Raton: Still Seeing Passengers More Than 100 Years Later. Moments away from finally having a chance to cool its heels and dynamic brake fans, Amtrak 3, the westbound Southwest Chief, arrives at into Raton, New Mexico following another successful day of having conquered Raton Pass. Built in 1904, the original Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway depot here at Raton originally had two, copper-tinned spirals atop both ends of the station. While these were removed by 1933, the majority of the depot has remained the same since it first open (minus closures of the dispatcher's office, telegraph room, trainmaster's office and express room). While it might not look like it, the structure actually boasts a second floor that once housed a octagonal record room above the dispatcher's office. In 1918, the arcade was expanded on the north end of the depot into a circular structure. This depot, which once saw the passenger of some of the Santa Fe's most popular trains with power on the head-end in the form of the railroad's most powerful steam and diesel locomotives, today rarely sees anything different than a pair of General Electric P42 units on the point of the daily east and westbound passages of the Chief.
