Scouts, families spruce up Howarth Park’s train station in Santa Rosa

John Kirby recalled the thrill of riding the small C.P. Huntington train with his brothers, through the tunnel and past the pond where Alfred the Alligator supposedly lives at Santa Rosa’s Howarth Park.

“Me and my brothers always talked about (the alligator), although we never saw it,” he said.

Now at 16 years old and measuring 6-feet-5-inches, Kirby no longer rides the train. But he wants to ensure it’ll continue to be an enjoyable experience for the children of Sonoma County.

The Boy Scout gathered his troop Saturday to spruce up the train station at the 152-acre park. Kirby enlisted about 40 current and former Scouts, family and friends to pitch in as part of his Eagle Scout project.

“It was in a little disrepair,” he said about the train station. “The paint was looking shabby and some of the boards were cracked.”

The troop scrubbed the station clean using brooms and brushes and removed cobwebs and abandoned bird and wasp nests. They then rolled on fresh coats of paint while some park visitors looked on. The troop also repainted the gutters around benches lined up in front the station.

“It looks pretty. Everyone should enjoy the clean and crisp new look,” said Kirby, a junior at Maria Carrillo High School, as scouts buzzed past him with paint rollers in hand.

Grace Murdock, 13, used the tip of her foot to remove some cobwebs as she painted under a bench inside the station.

As a young child, she said she frequented the park with her mother, Robin, who helped her paint on Saturday. And they often boarded the small train at that station, she added.

“People preserved it for us when we were young,” said the Rincon Valley Middle School student who is friends with the Kirby family. “Now we’re preserving it for others.”

The train and station are one of the city’s most popular attractions, said Patrick Driver, an assistant scoutmaster who has lived in Santa Rosa for almost two decades.

“Everyone who lives in Santa Rosa is familiar with the train station,” said Driver, who mentored Kirby on his Eagle Scout project.

The Santa Rosa Parks Foundation has been raising money to replace the little train. After ?45 years of hauling little ones around its quarter-mile track, the small replica of a 1863 steam train is at the end of its line. Breakdowns have become more frequent and maintenance costs have increased as parts have become harder to find.

Kirby wanted to breathe new life into the train station because of the site’s importance to families in the county, Driver added.

“Hopefully, it’ll give them pride to keep taking care of it and supporting it,” he said.

You can reach Staff Writer Eloísa Ruano González?at 521-5458 or eloisa.?gonzalez@pressdemo?crat.com.