Here's a methodology from Kansas for determining road damage due to rail line abandonment. Interesting... [www.ctre.iastate.edu]

Was the initial poster inspired by John Kneiling's ghost? Cost of maintaining the roads aside (since they're public roads they have to be maintained at whatever cost, d*** the taxpayers), it would take an awful lot of long-term guaranteed traffic to make any investor really interested in building or significantly rebuilding a shortline these days. Especially one that runs through terrain that resembles NWP in miniature (ohhh - flame alert!).

Economically, one can make the case for fixing the line if the cost of doing that (again and again given the territory in coastal OR) is less than the cost of extra road maintenance (I haven't seen road maintenance accounting that would allow a valid comparison outside of academic exercises like the Kansas piece). Another piece of the picture of course is the local economy, but it's a fact that lumber is a dying business in the US (for a number of reasons, not just spotted owls) and dairy products are a road shipment these days. If the local dairy business depends on feed shipped in by rail, then the business is susceptible to moving out at any time to a more cost-effective location anyway (probably one near a main line where they can build a huge dairy, and preferably in an area with minimal water and air quality regulation). If it's a niche business built on cows out standing in their fields, then they don't really need the RR.

If the economic case can be made for fixing the line, but commercial interest rates are too high, there may be a place for some government "enterprise" fund that doesn't have to make a Wall Street-style profit to step in. Otherwise, cough up for fixing the road more often and figure out how to restructure the local economy for the consequences.

No, I don't see a coastwise barge operation especially as a carfloat being practical.