A few months ago, AMTRAK said no more excursion trains with them. I understand that this put private car owners in a bind trying to ferry their cars from one place to another with AMTRAK. Now excursion operators have to find ways to fund the liability policy premium themselves. That one is huge!
UP has said over and over for years now that they will not have any steam from other groups running on their rails period. The attorneys got this one in to limit Public Injury Liability charitable jury awards from draining the corp. treasury. The attorneys have won that battle. A local steam group is having difficulty getting a hospital move of a cold steam locomotive moved from one location to another via UP rails. UP doesn't want the liability exposure from a bunch of foamers even on a dead engine. Unless you have your own ground to run on, steam is RIP these days in the West with UP. This really puts a dent in any plans for the California State Railroad Museum from even thinking about a possibility of a Railfair. I'm not sure what BNSF has established as a steam on their rails rule. Awhile back, they were friendly on a couple of occasions.
But since UP is the main link in the West, it's pretty hard to get around them. I say that as there may be joint trackage rights in some areas where you can scoot across in the dead of night.
Bill