Did you happen to notice there are several sites selling equipment for it? Mass-produced equipment? So you conclude no one's doing it?
Do you think the ore quality is uniform? If you have a whole hypothetical mine at your disposal, and someone else paid to buy it, put tunnels in it, and build a railroad or a road to get there, then you can pick out the best rock to mine because you don't have to make it pay to dig tunnels and build roads.
In our hypothetical mine, if they were mining there before, then there are probably slightly overgrown road beds or rusty railroad tracks to be found. They might remove the rails and ties but the raised, compacted bed would still be there.
So they wouldn't even have to do what Excelsior is doing:
"Excelsior Gold Corporation, LLC (a wholly owned subsidiary of Helmer Directional Drilling Corp) is pleased to announce that they have modified their Plan of Operation with the USFS. Excelsior had planned to install a bridge over a ravine on the primary access road. By working closely USFS personnel, the FS and Excelsior have agreed to utilize structural fill, which will greatly increase the load-bearing capacity, making it suitable for the transportation of a, trailer-office, as well as trailers tool storage and a change room for miners as well as the, transportation heavier equipment to the mine. More importantly, this makes it possible to use larger ore trucks which will increase our to shipping capacity and cost.
This announcement has been approved for release by Doug McFarland, Acting CEO."
