The railway track that I have lived beside for 20 years has been getting less and less traffic . The local grain elevator closed a few years ago and the railway announced that they would be abandoning the line . The rails extended about 150 miles past the little town that I live in . My thoughts went to building a powered line cruiser now that there was going to be no traffic . I had been researching wheel shapes and placement in the pictures of old line inspectors bikes . When I discovered motorized bikes I thought that this was the way to go .
The next thing that I saw was the tracks being pulled up and hauled away . The ties went next and were sold off to landscapers . They finally got around to the mound that the tracks were placed on . The gravel was valuable enough to scrape it to the bare prairie soil underneath . The line still exists going the other way , towards the provincial capital about 15 miles away . We got lucky there . The track has been taken over by an antique railway organization with its star being an 1882 locomotive that is a thing of beauty . Its final destination is my town and I get to see the antique train and its period cars weekly . The sound of its whistle rattles my windows and brings a smile to my face . I guess that I lost some and gained some . ...D.J.
This is a narrow gauge bike that was used in the mines .
