[Dr. Herzog posted the following self-introduction to the All-Aboard list in 1999. It has been edited here for typographical errors only.]
——– Original Message ——–
Subject: {A-A} MEMBER OF THE AA LIST
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1999 21:53:09 -0700
I am 51 years old and by profession I am a University Professor and Administrator in California. I grew up in a family that was closely connected to the operation of the Swiss National Railways (SBB/CFF) and academia. When I was two years old I had my fist ride on an American Passenger Train the SUNSET LIMITED from New Orleans to Los Angeles. However, do [sic] to a strike on SP that trip was diverted to Dallas and Ft. Worth and then continued west over the Santa Fe. So I can safely say I am one of the few members of this list who has ridden the Sunset through Flagstaff. Many years later, the late Byron Nordberg and I had the opportunity to ride a Sunset SUPERLINER set overnight from Los Angeles to Sacramento during the inaugural celebration of moving the Coast Starlight into Sacramento. That same year Byron and I rode a special move over the San Diego corridor which utilized a spare Sunset Train Set. This probably makes me the only living person to have been on the Sunset in Flagstaff, Sacramento and San Diego.
I came into Rail Advocacy when I was a graduate student at New Mexico State through Dr. Ron Sheck, a professor of Geography at that University. At that time he was involved in writing the first analysis of AMTRAK published as AMTRAK80. That document came out of many bull sessions held in his house in Las Cruces that were sometimes attended by Atk President Reistrup who just by accident had a sister living close to Ron’s house in Las Cruces. Ten years later, Ron Sheck asked me to contribute to AMTRAK 90 which is still a basically valid document. It can be viewed on the Arizona Rail Passenger Association Web Page.
In 1979 I first met the late Byron Nordberg who eventually became the senior partner with me in NHA (Nordberg Herzog and Associates) a California Consulting firm dealing with rail passenger issues. Our clients were mostly the cities and counties along the Southwest Corridor as Byron named the Santa Barbara to San Diego corridor. Several of the initial studies for rail projects that are now in operation on that corridor were done by NHA. Our largest client was UTDC the Canadian manufacturer of the Toronto Bi-level cars now in service in MIAMI, LOS ANGELES, VANCOUVER, SAN DIEGO and soon SEATTLE. NHA was involved in much of the initial contact work with all of the above cities except MIAMI. For those of us who have worked closely with Byron, seeing these cars on a daily basis is the greatest legacy of Byron Nordberg. Even though, I was the secondary partner in that operation, it is still an honor to see cars that you have helped deliver operate over a corridor where the first rough drawings for many of the stations began on my or Byron’s kitchen table. As Anthony Haswell, the father of what became Amtrak, said to me a few weeks ago, Byron truly was the father of the Southwest Corridor. It was an honor to learn from him and to serve with him in the many battles that we fought to begin that project.
In term of advocacy groups, I have been or currently still am, a member of the New Mexico Association (based on my second home in Las Cruces), RailPAC based on my primary residence in California, The Arizona Association, INTERRAIL (FORMERLY A NARP CHAPTER FOR WYOMING, UTAH and IDAHO). It was trough Byron that I first Met Andrew Selden, Austin Coates and many of the other key players who helped to make URPA the think tank operation it is today. Currently, I serve as Vice President of Research and Development for URPA. During the 70s and early 80s I was also a member of NARP, but due to sharp differences of opinion, both Byron and I resigned from that organization many years ago.
Dr. Adrian Herzog
URPA