Many may have heard bits and pieces of this story before. I'd never seen pics of the actual layout, so was really pleased to see them in what many must've started reading as a strangely Off-Topic post. Before there was computer science, before there were hackers, before artificial intelligence, there was a model railroad, MIT's Tech Model Railroad Club. Enjoy:
https://medium.com/backchannel/the-tech-model-railroad-club-3b06a3163563
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
I remember thinking when I was wiring up my layout for DC control with all the different remote turnouts and relays turning on one chunk of track, while turning off another, that this must have been how computers got their start. Very basic and simple, still sort of like a computer.
Great post Mike!
NP 2626 "Northern Pacific, really terrific"
Northern Pacific Railway Historical Association: http://www.nprha.org/
"Hackers" is still one of my favorite books. As a teenager in the 1980s, an avid fan of both model railroading and computer hacking, I found it most gratifying that there was a connection between early computing and model railroad layouts. Thanks for sharing the link! Have always wondered how the TMRC layout looked.
I was one of the early computer folks back in 1973 when you rolled your own system S-100 buss, KSR 33, paper tape loading, etc. I read "Hackers", too. However, I was too smart to try and mix the two, (computers and MR) for control. The fun is that you are in control of the trains, switching, etc.
The last thing I wanted then or now is to let a computer in on my fun. When MR'ing gets so complex or a layout so befuddling that I need a computer to help me control it, I'll either go back to my 4X4, 1959 first HO layout or get out of MR'ing altogether.
I currently work in programming micro controllers (arduino, Basic stamp, etc). Putting one of these little guys in charge of signals might be cool if I had a road that ever used them. But haven't one signal on my layout, not at crossings or on the roads single track mainline.
Keeping it simple. DCC is more than enough to hack through, thank you. I always had pity for the absolutely clueless and computerless folks fiddling with DCC for the first time, but the best of MRs who really want DCC, will tough it out and virtually all do. At least DCC can be as easy or as tough as you want when wading into it.
Some may not agree, but believe me, as a long time programmer, all the really hard work of controlling locos and their sound is already done for you. All you have to do is figure out what you want to do and poke in a few numbers from a cheat sheet.
I don't think, if I remember correctly, that the guys in the early TMRC ever did control their layout by computer! That was before lightweight computers or one chip CPUs. They talked of that early "weak" computer like thing that took up an office in which they begged for time. They just thought it would be cool to control their road with a computer at that time, but that time had not yet arrived. It would be a few years later.
Knowing MIT guys, someone probably introduced some high tech cpu or computer control to the layout later on.
Richard
If I can't fix it, I can fix it so it can't be fixed
Yeah, read about this about 15 or 20 years ago.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
Interlocking plants are, at their core, analog logic machines.
--Steven Otte, Model Railroader senior associate editorsotte@kalmbach.com
Steven Otte Interlocking plants are, at their core, analog logic machines.
Yes, and it's definitely a connection that persists. My wife is a programmer here at the big U -- and a bit of a railfan herself. One of her close colleagues at work is a pretty prolific rail photographer, in fact he's been published in Trains. He recently received his locomotive engineer qualification at the Monticello Train Museum. In recent years, as the University of Illinois railroad engineering program has grown rapidly, he picked up co-teaching a class on signals.
Obviously, if you want to mix trains and computers and you want to go someplace other the MIT or Michigan Tech, UI-Urbana-Champaign is a great place to be. There's also a model railroad club, although it's layout is in a dorm basement, rather than in an engineering building.
The existence of computers have affeced many areas of model railroading, in many aspects. DCC is the most obvious thought many have, but there has been software to run car-routing systems since the days when you had to type them into one's Apple II or TRS-80 in BASIC. Computers as a graphics tool let us take digital photos, scan old photos, or use drawing/painting programs to create signs, backgrounds, details and even entire buildings--and with the advent of 3D printing, computer-generated models! They let us do research by long distance, and communicate with other model railroaders so we don't feel so alone in our hobby even if we live in remote places, and can get inspired by others' work. And, of course, we can order model railroad components online even if there is no LHS nearby (with the predictable and sad result that, with the advent of online ordering, there are fewer local hobby shops nearby.) As with DCC, all the hard work of programming this stuff has been done for the model railroader--the end user just has fun doing creative things with a machine that was itself the result of creative minds of a different sort--but with model railroading deep within their DNA!
Model railroads are just a system, as railroads are systems, and the model railroader tries to simulate that system in appearance and/or function to varying degrees. Computers are also systems, so that "systems thinking" exhibited by hackers and model railroading benefits either pastime.
My layout is primitive from a hardware perspective (DC only, not even blocks, manually operated switches) and an operations perspective (wheel report operating scheme based on paper slips) but my scenery and buildings benefit a lot from high technology.
If you read about the historical development of computers, from the 18th century textile loom "cards" which enabled repetitive patterns to be made in a primitive industrial manner, the concepts and mechanical computer designs of Babbage, the paper punch card invention of Hollerith (the census offical who layer started the ancestor of IBM), into the early 20th century- the electromechanical signaling and track management systems developed for control of remote railroad switches were an important precursor to the development of computers as we know them today. If you're a model railroader using any type of computer control system these days (and hats off to young electrical engineering students back in the 1970s), then you may be proud of the real-world heritage connection to railroads in a historical sense.
Cedarwoodron
Modelling HO Scale with a focus on the West and Midwest USA
Alexander,
You're welcome
While it's not exactly news to many, it's certainly a bit of history that bears a revisit. We often read expressions of concern about the future of the hobby expressed here. Before we get too negative, it pays to remember how our hobby's fortune is interwoven with the science and technology that young people find so attractive.
It bears repeating periodically, because there will always be more young people. Most of us started out as young people IIRC. In that past, the hobby benefiited from interested RR workers and professionals in other fields, who also tended to be compensated enough that their consumption added significantly to making the the volumes that make producing products for all of us an attractive business venture - for the bravehearted Now those ranks are slowly turning over and many of those with a tendency to join the fun are again in a respected profession that is usually compensated well enough to participate. That sort of "curb appeal" is good thing.
mlehmanBefore we get too negative, it pays to remember how our hobby's fortune is interwoven with the science and technology that young people find so attractive.
I keep saying, change is the biggest part of growth. It really wasn't that long ago that kids had to push their trains around on the track, then came the first electric train. Oh the horror shouted all the old geezers. This hobby is becoming so hands off, it will never survive.
Thanks for posting Mike, I enjoyed reading that.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
I was a TMRC member in the 90s when I worked at MIT.
What doesn't get talked about much is that "The System" is based on "Progressive Cab Control" developed in the 50s by the NMRA and written about frequently in MR.
Disclaimer: This post may contain humor, sarcasm, and/or flatulence.
Michael Mornard
Bringing the North Woods to South Dakota!
Bayfield Transfer Railway I was a TMRC member in the 90s when I worked at MIT. What doesn't get talked about much is that "The System" is based on "Progressive Cab Control" developed in the 50s by the NMRA and written about frequently in MR.
That must've been a blast.
I thought the article description sounded a lot like Progressive Cab Control. Guess that explains why. It also points out that, while some folks look at the NMRA like a bunch of model railroader old timers (I plead guilty to being one any year now), it's also an organization that has proactively looked to the technical future of our hobby and made it better.
And it certainly speaks to the reputation of the organization for its work to influence the folks at MIT.
Let's not forget Dr. Bruce Chubb's Computer/Model Railroad Interface from the 1980's.
The computer did actually control the trains, at least the power routing and signals. I know because I built and installed the system for my previous layout. Worked like a charm in those pre-DCC days. Artificial Intelligence? Well, as a programmer experimenting with Artificial Intelligence in the Healthcare industry, I wrote the CMRI software using the AI language PROLOG. I didn't really use any heavy decision making code but I did some things the original BASIC software didn't do.