I was just out at Guilford County’s Northeast Park for local mountain bike organization Racing in the Woods excellent Wednesday night race series and I saw no sign of a train.
That’s right—Northeast Park has a train. Who knew?
The saga of the Little Train That Couldn’t began in 2011, when Guilford County moved forward with the miniature train project – the one that’s cost county taxpayers about $370,000 so far. In October 2011, Guilford County put out bids for the project. In January 2012, the Guilford County Board of Commissioners approved the funds to purchase the train – a new Katiland C.P. Huntington train. But now it’s May 2015 and the ride still isn’t open to the public and it’s not known when it will be.
Last week, the little train failed inspection again.
Guilford County Commissioner Alan Branson, who represents many of the residents in northeastern Guilford County, said he was very aware of the long-term and ongoing train fiasco. He said people who visit Northeast Park have been looking forward to the attraction for years.
“That’s been a damn nightmare,” Branson said.
Branson said the project has been plagued with one problem after another and he said that in the past one issue has been that the train would “run off the track when it went a certain speed.”
Gosh if the little train in Northeast Guilford County is such a ‘damn nightmare,’ we can only wonder about the proposed Southeast not-so-high-speed rail line.
