The Blue Smoke RR

[Anonymous]

The Blue Smoke RR is an O Gauge hi-rail pike featured in the 1987 book Great Toy Train Layouts of America, the follow-on video series of the same name (now on DVD) and in a June 1990 Model Railroader article. The track plan (designed by Steve Brenneisen of Ross Custom switches) is excellent; in 25' x 25' there's a long double track main folded over itself with two peninsulas, passing sidings, numerious industrial sidings and a yard. The railroad has two control panels, one for yard operations and one for the mainline. Each panel is separated by a high mountain reaching almost to the ceiling.

Each engineer is also a dispatcher, they contact each other by telephone and
pass orders for cars and consists. Hoppers for the mine, lumber cars for the
sawmill, etc. While this is going on a passenger train is making the rounds
and a fast clock ticks away. This is not unlike the kind of operation scale
model railroaders have been enjoying for decades, but you don't read much
about it on O gauge pikes. You could duplicate it on a smaller system,
tinplate or hi-rail.

Fast forward 20 years and you could replace the centralized panels with
walk-around controllers and use a PC based switchlist program. A walk-around throttle would certainly be good for solo operation, but too much of a tech revamp might spoil the railroad. The space allotted, the lack of wireless remotes/command control and the owners desire for dispatcher-oriented operations combined very well. Command control would eliminate the block operations, but I think the challenge would be in insuring command contol served the RR and didn't become the focus.

Going back and looking at the Blue Smoke has me re-thinking layout design in general. I'll never have the space for a linear design with miles of mainline, but
borrowing a few concepts from the Blue Smoke RR perhaps someday I'll be able to build a railroad instead of just another layout.

Brady

[daan]

It sounds like a great railroad. Of course you don't have to have a scale railroad to use the "operator games", a layout with a few sidings and some industrie with the possibility of multiple operators (even if it's just a ZW transformer) can be enough. And big is not always more beatifull.
Even if you have not a big space, a small wall mounted track between 2 small switching areas with a few beeps or small yardloco's can provide a multiple operator layout and can be used in the same way as a big layout. I've build some of these "island railroads" in h0 with on one side a small harbour and on the other side a small industrial area. The connecting track was just a one meter long flextrack. But since both small area's had a their own transformer and operating panel it was fun for 2 persons and it also had a form of "taking" and "giving" trains with a small number of requested cars. I used very tiny engines on that (Fleischmann black anna 0-4-0 and 2 0-4-0 o&k standard Fleischmann diesels. Cars where 2 lorries, 2 flatcars, one refrigirator car and 3 closed freightcar's, none of them with trucks, just plains 2 axle cars) A small pico diesel railbus was the public transport.
The tracks where a loading/unloading track; spare track and a small track to a platform for the station on the harbour side and on the other side a station/goods combined track and an unloading track near a factory. All of it just 3 switches and some flextrack and 2 50x100cm area's.
Of course no highspeed trains or long freight's but only one or 2 cars with a small engine, but it's fun to operate.. Just plain basic dual operation.