{"id":22224,"date":"2013-09-22T11:50:27","date_gmt":"2013-09-22T16:50:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=22224"},"modified":"2013-09-22T11:50:27","modified_gmt":"2013-09-22T16:50:27","slug":"the-station-to-station-train","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2013\/09\/22\/the-station-to-station-train\/","title":{"rendered":"The Station to Station train"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wired<\/em>‘s Douglas Wolk<\/a> looks at the Station to Station train tour:<\/p>\n

Adam Auxier is Station to Station\u2019s train producer \u2013 an energetic, affable guy who just happens to know pretty much everything there is to know about trains and their history. He put together the assortment of gorgeous old train cars that make up the vehicle for Doug Aitken\u2019s coast-to-coast art-and-music tour (and helped Aitken to select the stations where it\u2019s stopping), and he\u2019s been overseeing the train and telling fascinating tales about its provenance and its route.<\/p>\n

The cars on the Station to Station train were built between 1916 and 1953; Auxier arranged for them to be chartered from private owners who maintain them as a labor of love and rent them out to offset the cost of keeping them railworthy. (He has contact with all of them through his tour company, Altiplano Rail.) \u201cA car like this seems wonderful,\u201d Auxier says, pointing up at the skylights of the double-decker \u201cSuperdome\u201d that serves as the train\u2019s dining car and kitchen, \u201cbut it\u2019s 65 years old. Imagine taking a 65-year-old car at 90 miles an hour across Missouri!\u201d <\/p>\n

The train\u2019s individual cars all have stories of their own, all of which are at Auxier\u2019s fingertips. \u201cThe Mojave, which is the Levi\u2019s car, actually ran on this route, between Chicago and L.A.,\u201d he says. \u201cThe Santa Fe Railway was a big promoter of the Southwest as a place for tourism \u2013 they did up the interiors of their cars with beautiful Southwestern art and carpet patterns. The lounge car up at the front was built for the president of the Norfolk & Western railroad in 1916, and it\u2019s basically the private jet of its era. It was a mobile office, so an executive of that time would put it on a scheduled passenger train and take along a chef \u2013 he\u2019d have a bedroom, an office and a kitchen for himself. It allowed him to go to any point on the railroad and conduct business.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wired‘s Douglas Wolk looks at the Station to Station train tour: Adam Auxier is Station to Station\u2019s train producer \u2013 an energetic, affable guy who just happens to know pretty much everything there is to know about trains and their history. He put together the assortment of gorgeous old train cars that make up the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[237,13],"tags":[102,200],"class_list":["post-22224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-railways","category-usa","tag-art","tag-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-5Ms","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22224"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22224\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22225,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22224\/revisions\/22225"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}