I'll take a shot at your questions...

"- Who owns the right-of-way at this time and what will become of it after the salvage is complete?"

The railroad crosses quite a few different landowners. The vast majority of the right-of-way will simply revert to the owners. The parts of the railroad on U.S. Forest Service land exist under Special Use Permits, and those will just go away. The railroad owns a few parcels, and during the abandonment process the company discussed possible land exchanges with the Forest Service for USFS land the railroad operates over west of McCloud. Some of the grade may become roads, but I anticipate the bulk of the grade will be reclaimed and allowed to return to nature, especially considering how much of it is on private land that has been otherwise locked up in recent years. USFS especially has shown every indication that it will go after the railroad hard to make sure that a lot of reclamation work is done.

"- What will become of the hulk of the Red Goose, hidden in the forest at Kinyon?"

No idea. I think the site of Kinyon is private land, so it's fate is up to the landowner.

"- Will they *really* remove the Britton Bridge? Seems like more effort than it's worth, unless they leave the piers and abutments in place."

What I have seen is that the bridge will come down. I don't know about leaving the piers and abutments in place. Caltrains is currently in the process of building a new highway bridge that will run from canyon wall to canyon wall well above the railroad bridge. The land on both sides of the bridge is now owned by PG&E, although it may be disposed of...I think the bridge itself represents too much of a liability problem to be kept in place. One issue that will have to be dealt with is the fiber optic cable that runs alongside the bridge.

Thanks for your observations.

Jeff Moore
Elko, NV