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Please Help — An unthinkably large Ho Scale system.

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Posted by BATMAN on Wednesday, April 28, 2021 10:08 PM

Delusions are fixed and false personal beliefs that are resistant to change in the light of conflicting evidence. Delusions are the extreme case of irrational beliefs. These beliefs are obsessive and cause emotional distress. ... Even some otherwise rational people appear to believe bizarre things that are not true.

C'mon Dawg let us grumpy old men bring our ability for critical thinking to the fore one more time. History is replete with beliefs that just don't hold water, this one we are allowed to discuss.Big Smile

Pass the popcorn.Laugh

Brent

"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."

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Posted by JDawg on Wednesday, April 28, 2021 10:29 PM

BATMAN

Delusions are fixed and false personal beliefs that are resistant to change in the light of conflicting evidence. Delusions are the extreme case of irrational beliefs. These beliefs are obsessive and cause emotional distress. ... Even some otherwise rational people appear to believe bizarre things that are not true.

C'mon Dawg let us grumpy old men bring our ability for critical thinking to the fore one more time. History is replete with beliefs that just don't hold water, this one we are allowed to discuss.Big Smile

Pass the popcorn.Laugh

 

 

EmbarrassedCritical thinking indeed!Wink

     I took some time to look at our good artists work on his Flickr. Very detailed drawings in a very large room. Maybe this guy is serious. Maybe, I said maybe! I'm not jumping on any bandwagon until I get some facts. If our artist would provide some more solid evidence Ill entertain the idea of giving him some financal support, and perhaps some of my very valuable modeking skills(for a price). And if he's really lucky I'll grace him with some of my boundless wisdom. 

      Yes, I am a smart donkey, Tell me something I don't know.Stick out tongue.

JJF


Prototypically modeling the Great Northern in Minnesota with just a hint of freelancing. Smile, Wink & Grin

Yesterday is History.

Tomorrow is a Mystery.

But today is a Gift, that is why it is called the Present. 

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Wednesday, April 28, 2021 10:35 PM

ATLANTIC CENTRAL
Walmart has never just moved down the street to build the bigger store here.

You are very fortunate. Hopefully it stays that way for you.

This abandon WalMart in North Fort Myers was on the news tonight because of all the homeless that have broken in and set up camps inside.

-Kevin

Living the dream.

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Posted by Outsailing86 on Wednesday, April 28, 2021 11:01 PM

Jared is long gone, right?

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Wednesday, April 28, 2021 11:41 PM

Outsailing86
Jared is long gone, right?

No, he is still posting and sharing more about this idea. At least as of 48 hours ago.

-Kevin

Living the dream.

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Posted by Doughless on Thursday, April 29, 2021 3:27 AM

ATLANTIC CENTRAL
This is interesting. There is not one abandoned Walmart that I know of in this region? There are malls with empty anchor department stores, but Walmart has never just moved down the street to build the bigger store here. And the one time I know of when it was considered, The county would not even consider the idea without a plan for the old store....... And we are littered with Walmarts, I can leave my house and make a one hour loop and hit 4 or 5 easy. Give me 20 more minutes and I can hit 3 more and be back home.

Walmart started out as a competitor to KMart, simply as a general merchandise store with an auto care shop.  Later Walmart started selling groceries and needed to add on the grocery square footage too. 

The Walmart abandonment phenonenon mainly is from the vacating of a too-small store from their old business model and the building of a brand new bigger store somewhere close.  Counties tended to put up with the trade off because they got land developed and traffic counts up, so then the Taco bell's and Applebees of the world wanted to locate a new building near the new Walmart too.

Walmart started as a regional retailer and their expansion into the far east coast and northeast took a relatively long time.  They probably built SuperCenters from the get go in your region, so they may never have the smaller stores to abandon.  Or maybe the economics is slightly different.  

I don't know if there is wide spread abandonment of supercenters in favor of even bigger supercenters, but it could happen in some areas I suppose.

Edit:  The pic Kevin shared looks like a store from Walmart's old business model where the whole thing is anchoring and attached to a retail strip center.  The new Super Centers, for the most part, are free standing buildings.

- Douglas

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Posted by ATLANTIC CENTRAL on Thursday, April 29, 2021 7:53 AM

Doughless

 

 
ATLANTIC CENTRAL
This is interesting. There is not one abandoned Walmart that I know of in this region? There are malls with empty anchor department stores, but Walmart has never just moved down the street to build the bigger store here. And the one time I know of when it was considered, The county would not even consider the idea without a plan for the old store....... And we are littered with Walmarts, I can leave my house and make a one hour loop and hit 4 or 5 easy. Give me 20 more minutes and I can hit 3 more and be back home.

 

Walmart started out as a competitor to KMart, simply as a general merchandise store with an auto care shop.  Later Walmart started selling groceries and needed to add on the grocery square footage too. 

The Walmart abandonment phenonenon mainly is from the vacating of a too-small store from their old business model and the building of a brand new bigger store somewhere close.  Counties tended to put up with the trade off because they got land developed and traffic counts up, so then the Taco bell's and Applebees of the world wanted to locate a new building near the new Walmart too.

Walmart started as a regional retailer and their expansion into the far east coast and northeast took a relatively long time.  They probably built SuperCenters from the get go in your region, so they may never have the smaller stores to abandon.  Or maybe the economics is slightly different.  

I don't know if there is wide spread abandonment of supercenters in favor of even bigger supercenters, but it could happen in some areas I suppose.

Edit:  The pic Kevin shared looks like a store from Walmart's old business model where the whole thing is anchoring and attached to a retail strip center.  The new Super Centers, for the most part, are free standing buildings.

 

Some of our Walmarts are supercenters, some are not. Not someplace I go very often, maybe 6 times a year.

Sheldon

 

    

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Posted by maxman on Thursday, April 29, 2021 10:30 AM

We had a Walmart and a Sam's Club on adjoining properties.  Don't know who had that bright idea.  The Sam's Club closed and now sits vacant.

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Thursday, April 29, 2021 10:45 AM

Doughless
The pic Kevin shared looks like a store from Walmart's old business model where the whole thing is anchoring and attached to a retail strip center.  The new Super Centers, for the most part, are free standing buildings.

That is exactly what it is. This was built in 1985, and was the first WalMart in Southwest Florida.

WalMart owned the entire strip center. When WalMart moved out in the mid 1990s, they also did not renew any leases, and the whole thing was abandon within 2 years.

This one will never be redeveloped. There was a deal with the county that the land will be used to build a new interchange for roadways with a flyover, but that plan has been delayed for 20 years.

Living the dream.

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Posted by Track fiddler on Thursday, April 29, 2021 11:05 AM

We have one of those side by side Walmart Sam's Clubs down in Shakopee.  I'm sure everyone knows Sam's Club is owned by Walmart.  Last I seen both stores are doing quite well but I avoid that area like the plague. 

It has one way in and one way out and is like a city of shopping and fast food joints.  A horrific rat trap I call it, No Thanks!

Since the corona, every 5-6 weeks we power shop for groceries so we don't have to go out as much.  That's the only time I go to Walmart is to fill up two heaping carts of food staples that's all the same as anywhere else anyway but costs up to 30% less to eat.

I wouldn't dream of buying deli meat at Walmart as I have no idea the last time the meat slicers were cleaned.  It's a judgment call just looking at the thingsIck!  Getting a coat of solomonilla on my lunch meat isn't exactly my idea of a good sandwich.  We go to Jerry's, Lunds or Byerly's, for all our meats, that way we know we get the good stuff.  I don't skimp on meat.

 

P.S.   Has the real estate been purchased to break ground to start the building the size of 500 football stadiums for the Mega Layout yet? Whistling

 

 

 

TF

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Posted by SeeYou190 on Thursday, April 29, 2021 12:20 PM

Track fiddler
P.S.   Has the real estate been purchased to break ground to start the building the size of 500 football stadiums for the Mega Layout yet?

I think Florida is a non-starter for this project.

I tried to figure out how much area would be required for a retention pond (lake) for the rain water run off from a building the size of 500 stadiums, and the size and construction costs for the rainwater containment would be astonomical.

Better to build it in a desert.

Arizona maybe?

-Kevin

Living the dream.

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Posted by NorthBrit on Thursday, April 29, 2021 12:34 PM

SeeYou190
 

I think Florida is a non-starter for this project.

I tried to figure out how much area would be required for a retention pond (lake) for the rain water run off from a building the size of 500 stadiums, and the size and construction costs for the rainwater containment would be astonomical.

Better to build it in a desert.

Arizona maybe?

-Kevin

 

 

Why not ask Jared the Artist?    So far he has come up with no more than I have when planning my next layout.

 

David

To the world you are someone.    To someone you are the world

I cannot afford the luxury of a negative thought

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Posted by Doughless on Thursday, April 29, 2021 1:14 PM

maxman

We had a Walmart and a Sam's Club on adjoining properties.  Don't know who had that bright idea.  The Sam's Club closed and now sits vacant.

 

Yeah, things run their course.  Some ideas didn't work as a strategery, and some local situations don't fit the strategerizing as well as thought.

I think Walmart just decided as a company to start selling groceries and found the stores they had at the time weren't big enough.  That accounts for most of the vacancies.  Then they started the Sams Club idea.

Now they'll probably have to migrate into an online sales company and more stores will go vacant.

Maybe things are looking up for Jared's ability to find cheap real estate.

- Douglas

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Posted by York1 on Thursday, April 29, 2021 1:20 PM

Doughless
Now they'll probably have to migrate into an online sales company and more stores will go vacant.

Although they are far behind Amazon, Walmart is the second largest online retailer in the U.S.  The world is changing:

 

 

If the item is heavy and shipping would be expensive, Walmart offers their own products to ship to your nearest Walmart with free shipping.

York1 John       

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Posted by Jared the Artist on Thursday, April 29, 2021 2:08 PM

SeeYou190
 
Track fiddler
P.S.   Has the real estate been purchased to break ground to start the building the size of 500 football stadiums for the Mega Layout yet?

 

I think Florida is a non-starter for this project.

I tried to figure out how much area would be required for a retention pond (lake) for the rain water run off from a building the size of 500 stadiums, and the size and construction costs for the rainwater containment would be astonomical.

Better to build it in a desert.

Arizona maybe?

-Kevin

 

 

Fortunately, Disney owns the land in mind.  The easiest and most effective way to drive tourists to the park would be to simply tie into Disney. 

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Posted by Doughless on Thursday, April 29, 2021 2:16 PM

Jared the Artist

 

 
SeeYou190
 
Track fiddler
P.S.   Has the real estate been purchased to break ground to start the building the size of 500 football stadiums for the Mega Layout yet?

 

I think Florida is a non-starter for this project.

I tried to figure out how much area would be required for a retention pond (lake) for the rain water run off from a building the size of 500 stadiums, and the size and construction costs for the rainwater containment would be astonomical.

Better to build it in a desert.

Arizona maybe?

-Kevin

 

 

 

 

Fortunately, Disney owns the land in mind.  The easiest and most effective way to drive tourists to the park would be to simply tie into Disney. 

 

Kevin's not really talking about the size of the land parcel.  He's talking about the cost of building the pond.

When you build a structure, the roof(s) and parking lot keeps rain water from soaking into what used to be bare ground. 

That's water runoff that the builder has to account for...you just can't allow all of that water to "run off" onto other peoples property. You have to capture and hold that water on your property.

So you have to build the structures and parking lot, and account for the cost of acquiring the land for the "lake" and the cost of building the "lake", equipped with proper storm sewer upgrades to handle all of the additional storm water runoff you're going to create.  

Kevin was estimating the size and the cost of simply building the pond for the size of building (roof top square footage....AND...possibly an asphalt parking lot...accounting for the speed and volume of rainfall estimated during the numerous Florida thundershowers)

For that cost to be moot, you'd have to find an existing unused building on the Disney property (which would already be part of the entire Disney watershed so to speak).  If not, the new pond for the new building would be quite large. 

 

- Douglas

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Posted by Outsailing86 on Thursday, April 29, 2021 2:19 PM

Walt Disney was a 1:8 scale model railroader. But before you offer rides, there is a whole sidebar of insurance companies and amusement park considerations. 

for the HO scale world, a lot captures a kids audience for a few minutes as they walk around it. Before embarking on a project like this, I would go to Chicago and watch how long someone looks at the layout there. It isn't the main attraction for the science museum. So keep that in mind when you think of what admission could be per person... 

Then remember going to this track would be a dad weekend, so a family would do it possibly four times a year. So repeat business isn't exactly there... 

Time wise... there is a good video series on YouTube building the Missabe and Western. That should give you an idea of how long it takes to build a large home layout. Your empire... well, that's a whole new problem. 

Design wise, get a Autocad 2D mechanical drafting package. I think it's around $8k. Drawing turnouts just need linework, especially for this level of detail. Later on, you could plan your towns with a Track planning program, but your issue is space, aisles, curve radius, and how much RR can you fit. 

 

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Posted by Bayfield Transfer Railway on Thursday, April 29, 2021 2:39 PM

"simply tie into Disney. "

 

I am now 100% convinced that this person has no idea what they are talking about.

The most charitable interpretation I can come up with is that he's seen "Babes in Arms" with Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland too many times.  "My dad's got an old barn, let's put on a show!"

Disclaimer:  This post may contain humor, sarcasm, and/or flatulence.

Michael Mornard

Bringing the North Woods to South Dakota!

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Posted by Overmod on Thursday, April 29, 2021 3:08 PM

SeeYou190
I tried to figure out how much area would be required for a retention pond (lake) for the rain water run off from a building the size of 500 stadium

He, like anyone else with any sense, would use vaults.  A better class of armchair consulting engineers would have recognized and flagged the nominal parking requirements and done their drainage calculations accordingly.

Storm runoff is another matter, but by the time you get to where your vaults can't sink the runoff you'll have other storm-related concerns of more importance.  He might have to go to John Barnes-style power drains for larger buildings, but construction is greatly simplified here as there is no clear-span requirement as in stadiums or similar buildings, and drains can be run vertically at many prospective locations within the actual envelope.

Everyone seems to have forgotten his original point about the shuttle trains moving people between the original 'vignettes' in his starting buildout (which might be just the most notable 'scenic' areas).

While looking up data on PRR 'tenders of unusual size' I was reminded that Sam Berliner III has actual footage requirements for building Horse Shoe in full scale, including the altitude changes.  He noted (in 2002) that his calculations might be in error, so someone familiar with scaling laws might go through and 'fact-check' them.  He does not come up with an actual footprint, only route-miles.  (Interestingly he has numbers for HO, N, and Z; the total length in the latter gauge is under half a mile, and with curvature I would expect it's 'footprint' in viewable model form to be less)

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Posted by NorthBrit on Thursday, April 29, 2021 3:12 PM

Well here we are  258 posts  on this thread.     Jared is still at square 1.   He knows I know we will still be at square 1 at 500 posts.   One of us is laughing.  Not me,  I am smiling.

For the third time, Jared,   Prove Me Wrong.  Build your Wonderland.

 

David

   

To the world you are someone.    To someone you are the world

I cannot afford the luxury of a negative thought

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Posted by Doughless on Thursday, April 29, 2021 3:19 PM

The lake would be so large, it could be a recreational facility.  Much better way to economically amortize the cost of water management than underground tanks.

Now we've got a huge capital investment around what is a scale model of rural nothingness.

I'm afraid Jared would get about 10 minutes into his investor presentation before they would want to move on to a less risky investment.

But I'll heed my own comments and stop giving free advice.

- Douglas

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Posted by Track fiddler on Thursday, April 29, 2021 3:33 PM

Doughless

The lake would be so large, it could be a recreational facility.  Much better way to economically amortize the cost of water management than underground tanks.

 
LaughLaughLaugh
 
It could have launch excursions like on Milacs Lake where the girls sunbathe on the roof.  And then rent out binoculars on shore.  That would surely help pay the runoff expense.
 
 
 
 
 
 
TF
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Posted by tstage on Thursday, April 29, 2021 4:09 PM

How long until this fishing trip is over with???

https://tstage9.wixsite.com/nyc-modeling

Time...It marches on...without ever turning around to see if anyone is even keeping in step.

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Posted by BATMAN on Thursday, April 29, 2021 4:41 PM

Brent

"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."

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Posted by Jared the Artist on Thursday, April 29, 2021 6:45 PM

Doughless
Kevin's not really talking about the size of the land parcel.  He's talking about the cost of building the pond.

Doughless
For that cost to be moot, you'd have to find an existing unused building on the Disney property (which would already be part of the entire Disney watershed so to speak).  If not, the new pond for the new building would be quite large. 

Thanks for clearing that up.

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Posted by Jared the Artist on Thursday, April 29, 2021 6:48 PM

Doughless
The lake would be so large, it could be a recreational facility.  Much better way to economically amortize the cost of water management than underground tanks.

This actually bodes well for me.  Like I said earlier, I'll need a massive river system to ferry the radio controlled ships from port to port throughout the theme park, as well as a lake to "anchor" the ships in need of service/repairs.

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Posted by Jared the Artist on Thursday, April 29, 2021 6:53 PM

NorthBrit
Well here we are  258 posts  on this thread.     Jared is still at square 1.   He knows I know we will still be at square 1 at 500 posts.   One of us is laughing.  Not me,  I am smiling.

I'm not sure how you figure that.  Just because I don't post daily progress reports?

NorthBrit
For the third time, Jared,   Prove Me Wrong.  Build your Wonderland.

I will, David.  But you can't expect me to design a first-of-its-kind theme park in a day, week or month for that matter.  Not even Disney or Universal with a team of designers can produce a plan that fast.

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Posted by johnbalich on Thursday, April 29, 2021 7:16 PM

BATMAN

Delusions are fixed and false personal beliefs that are resistant to change in the light of conflicting evidence. Delusions are the extreme case of irrational beliefs. These beliefs are obsessive and cause emotional distress. ... Even some otherwise rational people appear to believe bizarre things that are not true.

C'mon Dawg let us grumpy old men bring our ability for critical thinking to the fore one more time. History is replete with beliefs that just don't hold water, this one we are allowed to discuss.Big Smile

Pass the popcorn.Laugh

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Posted by johnbalich on Thursday, April 29, 2021 7:18 PM

"Not all things that count can be counted. Not all that things that can be counted, count." Einstein

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Posted by The Milwaukee Road Warrior on Thursday, April 29, 2021 8:00 PM

Bayfield Transfer Railway
"simply tie into Disney. "   I am now 100% convinced that this person has no idea what they are talking about.

Exactly my thoughts upon reading the reply, lol.  There is no such thing as just 'tying into Disney', that multi-billion dollar enterprise that protects its intellectual property with fierce determination.  Good grief.

Secondly, I'm guessing no matter where this thing would be built, numerous zoning code variations would be required...

Thirdly, I used to work in a northern Chicago suburb that required residents to build their own detention basins on their own property if the amount of impervious surface area exceeded some stated percentage of the lot area.  People were furious and let me tell you: it was NOT cheap to build detention for even a 1/2 to 1 acre lot..

Finally, the costs of electricity and heating and cooling alone will be incalculable.

This is wine-fueled delusion.

Maybe we should all agree to let this "thread" die, and get back to more reality-based endeavors. 

Andy

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Milwaukee native modeling the Milwaukee Road in 1950's Milwaukee.

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