Container Port Ideas & Images I'm open to ideas & images to use for my container port that I wish to located in this area on my upper deck, just down from the SantaFe train station. This west coast port will be the imaginary origin for the container trains that will travel east to Baltimore located on the lower level. The shelf space is only a total of 18” deep, and the space between those two boards is about 6 feet in length. (that foil shaped rectangular opening was a window that will be covered over with blue solid board matching the other wall covering) I need one thru track on that upper deck area that can 'mask' some of the trains that are carrying coal, etc, that would NOT be passing in front of the container port, nor the SantaFe station. So I am imagining that track to be installed back very close to the back wall of that deck area,...and hidden from view by some sort of a view block, or multiple stacks of containers. I'm imagining 2, maybe 3 tracks running down the front edge of that container area, one that will be the other mainline of two, and one that will be a Santa Fe passenger train track. So that's at least 3 tracks I have running down that length of upper deck. That does NOT leave much area for container operations, and or container cranes, ships etc. I'm thinking that most all of the ships, cranes, etc will have to be painted background images? …..maybe something like these? Does anyone have some good reference photos, or know of good background images that are available?? I have PLENTY of containers I can use to create stacks in the area. And likely I need at least one spur track to hold container cars? Any ideas will be greatly appreciated.
Brian
My Layout Plan
Interesting new Plan Consideration
Perhaps you could find one of the Heljan operating models, which could actually load containers on cars. As I recall, these were pretty neat to see in action, but I think their play value would diminish after a while. They were originally very expensive. It might be fun for operating sessions, to let one operator just run the container terminal.
For a practical container port model, though, I think the idea of putting the ship and crane on a printed background is better. Guard shacks, chain link fencing, container trucks and lots of containers would bring the scene to life.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
There are container ports of all sizes from Alaska, the West Coast of Canada Washington, Oregon, California, Mexico, down to the southern tip of Chile. Start checking them out on Google Earth and you will get lots of Ideas.
I believe there are smaller operations up some of the rivers that can handle even the largest container ships, but you are more likely to see the smaller vessels in the smaller facilities.
As far as mixing coal and containers, both are shipped out of Roberts Bank Superport. Lots of videos and photos of that operation.
Your port is fictitious and that makes it easier to put together.
A smaller port at Prince Rupert. I agree that putting the ship(s) and cranes on the backdrop would be the way to go. You may be able to get a suitable photo from Google images and resize it.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
Charleston SC and Savannah GA have smaller container ports, IIRC. Perhaps there are images of those facilities easily found.
- Douglas
I was doing a brief look thru google images this morning, and their are a TON of images of container ports. I imagine that a person could chose one and have it printed out on a long piece of paper,vinyl, whatever these days?
I think you said you live on the First Coast of Florida.
.
How about a field trip to Jacksonville and see the port there?
I agree that with your space, nearly everything should be on the backdrop except for track and containers.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
Bunh of years back there was an MR series on building an intermodal port. In a rather small space. Ships were printed on the backdrop - they are WAY too big to actually put a model of one, one ship along would fill your shed.
The other option is to not make it a port where ships are loaded and unloaded, but rather a truck terminal where the containers are transferred to and from the truck chassis. They can be huge as well, but typically are smaller than the piers, and can be made relatively small without ruining the effect. And they seem to come in all sizes and shapes - long and narrow with only a couple of long tracks, or short and wide with lots of tracks. There was one near me that wasn't too huge, but they have since replaced it with a gigantic facility which has a multilane entry/exit adjacent to the local freeway. And the road between the freeway exit and the new intermodal facility was widened so there are two right turn lanes for trucks going into the facility and two turn lanes to get on the freeway.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
rrinkerBunch of years back there was an MR series on building an intermodal port. In a rather small space.
You might be thinking of Robert Smaus' fabulous Port of LA Module series beginning in the December 1990 issue of Model Railroader.
Layout Design GalleryLayout Design Special Interest Group
Someone commented about those images I posted above,..
A view such as you show in your example with the ship in front of the cranes puts your terminal in the water. That may be a problem for you because the only way to get the proper view of things is from a street view.
I agree, then I found this one,...
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/Stacking_Intermodal_container_in_Port_of_Chittagong_(17).jpg
My original thoughts were that I would have a LOT of containers stacked in the foreground, then the cranes & ship(s) in the background,..painted on the backdrop. I didn't think I would have enough space for the train loading equipment. But I ran across a few images I had saved that has me rethinking if I could limit some of those large stack of containers to those at the 'view block' area along the rear wall,...then provide some train loading equipments in the foreground??
Bernard Kempinski has a book about deep-water ports, specifically about the Port of Los Angeles I think, but certainly applicable to other ports as well.
Here's a link to his YouTube video (real-life shots, CGI animations, and HO scale model shots interspersed):
Port of Los Angeles Module
LINK to SNSR Blog
Got to figure out how to make that video run in slow speed,....flashing thru those scenes!
railandsail Got to figure out how to make that video run in slow speed,....flashing thru those scenes!
I understand. You also might want to mute the speakers.
Robert
Back to the container loading area of that upper deck. I found these images of Walther Mi-Jacks loading side-by-side double track configurations. I do realize the Mi-jacks don't normally straddle 2 tracks, but it looks real acceptable to me.
I also like the looks of those LED lights on the cranes
I don't have room for 4 tracks as depicted here, but rather only 2 tracks. I'm going to do some experimenting with the track arrangement as to whether to have 2 tracks side-by-side, or perhaps to either side of a central truck delivery roadway.
My 2 tracks vs that 4 track yard I don't have the shelf depth to have 4 tracks in my container yard, rather I will have to settle for 2. I can have 2 or 3 of those cranes down the length,...probable just 2 as it is a rather short length. Now lets see about the spacing of those tracks under the crane(s). I'm partial to the tracks being located to either side of the central roadway? It appears a little less congested that way??
Can't see any of your pics. Are you able to clip on a little width to your shelf in that spot?
Trainboard says I need to log in to see the images. I don't have a TB account.
Mike.
My You Tube
I think that to use Trainboard as a photo host for posts here that are visible to anyone, one must place the images in Railimages, not just link them from a Trainboard discussion thread. At least, that works for me.
Brian,
Try using Imgur to upload and store images. It's free!
https://imgur.com/
This is where I upload my images that I need to post on this forum.
Neal
You could use container lifts instead of cranes in a small yard. Kibri makes a nice kit and I believe walthers does too.
Joe Staten Island West
cuyama I think that to use Trainboard as a photo host for posts here that are visible to anyone, one must place the images in Railimages, not just link them from a Trainboard discussion thread. At least, that works for me.
railandsailI was lead to believe that photos posted on trainboard were acceptable to this forum. Now it appears there is another crease.
Yes, just use Railimages (part of Trainboard).
I tried that (railimages), but had some problems if I recall correctly. Maybe its just my limited mind when it comes to this 10k methods of working on the internet. ....probably the same reason I could not learn how to use my microsoft based smartphone. It out smarted me with all those crazy undefined icons, etc....
I would like to find an easy to work, easy to learn image hosting site thats going to be around for awhile. And that will not require a whole lot of effort to load up with images, locate in an understandable way, then extract in an easy way. I'm going to try that Imgur
nealknows Brian, Try using Imgur to upload and store images. It's free! https://imgur.com/ This is where I upload my images that I need to post on this forum. Neal
Hi Neal,I'm experimenting around with this Imgur site, and I'd like to ask you a question,..or 2?
Can you upload a group of photos at one time? There are those times that I take 2-10 photos of an experiment I have just made developing a particular scene/trackplan, then wish to make a posting using some of those photos. (I would wish that they were identified with the same image numbers that my camera gives them, and records them on the memory card in my Fujifilm S700 camera), but I likely can live without that if I don't have to upload them individually to Imgur. My first experiment was to upload the images individually.
I could then use a text document (Open Office) to compose the posting, and reference the photos by linking to them. Then post that.
On my cameras memory card I am able to open separate new folders to separate out subjects like,...container scene, steel mill scene, refinery scene, etc. Can I do the same on Imgur??
Any other hints?
PS: 3rd question. Can you delete an individual photo? As I was experimenting I duplicated some photo uploads that I would like to delete to eliminate future confusion.
You can upload quite a few at one time. You can delete a post from the public view, but it will stay in your account. I just tested this process for you...
You can also label your posts. Hope this helps.
Lets see if I can get this to work,...
****************************
I'm getting real fed up with this process. I downloaded images to imgbb, and was able to organize them into a nice folder. I then tried composing the posting on my Open Office program while coping the photos to that document. Then copy that all to the forum.
BUT the photos did NOT show up !!!
You cannot copy photos from a document into this forum. All you can do is insert a link to the photo stored in a picture hosting site - see instructions given by Steven Otte at the top of this forum.
Happy times!
Ulrich (aka The Tin Man)
"You´re never too old for a happy childhood!"
This may not be the kind of port you are planning, but it's a different option if you are squeezed for space. I literally took this photo from the forward breakfast deck of a cruise ship in Hawaii. The crane is not part of the port, but rather part of the container barge ferrying containers to the smaller islands.
I'm going to return to this discussion with my new photo hosting site in tow....ImgBB.I found it to be the most accommodating, and it also retains my camera's ID number of the photo when it uploads them into distingtive albums. This makes things easier when creating a posting off site, then eventually posting it. I can write the photo number down in the text document, then select that same photo number when making a posting,...less confusion in my older limited brain capacity....ha..ha
Have to finish up on several other scenes first.
MisterBeasley This may not be the kind of port you are planning, but it's a different option if you are squeezed for space. I literally took this photo from the forward breakfast deck of a cruise ship in Hawaii. The crane is not part of the port, but rather part of the container barge ferrying containers to the smaller islands.
Strange as it sounds one of the things I was able to do on my Hawaii cruise in 2014 was study container ports up close.