Have you ever "changed roads?"

[n2mopac]

I made a major change in my modeling focus a couple of years ago. I have always modeled MoPac because I grew up around a busy MoPac main and remembered them from my childhood. Then I lived in a town for 4 years with a busy BNSF main just after the merger. When I moved from there I ended up in another town with a BNSF main and industrial area that I though simply begged to be modeled. I have always modeled fairly modern timeframes (was 1980's, now 2000), but I have switched roads completely. I moved again about a year ago and am building a new layout, my first in BNSF. I still collect MoPac memorabelia, but my models are packed away.

I am curious how many people have made a major shift in the railroad they model, the time period, or the part of the country during their model railroading career. Let us know about your experience.

Ron

[twhite]

Never 'changed' roads, but I've added some. Started out with Rio Grande when I was a kid, have always kept it my main focus. Added SP, since I live in what was SP territory (Northern California) and have added some WP and GN since. Since I model 100% steam in the '40's and '50's, I can always 'borrow' from another railroad if I want, so I've ended up with some Eastern and Midwestern prototypes from time to time. Actually, what I'd do if I were you, n2Mopac, is unpack your Missouri Pacific and run it occasionally as a 'time-travel' line. A lot of model railroaders I know who change Eras, keep some of the older-Era equipment for 'nostalgia' runs. I've got an old 1880's D&RGW Consolidation and a few mixed old freight and passenger cars that I run as a 'Movie' train, since the Rio Grande appeared in so many hollywood productions during the '40's and '50's. It makes for some interesting contrasts.
Tom

[cwclark]

I haven't changed roads but have added them to stay prototype...it was exclusively SP at one time until they bought out D&RGW..then they were added to the layout...then UP bought out SP so here we go again...SP, D&RGW and UP all rolled up into one layout...Chuck[:D]

[Anonymous]

I was at the point where I simply couldn't commit to any one railroad. Every Railroad has something I like about. (The basic steel wheel on the rail for starters) that I simply couldn't commit to any one prototype. My favorite one and the one I get most exited about is the Great Northern in the late 1960s. But I am also a big fan of the B&O, the MILW, the CB&Q, The NP, the SP&S, the N&W, the C&O, and Union Pacific (Yes I am mad at them, but only because I am a fan) While my favorite era was the late 1960s, I collect stuff from all eras, so you will see the 4-4-0 "119" running down one track with the comparitively huge DDA40X heading up a train on a paralell track. It is my goal to by the time I die have modeled the entire North American Rail Network as it was in the late 1960s. If I get that done, I will do another as it was during WWII.

So in closing, I never had to change roads. I never could commit to one to start with.

James.

[lupo]

I am one that definate changed roads, even changed continent:
when I was young I used to model the european DB ( Deutche Bundesbahn ) at age 17 sold everything,
Started over some years ago, now I could afford the US engines I could only dream about browsing the Fleischmann and Marklin catalogues when I was young.
Changed to model UP ( but have some Santa Fe as well )

[Anonymous]

I started out modeling Southern Pacific as I grew up around it and then changed focus to Union Pacific later as I spent a lot of time living near the UP mainline. More recently I have been focusing on the UP in the late steam era. But I still love the SP, what can i say, I'm like most modelers, I like modern and steam era and i like multiple roads.

[orsonroy]

Six years, one house and one fiance ago, I was happily modeling a freelance West Virginia coal hauler, circa 1958. Since then, I've moved, married someone else, and become a proto-based modeler. I've got very little left from my old layout, except a few dozen twin hoppers. Basically everything else, from the benchwork, to the track, to what runs on the track, is brand new.

It might hurt a bit at first, but it's worth it in the end, so long as you have a clear direction, some sort of gameplan, and a real, long-term desire to make the switch. I'm extremely happy with the choice I made to change eras, prototypes, and locations, but it wasn't an impulse. Now my appeal for On30 is DEFINITELY an impulse, and one I've resisted (so far!)

[BNSFNUT]

I modeled the Erie Lackawanna for years but 1996 I was at a point due to lost of almost everything I had I had to to start over mostly from scratch. I still had a few buildings. When I started to design the new layout I tried to decide why my last couple layouts where short lived. Then I thought about the fact that I had been modeling the same RR for 20+ years and the east coast for longer than that.and it was just getting old.
So I looked for a new idea and after reading a lot decided on the BNSF in the southwest.
The change in RR and era was just the thing I needed to get me going again.
I believe if I had not changed I would have dropped out of the hobby.
So don't be afraid of changing it might keep you interest going,

[CP5415]

Not yet but I don't think I will.
I've been in love with the CPR for too many years to want to switch.
As others have stated here, I'd probably add railroads before I'd change.
But if I were to switch, it would probably have to be the Ashley, Drew & Northern

Gordon

[Anonymous]

I went from BN in Montana/Idaho to a fictional road in Pennsylvania.

I went througha weird period where I bought a bunch of CB&Q stuff even though it didn't fit in and then a CP Rail phase. Sadly a bunch of my CB&Q and CPR stuff in a box I can't find and all my bathtub gons were in there.

[n2mopac]

QUOTE: Originally posted by twhite


Actually, what I'd do if I were you, n2Mopac, is unpack your Missouri Pacific and run it occasionally as a 'time-travel' line. A lot of model railroaders I know who change Eras, keep some of the older-Era equipment for 'nostalgia' runs. I've got an old 1880's D&RGW Consolidation and a few mixed old freight and passenger cars that I run as a 'Movie' train, since the Rio Grande appeared in so many hollywood productions during the '40's and '50's. It makes for some interesting contrasts.
Tom

Thanks for the tip. I had thought I would do that from time to time, once the main is up and running on the new layout--that may be another 9 mo's to a year away. I can actually use a lot of my rolling stock as there is a UP line paralles to the BNSF line I model and I used to see a lot of old MoPac equipment running on that UP line. I am modeling that UP line and an interchange with UP, so I will have some use for much of my MoPac rolling stock.

Ron

[Anonymous]

I have not changed roads. but trains and loco. I always love the Pennsylvania RR and still do. My favorite loco is the GG1, and my favorite train was the
ACL's champion, But over the years I fell in love with the Athearn F7 and it became my main loco on my Eastern RR. Also end up modeling the Super Chief and not the Champion.

[Anonymous]

I've been hooked on the B&O and Chessie for quite some time. However last summer I almost switched over to Rock Island. I had line on a couple of RI engines but I came to my senses once I realized the cost associated with the switch.

I do like the blue/white scheme though..............

[Noah Hofrichter]

I did once model a fictional SOO line route on my first layout, because that was my first engine, but then I found my true love in the Wisconsin And Southern.

Noah

[Anonymous]

when i started out i was modeling the current Union Pacific in Southeast Texas and i had tons of modern locomotives and freight cars. but a year or so ago i decided to switch to modeling the Southern Pacific line between West Colton and Indio set in the mid 90's after watching the Beaumont Hill video by Video Rails. it was a pretty hard choice, but those SP diesels are so much fun to model, and i love running long trains with tons of locomotives. so the Beaumont Hill route works perfectly.

just about all my more modern locomotives and freight cars ended up on ebay. but there were still quite a few that i could use (had to renumber a few of them)

[Anonymous]

Changing roads is a constant situation with me as I can't quite get sufficient focus on era and region. Case in point....for my birthday this year I received an Athearn ATSF GP60M/GP60B set, a Proto2000 B&M S-1, and two Kadee PS1 40' boxcars and I like 'em all. As long as I don't pull the PS1's with the Geeps, I'm not totally hopeless, right?

[ericboone]

Sort of... I started out modeling the Chessie System, mainly because one of it's former C&O / Pere Marquette mainlines ran about 1/4 mile from the home I grew up in and my grandfather worked for the railroad. Of course that was a small fictitional layout in my parent's home's basement, but with lots of Chessie locos and cars. Sometime in my late teens, I got bit by the steam bug and the strictly prototype bug too. I chose to go back to 1946, the year before the C&O takeover of the PM, because the C&O rapidly dieselized the PM and the PM was essentially a Michigan railroad. I have been building up my collection of PM equipment and hope to start building a good sized layout in my new basement soon. (The basement needs to be finished first.)

[joebraun]

I would like to offer the related notion of a "radical change of paradigm" in the design of the model railroad without rebuilding the whole thing. My railroad was completed, complex-looking with a long main-line run, though in essence it was a loop; operation became sort of boring. The Erie Limited was back home in six minutes.
I had put an addition on the house which gave new basement space with one wall between it and the railroad. With ultra-careful planning, I rented a jackhammer and put four different holes through the cinder block and added four 12-track reverse-loop staging track levels in that new basement room, each level connected to the old mainline at four different places. The old railroad remained totally intact, except for some configuration changes at the four meeting places. The major change is that it is now by design totally impossible to have continuous running out there on the basic railroad. Trains appear from one of the entry points and can and must exit at any one of the other three, after having a pretty good run and exposure. My "railfanning" kind of operation is now so engrossing. (The technical aspects of occupancy detection are for another venue but I can summarize by saying that it can and is pretty simple.)
The point here is that I have truly exciting railroading that probably saved my interest in the model railroad. I collect mainly Erie and E-L but I have lots of other roads represented because I have loved them or rode them. It is now easier to have them all on the system at one time, because now I can hide on the staging loops, say, a couple GN trains and save them for a time when I want to pretend my eastern cliffs are the Front Range.
Moral: never fear a big paradigm shift, whether it be railroad modelled, your trackplan, or some other aspect of our great hobby.

[Anonymous]

I started off modeling a fictional railroad, loosely patterned after the Sierra Railroad set (roughly) in the 1920-1940 era. Later I switched to the Sierra firmly entrenched in the 1940's - 1950's era. When that layout had to be torn out for a move I let the hobby go fallow as career and family took priority. I am now able to free up some time and work on an On30 model of the Empire City Railway operating out of Lyons (on the Sugar Pine/Pickering) to Empire City based operations along the North Fork of the Tuolumne River. This one wil be focused on a "what if" the ECRy. continued operations into the 1920's - 30's and actually moved into some of the territory that the West Side actually logged.

So, while I changed specific railroads, I never left the geographic area of Tuolumne County. Of course being born and raised in Sonora and spending my childhood watching the Sierra, West Side and Pickering may have had something to do with my preferences [:)]

[Anonymous]

Hi Ron, I had several favorite roads for either their steam loco rosters, diesel paint schemes, passenger equipment, or the type of freight a road predominantly hauled. As it turned out, I found on a national map of U.S. railroads, a common location where most of these roads converged upon. Would you believe Kansas City Mo.? I was able to get detailed prints on the K.C., Mo Union Station along with many pix of the buildings in the immediate area. The Depot (fourth largest in 1914 U.S.) became the focal point of my layout and a rationale for the diversity of different roads found on my pike. Of course, this precluded some eastern roads that are favorites of mine as well. What I couldn't bring myself into, was creating a road name (or two) of my own, thus having the liberty of choosing any locos and rolling stock I fancied. As far as time frame? Unless you have an extremely wide preference of say, wood burners to EMD SD40t's or Bullet Trains, you can always get away with some pretty old vintage steam locos (std. hvy. wt. cars, etc.) run as "rail fan excursion" trains. Personally, I placed a 1950 date limit on my layout and found it covered most of the steam, steam turbine, diesel and overhead electric locos plus standard, smotth side, fluted side passenger cars going back to the late 1920's. I'm afraid anything passed the 1950's puts constraints on much of the finest steam, and rolling stock which I could not live without. By the way, MoPac, as you know, ran its' Eagles through Kansas City , Mo. Good luck and happy railroading. Bobfarkus

[Hawks05]

i don't really have a specific road that i model right now. i have 2 CB&Q engines and 2 BN engines. i hvae one Rock Island loco but i might sell that. i'm not sure. it doesn't fit but i like the paint scheme. i'm going to try and find a few NS and CSX locos next weekend. i'm buying a NS off ebay this week. next weekend i'm going to hunt for a BNSF, CSX, or UP loco.

i don't know what i'm gonna focus on. as i won't be around next year hardly at all to work on a layout since i'll be 2 hours away in college. i'm sure i'll still buy stuff but i won't be able to work on it unless i come home. i'd really like to focus on BN and NS. with some of the others worked in there. i just like the look of BNSF and CSX. UP is what goes through town here and because of that i want to represent it a little.

[fischey]

I read this thread with interest. I started out in European prototype, AC Marklin. Then I got interested in US prototype, mostly California Steam-Diesel era roads (SP-WP) and Colorado Narrow guage. Then I got interested in European DC in about 1978.... Here we go again! I reluctanly sold off my US stuff in 1990, mainly because I got hooked on European Meter gauge in about 1980 and three feet just doesn't stretch wide enough for one meter. It caused my HO meter stuff to bump along my 36" Colorado track with one flange on the outside. Sure, go ahead and laugh! But it worked, at least until I encountered a turnout. Sure, I was just test running, but I realized something had to change, and for me, staying on the continent worked. It's where I was born and have fond memories. I concentrated my time and energy in building modules operating Swiss Standard gauge, dabbling in Swiss meter gauge alongside. This allowed the use of quite a bit of international interchange, and operation stuff that runs on juice, diesel and coal. I model one era phase, a transitional time in the 60's to 1972, with a little slop pre- and post- era, and "visit" German, Austrian, and French trains into the theme (I get away with border-crossings all the time!). Friends operate modern era high speed, very colorful trains, or operate old prewar themes from time to time. We just change out the vehicles on the layout modules, in order to change the timeframe. It ranges from modern 1990's tour busses and ferraris to 1920's jitneys and flivvers, to 1957 Chevies and Porsches and those oddball Setra bubble-top busses in the booming late 50's of Europe, depending on moods. (you should try this vehicle shift! Easy way to change out your eras and justify that broad collection of yours...)

Now, I am transitioning again and trying to focus on designing and building a layout. I am getting tired of setting up and breaking down, twice a year, building the modules only for a few shows or meets, and then letting the stuff rot in storage and in boxes. I may get more radical and spin off some stuff and concentrate again in another direction. Afer all, I did that twice before. This new venture will save my interest in the hobby. To answer the question, I guess this is "yes" in one hundred words or more.

But it's really up to you! I have a friend who models the Slim Princess SPNG, Colorado NG, Nevada County NG, Swiss (two roads), Great Northern juice, the Milwaukee (electric too), HOm (two roads in Switzerland), and the SF Super Chief, not to mention English and US garden steam. He's happy, quite likely because he never has any one theme to bore him. The spice of life is change and variety.

Or look at it the way one pundit put it, "Change is not necessary. Neither is survival."

Cheers,
Jim Fischer

[Anonymous]

All: Not only have I changed "Roads", how about scales? Very early I began with the usual Lionel as a child via my Parents. I then changed to HO. Dabbled with that until Sn3 came on the scene in the 70's. Too neat to pass up so the HO went on sale to finance the Sn3. I really enjoyed that but was still lacking "something". Converted back to HO and followed a could have/might have been Railroad. I followed a prototype that was merged with an abandoned short line. I still was missing that "something" after 10 years. Last but not least I hit what should be the last of my "career" in Model railroading, On2. I always liked the 2-Footers ever since Ride the Sandy Rivercame out.
At the same time my eyesight went south as my bi-focals don't too well anymore. So On2 has fit my needs very nicely. Besides, my wife summed it all very nicely after I asked her what her thoughts were on switching . Her comment was simply, "You always liked wood kits". Ah yes-thank you honey!
So here I go off through the Woods of Maine in 1915. You just would not believe the amount of cars to be handled by one small freight train. Gotta run, pulpwood calls. [soapbox] Paul

.......................................................
Consistently inconsistent.

[Anonymous]

I just recently broke down my Swiss based railroad en started selling the equipment on Ebay.
After a try-out with a 4 x 8 layout (ATSF, 1958) I decided to go US trains all the way. I began laying track for my ATSF/UP based freelance Portugale & Green Mountain Railroad.

How's that for changing roads?

[Pruitt]

Ever since high school I've had an affinity for the Great Northern, and when I moved to Seattle it became the sole focus of my hobby attentions. I read everything I could find on the GN and planned on modeling some portion of the mainline some day.

As my layout plans evolved, I decided to model the locales of my youth - the towns along the CB&Q and C&NW lines in Wyoming, but with a twist - on my layout GN, would own the lines through the town, and not the Burlington and the C&NW.

Plans continued to evolve, and I slowly came around to modeling the proper railroads. At some point (I'm not sure when), I became a Burlington fan, and to a somewhat lesser extent a C&NW fan. I still like the GN, but It's no longer my modeling passion.

[mandelswamp]

Model Railroader's Contributing Editor, Tony Koester (author of the Trains of Thought columns) is well know for changing time periods on his layout. His efforts are documented in older issues of the magazine.

I, myself, have kept the same time period (1989 - 1990) and region (Northern Vermont) but changed from HO scale to N scale so that I could fit more railroad in a limited amount of space and have the ability to run longer trains.

[deltamech]

I have long been a fan of Southern Railway. I grew up one block from a Central of Georgia (part of Southern Railway) yard near Atlanta, Georgia. My first two layouts were free-lanced with no particular theme or time period. My current layout is a short line (Hog Mountain Railroad) based in the North Georgia hills with a logging line (Hog Mountain Lumber Co.) that interchanges with the Southern Railway. The time period is 1945-1955. I am a steam fan (I do not care for diesels) so this way I can run steam only. I think it is good to change at some point. This adds a new point of view and a new outlook to the layout.

[Anonymous]

As a youth, CB&Q chinese red was IT for me.
Then I switch to B&O,, then a fling with Pennsy, but for the last 15 years, I have been (almost) all Western Maryland and Maryland Midland. An occasional flirtation with Chessie ,CSX and D&H happens, but I always come back to the WM.
Fickle, aint I"[;)]

[Anonymous]

When I got into this hobby about three years ago, I at first looked at the Rock Island, Union Pacific, New York Central and other more famous lines. Than I found the CB&Q-what a perfect road, with everything a fan of Granger Lines could want! Since then I have been thinking of modeling a portion of some other road like the Wabash, Rock Island, NKP, GM&O, and others, but that's when I realized other than the CB&Q and GM&O I knew little about these other lines, however I did know about the modern class 1's, so I began thinking of modeling a Modern-Day CB&Q--showing the Q as if it never had even thought of merging into BN. I've had doubts of modeling this over the transition era, but I've always wanted and enjoyed model railroads that have something that makes them unique and interesting. Of course doing this would mean almost having to model 3 or 4 fallen flags in modern times; being that the Santa Fe, NP, and GN would still be around, but once I get the idea of what can be done with a modern CB&Q, I might, just might model it!!

[Anonymous]

I've been in this hobby for some years now - started with a train set loop and built up to a small system before selling it all to buy photographic equipment.
Back into the hobby a few years later, I now have three small, exhibition-quality layouts in my loft, and I just set up whichever one I fancy for a few weeks at a time.
I've modelled British outline 00 gauge, LMS/Midland Railway (1920/30), and had a small layout which did about 20 shows before I retired it. I now have a more modern British layout, based in the 1950s and 60s, and a 4-baseboard system in 7mm narow gauge. The third layout is American HO, a small switching layout which I built following a holiday over in Canada ten years ago.
So yes, I've changes roads, I've changed scale, I've changed continents. But that's what this hobby is all about. No hard and fast rules. Do your own thing, just enjoy it. That's what's most important. Just enjoy it.
If we all did the same all the time, things would get kind of boring!
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