Great work there Mike, I shall be following your progress as well.
But count me in too. I have a hole in the wall in the right back corner of my layout. It goes to a four track staging yard that all tracks are about 14 feet long in a storage area. It connects in that corner to my Mainline..
Long live Holes-in the-Walls.
Johnboy out......................
from Saskatchewan, in the Great White North..
We have met the enemy, and he is us............ (Pogo)
I often wonder how many members of the "hole in the wall" gang there are out there. If I ever get to the point of expansion on my layout I may choose to join the group rather than the "remove the wall altogether" gang.
Thanks for the tour Mike and keep posting updates. I will be following with interest.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
Awesome Mike, thats really cool what you've done on this expansion. Oh we like holes in the wall. If you remember, thats where my expansion room goes through. Hehehe
That must have cost you some from your finance minister to get that approved.
Michael
CEO- Mile-HI-RailroadPrototype: D&RGW Moffat Line 1989
Mike,
Very impressive concept for your addition. Your thorough research adds another dimension. I am looking forward to your progress reports. Thanks for sharing.
Wilton.
With the main layout fully formed, if far from completely detailed, I've been getting the itch for new horizons. And the storage room that held my standard gauge staging and lone 3' of track that previously represented the HOn3 Cascade Branch off of my Silverton Branch line needed cleaning. There was already a hole in the wall, so why not?
A week or so later, it's time for a tour. I did have a vague idea of what I wanted in terms of a general track plan, constrained by the location where the branch entered the room, etc, so sketched out a plan. Something like this...
Once underway, I received authorization from the Finance Minister to go ahead, make another hole in the wall, a big one...
So the trackplan on paper doesn't quite cover things. With the charter extended, I managed to add about 50 feet of branchline, 3 stations, 3 logging camps, 2 wyes, etc, etc before the grading of roadbed was complete. Want to fidn it on a map? Get your Colorado DeLorme Atlas out. At the right bottom of page 76, you can see Tacoma on the D&S noted. Follow the RR north, past the gaging station. The Animas curves east here and it says "TR 675" on the map at the location of Tefft. However, Tefft itself is not labeled on the Delorme, but it is on the maps sold by the D&S, etc.
Going northwest from the river, Cascade Creek goes uphill. Whatever the maps may say, my surveying crews discovered a great access for a line into an area rich in lumber, limestone, and hard metals. It's been feeding the lumber mill at Rockwood for several years now, so it's about time to invest in this lucrative route. It'll be a joint venture between the Silverton Union RR and the Rio Grande. The SURR adopted Mears' railroad operations in the Silverton area after that bit of labor unrest was resolved a few years back and is now employee-owned. SURR crews are already qualified to operate to Durango. The net is that a lot of traffic will operate directly between Silverton and the end of the Cascade Branch and back. Service between Durango and Silverton will be maintained also.
In real life, there's actually a similar story also at play, besides more room to model. Limited aisle space restricts operations when more than three crews are working the main layout. By adding the Cascade Branch, I can put two more crews to work there. This makes it easier to accommodate all the operators who want to show up, a good problem to have that I'm now experiencing.
So a few more pics to finish this installment. Here's Tefft, where you can see the Cascade Branch rising in the background.
A closer look at the engineering on this bold new branch. Someday, world famous Cascade Falls will extend all the way up to the source of its water, trust me.
Now we've driven our LandCruiser in from Highway 550 to get to this location and can see a train coming! Looking closely, you can see a sag in the line where it runs through the wall. THis was done when it was a stub end staging track, to make sure there were no runaways. I decided to leave it for similar reasons, as it is gentle and well engineered as not to create any more problems than it solves. Unfortunately, right now we'll have to rely on the LandCruiser to follow the rest of the line, since the track runs out here for right now. We hope to make it to Purgatory, located at Purgatory Flats naturally enough, soon to take up the story of the pre-fantrip of this new line.
Now we've driven our LandCruiser in from Highway 550 to get to this location and can see a train coming!
Looking closely, you can see a sag in the line where it runs through the wall. THis was done when it was a stub end staging track, to make sure there were no runaways. I decided to leave it for similar reasons, as it is gentle and well engineered as not to create any more problems than it solves. Unfortunately, right now we'll have to rely on the LandCruiser to follow the rest of the line, since the track runs out here for right now. We hope to make it to Purgatory, located at Purgatory Flats naturally enough, soon to take up the story of the pre-fantrip of this new line.
Looking closely, you can see a sag in the line where it runs through the wall. THis was done when it was a stub end staging track, to make sure there were no runaways. I decided to leave it for similar reasons, as it is gentle and well engineered as not to create any more problems than it solves.
Unfortunately, right now we'll have to rely on the LandCruiser to follow the rest of the line, since the track runs out here for right now.
We hope to make it to Purgatory, located at Purgatory Flats naturally enough, soon to take up the story of the pre-fantrip of this new line.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL