Re-read my post, son. I said nothing about a mine or any other kind of like operation; merely the aspect of a product/commodity in transit.
ef3 yellowjacketCoal, cement, wheat, iron, taconite (iron ore) et al are all bulk commodities in their raw form, and are very good ideas for a layout, as they are pretty conducive to most perceptions of operation, and do give you a pretty good justification for your railroad's existence in the first place.
What always amazes me is people always think they need a coal MINE. Forget the mine. Unless you are modeling the limited regions that have mines (which is in the greater scheme of things a pretty small area). Instead look at the users of coal. There are hundreds or thousands of users for every mining region. Plus a coal mine has very limited potential. It has relatively few if any inputs and generally only one output, coal. If you look at the users of coal you have a waaaaaaaay larger opportunity for car mix and switching. (If you have staging or allow for staging).
For example rather than model a mine, model a power plant. You have coal in and fly ash out. Plus you can occaisionally ship in transformers, boilers, or if its a small company they might have their supply yard atheir too so you can spot poles, wire, small transformers, boxcars of smaller parts, etc.
For example rather than model a mine, model a cement plant. You can have coal and limestone in and cement out in bulk (covered hoppers) and bagged (boxcars). Plus you can occaisionally ship in boxcars of bags.
For example rather than model a mine, model a retail coal dealer. They often are combined with fuel oil and lumber dealers. So you can have coal and gravel in in hoppers, lumber in boxcars and flats, boxcars of bagged cement, windows, doors, siding, etc.
A mine is usually a pretty big operation. The users of coal can be tailored to a smaller operation more in line with the size of a small layout.
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
Coal, cement, wheat, iron, taconite (iron ore) et al are all bulk commodities in their raw form, and are very good ideas for a layout, as they are pretty conducive to most perceptions of operation, and do give you a pretty good justification for your railroad's existence in the first place.
I have always been fascinated by city, industrial, port, etc scenes, and the concept of same pascks a lot of appeal to me. It can also be said that you can pack a lot of layout based on the forementioned into a small area and still keep it interesting.
The coal can be delivered to either a coke works , a coal distributor, a power plant, etc, . The cement plant would need aggrigate imported as well, and may ship out cement castings, bag concrete, cinder blocks, even pre cast bridge beams.
I would suggest a elevator or feed mill rather than a coal mine. Coal mines are very rare on the UP, the majority of them on other lines the UP has merged with (So. Illinois/MP, Powder River Basin/CNW, Colorado/DRGW, Utah/DRGW) A feed mill also would get a wider variety of traffic, grain bulk and bagged in or out, possibly fertilizer, maybe even implements (tractors, combines, etc.)
Dave H.
I have seen large, rail served companies that make concrete pipe, as the prior poster noted. I have never seen a plant that makes concrete railroad ties but somebody has gotta be making them and certainly the UP is a user, so there is very likely a supplier on-line. Consider this very large website for example, and consider having Pomeroy on your layout. http://www.pomeroycorp.com/index.php
Consider a plant that makes the familiar concrete barrier used on a permanent basis for freeways but also in demand as a temporary item during road construction. This interesting website has information and drawings, as well as photos. http://www.jensenprecast.com/products/K-Rail/ In fact why not model Jensen on your layout? On your layout, Jensen could get concrete in by rail and ship their product out by truck or rail. BLMA makes a plastic casting for what they call the K rail barrier.
Dave Nelson
A number of cement end users are possible dependent on your era which you didn;t mention. A local concrete company near me gets ten to twelve cars a day of stone and cement to feed their concrete plant for foundatons, roads and other users. A fairly large site near my house that has some smaller nondescript buildings makes septic tanks and a variety of cast cement products for water and sewer service. the vast bulk of the area is just finished product stiing outside waiting for sale. You could also have a company that casts concrete water pipes for mains. If you are modeling a modern era just about all the coal goes to power plants, steel mil coke ovens (metallurgical grade). and for some reason college and university power houses on a couple of cars a week basis. As you go back in time many towns had homes with coal fired furnaces that required a dealer or dealers to supply the coal. Coal was usually unloaded from a trestle and just dumped into various areas to keep it sorted. Several coal dealer model kits have been offered over the years.
So hate me. See if I care.
The major industries that you have identified will either ship to or receive from two main places - hidden staging, and modeled interchange tracks that lead to other hidden staging. Cement comes from wherever the local purveyor of cement blocks and ready-mix can get the best deal - probably several states away. Coal is shipped to whoever needs it - probably a fair distance and a state line or two away.
On my own layout, I have a private railway that exists only to carry the output of two coal mines to the rest of Japan - and that's where about 98% of it ends up, in any one of three staging yards. A few cars a day are routed to the coal docks that serve the mainline steam, and a few old cars in captive service keep the coal-hauler's teakettles ready to climb the grade back to the mine (with the aid of some workers with strong backs and shovels.)
The other major industry, a sawmill, is fed by a narrow gauge logger and ships about 90% of its output to staging. About 5% goes to the mine, for underground use, and the rest is distributed to team tracks at the five modeled towns. The house builders and furniture makers don't have sidings of their own.
That logging line brings in more logs than the local sawmill can handle. The excess is transloaded to JNR cars and shipped out to staging.
During my modeling era, the roads in the area I model were hardly better than goat trails, so a lot of things came in by rail that would normally be considered truck cargo. With the exception of things going to that big coal mine, all of those inbound shipments are handled at team tracks or freight stations.
Then there are the through trains, passenger and freight, that run from staging to staging with only a crew change at Tomikawa. Steam powered trains swap power, to catenary motors. Diesel-hydraulic locomotives and DMUs run through.
In short, most traffic should be routed to or from off-layout points. Loads traveling short distances usually move on rubber tires unless there are no passable roads.
Chuck (Modeling a little bit of Central Japan in September, 1964 - with the rest of Japan in hidden staging)
uttrainmanWhile running some trains at an open house, I noticed the trains were simply going around in circles with no particular purpose. I realized that my railroad would operate that way unless I made some changes. I am just starting to build a slightly modified version of the UP in a Bedroom plan that appeared in the 2006 Model Railroad Planning special issue by Model Railroader. I have planned for two primary industries - a coal mine and a cement plant. I had not given any thought to where the cement would come from or where it or the coal would go other than around in circles. My question is this - what small line side industries can you suggest that will use the products produced by the two major industries?
You have just discovered the concept of staging and/or the concept of universal industries like interchange, harbor or team track :-)
Staging - you can have one (or more) tracks leaving the modelled part of the railroad and go behind something or under your layout. Trains leave your area by driving into staging - they departed for somewhere else. Trains enter your area by driving from staging onto your layout - they came from somewhere else.
General industries that are easy to model on the visible part of the layout:
- Interchange track - just a siding where your railroad drops off cars that another (maybe not even modeled) railroad will "later" pick up the outbound cars from your layout and drop off some inbound cars for your layout.
- Team track - a track that ends along a road, where stuff can be transloaded from a RR car to trucks (in the olden days to wagons drawn by teams of horses - hence the name).
- Harbor (river, lake or ocean), where your RR cars stop on the pierside (which is modelled along the inner edge of the layout) to be unloaded into (or loaded from) a ship that is not modelled - imagined to be in the aisle.
Any of these could be modelled as a simple track - doesn't need any fancy buildings, and doesn't need to take a lot of space.
Smile, Stein