Fortress is a business with a responsibility to its investors to make double-digit profits. A business like that only buys another business if it thinks, one way or another, it can make that level of profits. Even the Big Name rrs don't make double-digit profits regularly - it's a capital-intensive and labor-intensive business that doesn't throw off huge sums of cash for long. Think airlines if they had to run their own ATC system and airports with minimal govt help and pay taxes on them besides.

Fortress should have thought of that if they intended to keep running RailAmerica as a rr business. OTOH, many such investment firms (think Maxxam and PLC) buy firms that they think have potential for a cash hit through liquidation - their assets are worth more than the company is. Do the math regarding scrap prices and real estate (though they might have to sit on the latter for a little while in the current market). Ditto the Neverland deal - it looks goofy, but what if they could get the County to let them set it up as a theme park to cover costs while they wait for the market to recover?