I model the 1950's Norfolk and Western because I am fascinated with the era as portrayed in the photographs of O. Winston Link. I also want to see something that I was born too late to see, though I did have the opportunity to spend my early years along the N&W mainline in the 1970's.
I model trains because Model Airplanes got annoying and model ships didn't pan out!
I model the Northeast Corridor (a few feet at a time), and the main reason is because many of my family members lived near the Metropark station.
As a result, I've been seeing those big PRR Catenary towers for quite some time, and nothing was quite so exciting than seeing an AEM7 shooting up t o New York. Before I was ever even remotely interested in model trains, I would always be excited to pass by the Northeast Corridor. The NEC seemed to follow me where ever I went. I used to stand by the overpass near the Philadelphia zoo and hope a train would come by.
I ended up picking the late 70s though, since it allowed me to run Conrail (my favorite) under the wire, as well as GG1s and other types. I also managed to get a lot of the more rare and unusual models in HO, such as the E44As (very nice Alpha ones, all to scale and good runners), and a fleet of the Arrow III MU cars through a friend. At the same time, I also came across a lot of incredible data from that time period, such as freight schedules, train consists, Catenary diagrams.
Not only was the late 70s practical, it was an interesting time. Conrail had just formed bringing color (or PC black) to places it didn't normally show up before. Amtrak had just become the owners of the Northeast Corridor. the GG1s and MP54s were rolling through their last miles, "current" favorites like the Arrow III were only just being delivered, experimental European locomotives were rolling about.
There was a lot of things that were not certain in that time period, Would Amtrak fix the NEC? Would Conrail Last? What will become of the Northeast? a lot of old, rust and grime, as well as a lot of new, polish and shine.
Its all super fascinating.
Modeling Conrail, Amtrak and NJ DOT under the wires in New Jersey, July 1979.
It is hard for me to narrow things down, so I guess you can say that I mostly model the Erie Lackawanna of the early 60's. The reason...I love the scenery. After taking a trip to Binghamton and touring that part of New York in '84, I figured it would be fun to model.
Having said that, I sometimes work on my freelance Trinity River & Western. Having grown up in North Texas, I wanted to do a fictional spin of the Frisco RR in Fort Worth. My aunt lived on a street right behind the Frisco yard in FW...my Dad and I visited the shops and roundhouse often. Cool stuff! I have been modeling my TR&W occasionally since '92.
Lastly, I like narrow gauge a lot. So, I also do a bit of that in On3. Growing up, we would take family vacations to Colorado and that is what got me going on that. My On3 Squaw Valley Narrow Gauge gets its name from my Dad's layout that he built in the 70's.
It is very hard for me to completely decide what I want to focus on more. Just don't get me going about the N gauge that I have...
Chuck - Modeling in HO scale and anything narrow gauge
Hi JaBear
Thanks that's the beast
regards John
"JaBear" So What and Why do you model what you do???? Remember the is no "right " answer and there fore no prizes or second place, and this time I will now thank you all for your contributions. Have Fun Cheer, the Bear.
So What and Why do you model what you do????
Remember the is no "right " answer and there fore no prizes or second place, and this time I will now thank you all for your contributions.
Have Fun
Cheer, the Bear.
Why is a very subjective question. My why is mostly subjective. I model the local railroad that served my childhood home, upon which my father commuted to work behind steam, from which we picked him up in the evening, and which I rode to summer camp, to Grandmother's house, and into the big city.
The Boston and Maine carried the name of our regional city. It was never as famous as the Santa Fe, the Pennsy, or the New York Central, but it was OUR railroad, nearby, familiar, whereas the more famous roads were far away. In the 40's and early fifties it was a plain jane, kinda dowdy looking thing, rust red box cars, simple maroon with gold stripes diesels, cabeese painted box car red. In the middle fifties it was taken over by a fast talking president named Patrick McGuinnis who tried to change everything. New blue paint on boxcars and cabeese, new blue paint scheme on the diesels. I never really warmed to the new (60 years ago new) scheme. My models are mostly painted in the old pre McGuinnis schemes. Patrick McGuinnis had numerous enemies who finally got him, prosecuted him for a complex deal involving sale of passenger cars and sent him to jail.
I like steam engines, all the visible moving parts are compelling. The B&M ran steam right up until I entered high school. I also like diesels. So modeling the transition era is a natural, lets me run steam and diesel, and its the era I grew up in. Now if I could just purchase some of the distinctive B&M steamers RTR. The old IHC moguls make a so-so stand in for the classic B-15 mogul, too bad IHC is no longer with us. Some kitbashing of a Mantua Pacific yielded a fair to middling P-4 Pacific. But I don't have anything for the big T-1 Mountains or the humble P2 Pacifics that pulled so many commuter trains.
There are some objective reasons for me to model the B&M. I still live in "Mogul Country" so I can go out and photograph real B&M scenes. I scratch built a tiny rural passenger station from photographs I took of the original. There is a fair amount of commercial B&M rolling stock available so you don't have to scratchbuild everything. Microscale carries a decent selection of B&M decals so train show pickings can become home road rolling stock for just a paint and decal job. There are some very useful coffee table books of B&M photos, including the invaluable Northern New England Color Guide.
But the real reasons, the compelling reasons for my choice are the subjective ones, the objective reasons are just back up arguments, rationalizations, for doing what I want to do anyhow.
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
What? D&RGW between 1965 and 1990. Secondary interest, SP of the 70's and 80's.
Where? Grande Junction Colorado and if space allows, include Denver and the Front Range.Why? I spent time traveling from northern California to Colorado in1982, 1983, and a last trip from Texas to Colorado in 1985.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
What: "Proto-freelance" alternate future Espee... one where they're still alive and kicking 1996+. More specifically, short lines that did business with the SP and were (eventually) bought out by the SP.
Why: Like most I grew up near a railroad and fell in love with what I saw on a regular basis. I was a kid when the SP was in its final days and was in high school when they finally folded and was aquired by big Uncle Pete. I grew up on the lower end of the middle class in the 'middle of nowhere' AZ, and with information at a minimum (and because i was a kid), I never really thought past the hypnotizing allure of massive lashup of tunnel motors roaring past draging multi-mile trains behind them... so I didn't even know that the SP was in trouble (as a business) and that the aquisition of SP by UP was the end of an AMAZING chunk of history.
By the time I got my act together and History actually became interesting to me (aka, well out of high school), there was yellow rolling through my old stomping grounds instead of bloody noses! I was right there and missed it! Grrr......
So, in my 'alternate future', the SP got a CEO in the early 80's that really knew his stuff and though it took several years of meager profits and copious quantities of hard work, the SP turned around as a business and started to become successful again. They brought back economical and high speed passenger service across the long flat stretches and difficult mountain ranges of the southwest. Frieght became comparable to trucking service in speed and costs. SP played the Green/Eco card and purchaced GEVOs, electrics locos, etc.
Not only where they successful in securing their position in the Class 1 railroad market space, but they even began to chip away at the UP and BNSF's territories by aquiring a few miles of trackage here and there.
With an environment setup such as this, it will give me a very wide range of power, rolling stock and scenery to model. I've two small shelf style (mini) layouts in the works as my current life situation doesn't allow for taking over of the basement.
Dave Loman
My site: The Rusty Spike
"It's a penny for your thoughts, but you have to put your 2 cents in.... hey, someone's making a penny!"
The layout I am currently working on is a HOn30 layout, depicting a freelance short line on a fictional island off the North Sea coast of Germany.
This lets me employ cheap rolling stock and locos from various sources, adapted to a small degree to give it a corporate look. I chose HOn30 for reasons of space & cost.
The layout is a micro layout in the best sense of the late Carl Arendt.
John BusbyIt was the real locomotive I was referring to I believe at least one is preserved in NZ.
I think you're thinking of the "mixed traffic" 4-8-2 "J" class locos, here's a 1940s photo of a partially streamlined example.
And here's a link to the preserved Streamlined "Ja"1211.
http://www.mainlinesteam.co.nz/j1211.html
Cheers, the Bear.
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
Why I model the Canadian Pacific with a dash of the D&H??
First, I grew up in Agincourt, ON just south of the CPR Agincourt Yard. Watching the parade of trains in the 70's with the multi liveries was amazing.
Second, when the CPR bought the D&H, I read up on & fell in love with the D&H Story & especially the PA's.
So now I combine the 2 & have my PA's running with my AC4400's
Gordon
Brought to you by the letters C.P.R. as well as D&H!
K1a - all the way
Triang was the cheap alternative, No Hornby Dublo for me till only 4 or 5 years ago
and one two rail loco is all I can afford of that it runs and gets sneaked on to the layout when no ones looking.
I have 3X Hiawatha all bought cheap second hand quite a few years ago no mad collectors prices then and I got them repaired wasn't expensive just a clean and new brushes. Now the collectors would kill me for having the cheek to get them working and using them.
Not sure what I am going to do about the one that needs new wheels.
Now I know where the red Triang double ended diesel is from no idea how I ended up with one of those haven't been any where near NZ
It was the real locomotive I was referring to I believe at least one is preserved in NZ. I believe it is an express passenger engine and has box pock drive wheels.
A whole shilling you Lucky lucky B&&&&&&d I was 5 at the time and I only got 6d
NP2626. I think that somehow we both "jumped the gun".
Audio Bob. A belated to the forum.
John Busby. Gidday John, the Triang factory was in Panmure, Auckland. I wonder if the steam loco that you're referring to was the "Hiawatha " 4-6-2 pictured in this catalogue here.....
http://www.tri-ang.co.uk/OONew/NZcatC.htm
in 1966 I was eight and received, if I did my chores, a shilling a week, nine pence of that which was to be banked. I know that Triang was supposed to be the cheap alternative , but with the cheapest set at six and a half pounds I never really had a chance. . Here's a link to the Australia, New Zealand section on that site...........
..http://www.tri-ang.co.uk/OONew/indAUST.htm
Gentlemen. The only conclusion I can make so far is that we seem to be a pretty diverse bunch of happy modelers. I ask myself, who would what to be a manufacturer of model railroad to try to cater to the likes of us??
Thanks and Cheers, the Bear.
So, why do I model Central Japan in September, 1964 - with a couple of add-ons from other parts of the country and some locomotives and rolling stock from Never-Never Land?
The twig was bent early - on my first Christmas. I teethed on a Lionel lithographed tin box car.
I went to HO early - HO kits were less expensive than Lionel, and my budget was limited.
In 1960 my then-girlfriend gave me an inexpensive kit for a brass locomotive of Japanese pattern but no known prototype. That decided me on Japanese prototype modeling. (I married the lady later that year. After 2 kids, 3 grandkids and 3-and-counting great-grandkids, the marriage is still going strong.)
During the same period, I spent a lot of time exploring the coal field in the vicinity of the base I was stationed at, with the idea of reproducing some of it in HOj scale.
In September of 1964 my wife and I, and our two toddlers, visited the Upper Kiso Valley - and fell in love with the area. My wife comes from a similar place (up-country Shikoku) so she was right at home among people who make their livings in the forest. Our kids were spoiled rotten - without picking up the spoiled rotten attitude. I had a steam-powered mainline and a narrow gauge log hauler to explore.
Ever since then, it has been my intention to combine those influences. Now I'm finally building the layout intended to let me do that. I'm a happy camper.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Hi gentlemen,
I am modeling between prototype scenes and sweet dreams.
Living in the Netherlands near Amsterdam tracks were everywhere; especially the rail-marine scenes were on the top of my list. However Dutch prototype railroading usually was dull dark brownish and dark greenish.
Since the 60's, still a teenager, I started buying Model Railroader magazine. Though it was printed in black and white in those days, American movies were showing me a new world with light and bright colours.
The Mama's and Papa's had a great song about Californian dreaming. The Dutch National Railways bought a lot of American designed engines just after WW2. Sadly enough not the well known Noab diesels bought by a lot of other more sophisticating European countries.
My Californian dream became finally clear. Why not consider a small part of the Dutch Nat Railway System as a privately owned company? Running exclusively those American designed engines and using 4-axels colourful freightcars, also USA designed.
My biggest issue turned out to be something else. Instead of a lot of selectively compressing I started to look at way smaller scenes (thank you Stein Jr). They were so nearby. Street running through a warehouse district where I used to visit a Jazz-club. A small branch to an entrepot-terminal in front of my aunts home. Those were build in the middle of the 19'th century. The small town fisherman's wharf of IJmuiden had a completely different size then the large "new" docks and warehouses in my home town Amsterdam built at the dawn of the 20'th century; two floors instead of 8.
All still very present in the 50's and 60's; all gone now or turned into condo's.
My avatar is such an engine BTW.
In the Europe before the EU, all countries had their own tax-regimes. Commodities from E.G. the UK going to Germany could be warehoused in Holland wihout being formally imported. This was done in area's sealed off by custom officers. This was called "in between depot" or in French: entre pot.
(yes our Dutch king is from German blood, while at the court French was spoken, those were the days!)
Smile
Paul
My first train set was a Santa Fe train set.
I have often struggled with the fact that I live in the eastern U.S., far from Santa Fe territory, though I have seen a good portion of the Santa Fe in person on two road trips.
My favorite color is orange, and I have a special affinity for Illinois Central Gulf and Frisco, too.
I've dabbled with many different roads, including CN and NdeM, but in the end, always go back to Santa Fe.
Recently I just couldn't pass up the BLI E-6A that my evil friend, the train store sales manager had on the counter, open for display. It wasn't what I was looking for at all--and I've passed up beautiful brass, nickel plated and painted Santa Fe E units in the past...but this time was just different.
I give up--no more trying to do the "orange" railroads. For the last time I'm sticking with Santa Fe, and am buying more E units as I purge my entire roster of engines and rolling stock, to backdate to the 1960's.
The "correct" Santa Fe freight cars for the era have begun to arrive. Next I'm buying the lightweight passenger cars with factory installed grab irons and lights (once the additional E units are paid for by the Ebay sales).
It's my railroad, and if I want to dispatch E units or Alco PA's on freight, it's perfectly ok, and even prototypically correct. There are photos in the Goen book Santa Fe in the Lone Star State, Vol 1, that prove Santa Fe did just that--not to run out the last miles as one might expect (as is often quoted)--but simply when there were power shortages during the early and mid-1960's.
In the late '60's, the Alco PA's also ran out their last miles in Southern California on hot perishable trains of reefers. I can have the colorful mid to late 1960's freight cars on the layout, and still have the aging passenger units.
John
I'm on my first layout so that partly explains what I chose to do, The track is freelance in the transition era.
I grew up with the PRR a stone's throw from where I lived on the West side of town. It must have been the Southern most point in the area and stub ended with a passenger station,a freight station, and a manual turntable. Of course there were a couple of businesses nearby that were rail served. This adjoined a woods and made for a great place to have grown up.
On the East side of town there was the B&O with it's passenger station, freight house. The B&O was the dominant railroad and served most of the industries as there weren't many on the West side. The B&O ended up with the PRR trackage.
And then there is the Winchester & Western. It came about during WW I to bring lumber out of West Virginia for the war effort. It now hauls glass sand from a mine 8 miles West and is owned by the mine. It also does some switching for CSX successor to the B&O. The W&W first connected to the B&O later the CSX.
So that explains my interest in steam but after college and a stint in the Navy it was all diesel when I returned home and therefore I wanted diesels as well as the steam.
I have located two industries, a service station and diner as well as an oil distributor on the layout that are special to me. Other wise everything else is from my imagination
The rail history makes me feel 0k having PRR, B&O, C&0/B&O, W&W, and CSX locos .
Bob
Edit: The sand mine is in the planning stage
Don't Ever Give Up
Long story so I'll try to make it short as possible. As a child I started modeling the things I saw in front of me every day. One cannot grow up in Colorado and not model the D&RGW, C&S, and Santa Fe. Why, it is what I knew.
Read about the V&O in MRC and decided to go freelance. It took so much work I decided to switch to a prototype. Why - Prototype research is so much easier than inventing high quality histories.
In high school I went to Woolworth's over Christmas and discovered that passenger cars could be some other color than stainless steel. I instantly became a Great Northern modeler. Why - I fell in love with the big sky blue scheme.
Studying the GN I soon learned that their steam locomotives were distinctive (to say the least) and to model them would be either expensive brass, huge scratch/kit bashing/ or just "good enough" type things. None was desirable to me. So I switched to NP. Why - no readily available steam equipment.
Going the NP route I soon learned that there were different limitations (like no Alco PAs), and even though they had great "normal" looking steam power it was still not USRA type equipment that I could just buy off the shelves. Had some research issues too as NP territory was to far away to just run out and get pictures of, especially when they became the BN in 1970. Switched away again. Why? Geographically Undesireable.
So now I am favoring free lance again. Even though I used up most of my really good ideas for the Club's PV&W, I'm hoping I will find the creative juices again. Why, 45 years of reasearch I think I finally know enough to bring together something that works on all the different levels of a good Model Railroad. All the cohesiveness required for operations, scenry, rolling stock, roster, track planning, etc. I think I can finally pull off.
What do I model? - I model a fantasy, (freelance), narrow gauge road in Colorado during the WWII period. My road is a 59 mile short line created to move the increased mineral traffic during the war. The road mostly hauls the new secret critical metal uranium and the standard war metals of Copper, lead and zinc.
Why do I model it? - I love the tiny little mikes and consolidations fighting their way through the rugged terrain loaded down with critical ore headed towards the standard gauge roads which will carry the material to distant eastern mills. I do a short line as it gives me a lot of freedom from the prototype world. I need not struggle to follow extant roads or their rolling stock, though I do connect with the real RGS narrow gauge.
I have always loved the narrow gauge for more than 40 years of model railroading, but couldn't get in since the cost of the engines were very expensive (brass only). There was no rolling stock that wasn't a 60+ piece wood kit with no trucks and no couplers. Blackstone changed all of this in 2006. While still costly, there are now engines and rolling stock ready to run. I will make a lot of custom rolling stock as many short lines often made or modified cars to suit their specific needs. A shortline rarely needed more than 3 or 4 engines and 30 cars was often quite sufficient.
Nothing is as nice as an outside frame, K-28 with its off-set, smokebox mounted air pump! The trains are just "people sized" railroading.
Richard
If I can't fix it, I can fix it so it can't be fixed
Granted I am only getting started, but my initial focus has been the northern Utah Union Pacific, 1945-1953. Why? Because my father's father was a brakeman for the UP in Utah during that time. (My grandfather had a number of occupations, including brakeman, postman, and homestead potato farmer.) Also, my mother's parents lived near the UP tracks in northern Utah and when we would go to visit in the summers, I can remember hearing the trains at night, granted this was much later than the 40's and 50's.
I say initial because my wife, who is also interested in the hobby, grew up near Albuquerque, and she was a little bummed with my selection of early UP diesel locomotives. To make her happy, we also have a pair of Santa Fe SD45's with a SF red caboose. When she saw these, she said, "Now that's what a train is supposed to look like!" She even refers to the SF train as "her train." Needless to say, our scenery will be a split between Utah farm land and New Mexico high desert. Different sections of the proposed layout, of course.
I freelance, or maybe more correctly protolance, the Mid Atlantic region in 1954 with my ATLANTIC CENTRAL which also interchanges and shares trackage with the B&O, WM and C&O.
Why, well not because of childhood memories since I was not even born yet 1954 - so much of that theory.
The location is because it is were I have spend my whole life living, it is what I know. And I do love the lush green nature of the country side here.
I been around a lot of the country, and most of it is beautiful, but I still like central Appalachia the best.
The time period - well you see I like history, and as my interest in trains grew, I studied rail history, and I found the early 50's to be the most interesting in terms of railroad history. Steam and diesel, beginnings of PIggyBack (Inter modal for you modern guys), passenger trains still run by the railroads, and still pretty flashy in most cases. and I like all the flashy post war freight car paint schemes that faded quickly to "dip jobs" by the 60's.
And I like east coast railroad motive power, as well as the double track, high volume, busy nature of an east coast Class I.
Sheldon
Central Illinois 50's thru the 2000's Why the industries kind of still look the same from years ago. Roadnames are very numerous from TP&W Iowa Interstate. My roster has Cars and Deisels from each era so i switch them out. The Big ones too like CNW,UP,BN,CB&Q 60's and early 70's,NS,Santa Fe. I love the diversity so that is why i model my area
Why the SP&S? Well I feel I owe the real #802 and it's former counter parts a second chance at their former lives though in N scale. Plus I have to paint and decal everything because manufacturers for some reason or another keep forgetting that the SP&S was a BN merger road. That and since I got SP&S #50, I figured it would be a challenger to model something out there that isn't a popular or very common road at all.
Why the late steam period? Because it allows me some freedom to what can run like my GS-4, 4-8-2, and 4-8-4 along side Diesels of varying make and model. #50 was built in 1945 and served all the way up until 1970 before it was sold off. plus I have a USAF train, the pullman boxes were made in 1947 and I have a small 1:144 scale P-51D. There was a lot of military activity in this area.
I guess I'd like to think of it as a challenge, anything that isn't available I can paint and decal to make it into SP&S.
SP&S modeler, 1960's give or take a decade or two for some equipment.
http://www.youtube.com/user/SGTDUPREY?feature=guide
Gary DuPrey
N scale model railroader
I model a specific year, 1927 and a specific location, a 19 mile SP branch serving the citrus industry in S scale, why 1927? PFE reefers in their final year of yellow paint, it was the last year Pullman sleeper cars were operated. F class 2-10-2's were first assigned to handle the 700+ cars a year that local growers generated.
It's rare to rare to see modeling of this period...especially in a minority scale.
Dave
I model places I've been or would like to see.
I model mostly Swiss and German prototypes because in 1968 almost everything in N-scale was European. By the late 1970's I was deeply entrenched in German steam.
My current large N-scale layout is very Swiss based.
I'm an avid hiker/camper and love mountains.
I model steam because I enjoy the movement of connecting rods and valve gear and it fits easily in almost any European setting.
On my N-Trak modules, I model modern American, Canadian, Japanese, and Disney.
The Maryland & Pennsylvania in the early 50's.
Why?
1. The Ma&Pa was still running old steam: 4-4-0, 4-6-0, 0-6-0 sloped back tender, 2-8-0. All but 1 2-8-0 were built before WWI.
2. It had 4 diesel switchers SW1, NW2(2), SW9.
3. It had 2 gas electrics
4. It still used open platform truss rod passenger equipment.
5. Ma&Pa freight equipment had truss rods and archbar trucks.
6. It ran passenger trains.
7. It was known for very sharp curves.
8. Connecting roads were the B&O and PRR which had modern equipment (i.e. 50's modern)
All of this allows me to have a model railroad where sharp curves and short freight car trains (even down to 1 car) and 2 car passenger trains are the norm. I also can have equipment spanning a 50 year time frame.
Enjoy
When I was in kindergarten I lived smack dab on the Southern Pacific right of way. I mean it was on my back porch. I admit a very strong tendency to want to model the late 50's SP. I have to hold back when I see a bloody nose on the shelf. But even stronger is the desire to model small steam in big redwoods. From ages 1-4 I lived in California Western territory and I can remember my mother talking about riding the skunk. But I don't remember actually seeing it. But other than the pragmatic reasons for modeling small steam that Dave mentioned--tight turns and #4 turnouts, I really can't tell you why I am drawn to watching 2" tall 2-6-0's running under 3 ft high redwoods.
Chip
Building the Rock Ridge Railroad with the slowest construction crew west of the Pecos.
Good question...I was thinkg of starting a thread like this myself.
I'll try to make a long story short:
When I was 6, I visited the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago and loved the model railroad they had set up. I remember a Santa Fe Warbonnet F-something running all over a huge layout. Lots of scenery and animation. (40 years later I got a chance to visit it and it is the same as I remember)
Age 9 got my first train set, a lifelike double loop of track on syrofoam mountains. It was fun fun, but it wasn't what I saw in Chicago 3 years before.
In 1977, RMC ran its V&O series, starting with the story of the teenagers chasing trains in the Appalachians. Loved it.
When the issue came out with the trackplan, I ultimately got disappointed because I knew my parents would never let me have the space I needed for the kind of layout I wanted. Also, and which motivates me today, I thought it was too much layout for one person (at least for me) to build, maintain, and operate by myself.
Then, in 1980, MR published Andy Speradeo's San Jacinto District, and bingo!, that was the solution.
Enough mainline to watch a train run through different scenes. Some switching, a small yard, different destinations. All in a manageable space.
in 2013, that is still the only kind of layout I'm interested in owning. I like all kinds, but something that can be operated with a few locos at most, that moves cars around from industry to industry or to interchange is what I'm interested in building and owning. I really don't think that will change.
I set my layout in the modern era in the midwest because that's what I see. I could easlily adapt the San Jacinto theme to a 1920's logging railroad, or a 1950's urban wharf setting. I may do that at some point.
But right now, I enjoy researching the types of operations and equipment a modern era shortline might have and observing structures and things that the trains serve today. Researching, building, and operating that type of layout keeps me busy enough in the hobby.
I am a lone wolf, so having a layout that accomodates multiple operators is really not my goal.
- Douglas
I model the mid 90's. I model a short line called the "Black Swamp RR". I grew up in the Great Black swamp region. There is some influence from the major railroads in the area. I chose to model the mid 90s due to its an era I like. I also chose to model a short line due to the "God factor". Its my layout..I can do what I want on it without some nitpicker saying that its not accurate....I am God of it..LOL. My railroad consists of some early diesels ( alco s-4..GP 15, 38, 40) whatever else my short line can afford on its limited budget.
Jeff
Once upon a time, I modeled the modern era. But, that was back in the 1950s, when I bought my first HO train set. Why the Milwaukee? I liked the color scheme. I was growing up on Long Island, outside of New York City, and I knew nothing of freight railroads at all, since the Long Island Railroad was a commuter line and handled very little freight. It's logo was a guy named "Dashing Dan" above it's slogan, The Route of the Dashing Commuter. As he was running while checking his wristwatch, we may assume that "dashing" referred to his speed rather than his charming ways with the ladies.
I loved the subways. I still remember my favorite birthday, when my Dad took me into the city and we rode the subways all day. I think we only left the system for lunch. Tokens were 15 cents, so the excursion cost 60 cents. Not bad for a life-long memory.
When I pulled those same trains out of their 40-year slumber in attics and basements, I began to look at what's available now, and found the Life-Like (pre-Walthers buyout) R-17 sets. I knew then that I had to have subways beneath my layout. I built the subway system from memories of the NYC system, although I didn't set it in New York, but rather Moose Bay, a ficticious town somewhere in the midwest. You see, I still had all that Milwaukee equipment, although what I'd bought as "modern" was now "late transition era" thanks to the passage of time.
That would be the story, except for one fateful trip to the LHS. There she was, a dark beauty, and she gave a low whistle as I gazed at the in-store layout. I was smitten with a case of Steam. I had to have her, but she was spoken for, so I ordered her sister that very day. Years later, I now have what will be a dual-era layout, when I finish laying track and stop having everything on the layout at once for testing.
My diesels let me hang on to my lifelong relationship, but those steam engines give me the chance to have a fling with others, a romantic ride with someone with a tender behind.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.