency responders remove the car & driver, secure the building,
do the car removal without additional damage to historic elements of the
building, secure displayed artifacts, or just plain "be there" to help lend
support.  AND, I must say, equally impressive was the village responding as
a village does to "one of their own" with a problem -- for Arkville, this
was not the Mighty Chessie or Great Uncle Pete, but their friends at the
railroad with trouble, and someone was there right away with a backhoe to
hold up the damaged side of the building till it could be jacked and braced,
the convenience store across the road was "don't-worry-about-it"-ing the
people who needed coffee; state troopers, rescue squad, and Arkville VFD all
showed up right away, available if needed, a AVFD guy especially impressing
me as FD always does the world over, standing on station point-blank range
away from that car with his foam nozzle ready in case the gas tank started
to go -- I was all too close to the Trade Center last week, in my office
just a few blocks away as all those awful events happened, and this guy was
just in the spirit of all those FDNY heroes we lost, on the job in a
dangerous place becaue that's what firefighters do.
    Thanks
    Steve Delibert

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