Just a couple of things. The excursions are a fund raiser and a community service for the local Lions Club. The club built a station and refurbished the cars to support the venture, and the railroad gave a very low rate to operate. Second, having to have a certified bridge engineer is above and beyond the former FRA requirement that the inspectors have FRA certification to inspect bridges in the first place. Only a class one and major regionals can afford to have an actual engineer on staff for annual inspections and then do nothing the rest of the year, further you have to find engineers that are experienced in the field and know what they are looking at with respect to rot, rust, concrete decomposition, ballast contamination stream angle and such. There is a significant difference between a bridge engineer that designs the things and one who maintains them and knows what they are looking at in the field --- few actually work in the field and ones that know what they are doing are fewer still (AND VERY COSTLY) and you still
have to have the FRA certified inspector anyway.