I also think alot of it, is you model what you were exposed to as a child, for many in the hobby that would be the early diesel years and not that long ago was the transition time frame. Locally we still have a few guys that are active that can remember the end of steam, but they are in their 80's age wise. This opinion will vet itself out in the coming years as the younger generate that did not see steam in regular use, or even F units/early diesels, chose their era to model. The 1970s and forward might become the new focus, only time will tell. Atleast the ATSF modelers cannot claim "Warbonnets" for a layout stuck in the 1950s era as that paint scheme returned in the modern era for the "Super Fleet" engines that handled the crack stack trains, UPS TOFC and most anything else that was "hot", a few still roam the BNSF on whatever train they get stuck on. But I still stick to the ablity to run both steam and diesel being the main reason for transition era modeling if one wants to keep to some sense of realism. Mike
Silly NT's, I have Asperger's Syndrome
jeffhergertIs there a rule that once you start a thread that's really just asking a question, you have to respond again?
Many is the thread I started to read answers or wisdom, not to post (except for clarification or expansion). Any new thread asking purely for readers' opinions or experience would be in that category. Now there are plenty of posters who promptly jump into such a thread to deny the idea that the era is the one to model, or to go off on some more or less chestbeating tangent about why they model something else, or to drift the thread into the politics, racism, etc. of the era as perceived by the poster... but thise are occupational hazards of posting almost anywhere on the Internet, and really have been as long as the Internet has been 'open to the public'.
mbinsewi This thread has jumped the shark multiple times. Still nothing from the OP. I'm full of popcorn. Mike.
This thread has jumped the shark multiple times. Still nothing from the OP.
I'm full of popcorn.
Mike.
Is there a rule that once you start a thread that's really just asking a question, you have to respond again?
I came to read this thread late, or I might've chimed in on a few things. IMO, the original post was a question that the OP probably didn't expect to get answers and comments that go on for multiple pages. Reading them, he may not wish to comment further, or has nothing really to say.
For the record, while my modelling is in a state of hiatus, I model the Rock Island in 1978. I have some era creep by allowing passenger service on the section that I model that ended in 1970. I model it because it was my teen years when I hung out at the local depot that was still a train order office. Time Table and Train Order operation is one of the things of that era that appeals to me.
Jeff
My opinion is it covers the transition from steam engines to diesel, so moderlers can have both on the layout at the same time. Filthy black steamers working out their final days and shiny new streamline diesels and early switchers from various builders make for interesting modeling. From Big Boys to the classic EMD E and F units with the bulldog nose and Alco PA/FA series. Mike
angelob6660 Basically the reason why I loved the railroad.
Unfortunately, the NYC steam locomotives in brass command a premium price. Otherwise, the STRATTON AND GILLETTE locomotive fleet would be based on NEW YORK CENTRAL prototypes.
I decided to go with USRA standard designs instead. I can get 3 or 4 USRA Mikados in brass for the price of one NYC Mikado.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
SeeYou190 angelob6660 New York Central is the railroad I like in this era because I always wanted to go New York State to see this railroad in action until I realized it ended in 1968 I love NEW YORK CENTRAL steam locomotives, and not just the Hudson. These locomotives had a unique lean yet brutish look. I imagine that the tunnel clearance requirments had something to do with this. NYC locomotives just look like they are there for business. -Kevin
angelob6660 New York Central is the railroad I like in this era because I always wanted to go New York State to see this railroad in action until I realized it ended in 1968
I love NEW YORK CENTRAL steam locomotives, and not just the Hudson. These locomotives had a unique lean yet brutish look. I imagine that the tunnel clearance requirments had something to do with this. NYC locomotives just look like they are there for business.
Amtrak America, 1971-Present.
My main thing has been the PRR in the '50s since my teenage years. Sometimes I got into N&W, and B&O, but the '40s-'50s era for railroading has always been my favorite. Mainly because I always liked looking at photographs of railroading in those eras and seeing the "changing of the guard" as one poster put it of steam being replaced by diesels. I've no desire to have lived in that era and have read much on how society had been at the time. I hadn't been alive then either as I was born in 1983. My memories are mainly of Norfolk Southern and some Conrail depending on where I have travelled too. But spending time looking at Don Ball's Trackside Pennsylvania Railroad 1940s-1950s, O. Winston Link photography books, and others showing trains and railroading from that era has always captivated me. The aesthetic of the cars and trucks is always a plus to for me.
Alvie
My You Tube
angelob6660New York Central is the railroad I like in this era because I always wanted to go New York State to see this railroad in action until I realized it ended in 1968
MisterBeasley BigDaddy One of the most successful, single post - drive by threads I have seen. We have Jim Crow, prohibition and playboy centerfolds all in one thread and the OP is no where to be seen. Well, I do have a Playboy centerfold on my layout. She's a bit out of era, and I printed the image a bit oversized. She's hanging over a workbench inside the roundhouse. Centerfolds were a fixture of male-dominated workplaces back then. It's a simple historical reality, like an Edsel or a caboose.
BigDaddy One of the most successful, single post - drive by threads I have seen. We have Jim Crow, prohibition and playboy centerfolds all in one thread and the OP is no where to be seen.
One of the most successful, single post - drive by threads I have seen. We have Jim Crow, prohibition and playboy centerfolds all in one thread and the OP is no where to be seen.
Well, I do have a Playboy centerfold on my layout. She's a bit out of era, and I printed the image a bit oversized. She's hanging over a workbench inside the roundhouse. Centerfolds were a fixture of male-dominated workplaces back then. It's a simple historical reality, like an Edsel or a caboose.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
New York Central is the railroad I like in this era because I always wanted to go New York State to see this railroad in action until I realized it ended in 1968. Then it was controlled under Conrail now CSX.
Although I'm modeling a small 40's with two steam locomotives. I have also planned a medium sized 50's for my NYC 20th Century Limited train set. Most of cars are mid 50s and very few are 40s to completely make a 1950 or 1953 timeframe.
I don't have that problem when I'm modeling the 1980s-1990s expect for tank cars, SOU boxcar, reefer, 48' Maxi Well cars, Auto racks and others.
BigDaddyOne of the most successful, single post - drive by threads I have seen. We have Jim Crow, prohibition and playboy centerfolds all in one thread and the OP is no where to be seen.
It seems like there is a strong underlying desire to discuss forbidden subjects in an obscure way... I am sure Jim Slade had no idea what would happen.
LastspikemikeIf you are a real modeller then...
Why not? We might as well add "real" model railroaders to the discussion as well.
I am going to join Sheldon and make some popcorn.
Lastspikemike I'm not sure what readers expect when the topic is about why a particular historical era of railroading is popular to model. If you are a toy train runner (basically what I like to do) then the why is only marginally interesting. I just like the look of the transition era stuff a bit more than the very old stuff and a lot more than the very new stuff. I mean I can still see the current and recent real stuff. If you are a real modeller then all the background reasons the railroads were the way they were is pretty compelling stuff. Interesting way to learn a little history. Maybe even gain an understanding of the economic forces driving what we model. The why, not just the what, when and where. Economics is very interesting stuff. 99% human psychology and 1% statistics.
I'm not sure what readers expect when the topic is about why a particular historical era of railroading is popular to model.
If you are a toy train runner (basically what I like to do) then the why is only marginally interesting. I just like the look of the transition era stuff a bit more than the very old stuff and a lot more than the very new stuff. I mean I can still see the current and recent real stuff.
If you are a real modeller then all the background reasons the railroads were the way they were is pretty compelling stuff.
Interesting way to learn a little history. Maybe even gain an understanding of the economic forces driving what we model. The why, not just the what, when and where.
Economics is very interesting stuff. 99% human psychology and 1% statistics.
But that is not an all or nothing choice. I model the 50's because it was an interesting time in RAILROAD history, and in industrial history in general. Yes those factors where driven by a recent war, social change, economic recovery and list of other factors.
I'm not modeling those invisable factors, I'm modeling the trains, buildings, automobiles, landscapes and such that you see with your eyes.
So yes, I too find the trains of that time interesting and visually pleasing. And yes they seem to lend themselves to more visually realistic selective compresson than newer prototypes - that is a plus.
I'm not really interested in getting too deep into the 99% human psychology part. If I want that I will go talk to my wife, the retired addictions counselor.
And, since they could not see the future, it was a relatively positive time in railroad history.
So some of the "why" plays into what I model, or how I model it. But I also model a little bit of what "could" have been a little different.
Like if the government had gotten out of the way of Piggyback sooner.
It's all about finding what is fun for you - there are no airports or Interstates on my layout........
Sheldon
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
I'm going for more popcorn and another Coke...........
Lastspikemike We all pay for everything. Business pays nothing, including no taxes. It's all paid for by the individual consumer. Only money losing businesses contribute to their cost and we all know how that works out over the long haul. The taxpayer picks up that tab too to some degree when the losses are claimed by the business against income. So, given a rational business plan it really makes no difference whether the consumer funds business development by purchases or taxes. Really it doesn't. The only difference is who decides what gets built. Public expenditures made for what one might think are private capital interests are not fundamentally different. Business has notoriously short sight and requires much faster returns on capital. Leave some stuff to the private sector and it doesn't get built. Government investment can be very remunerative for the consumer. I estimate that all modern railroads were originally built using a combination of tax payer funding and investment losses suffered by many of those tax payers who invested their after tax dollars in uneconomic railroads. Those failed railroads did not disappear, they're still being used today.
We all pay for everything. Business pays nothing, including no taxes. It's all paid for by the individual consumer. Only money losing businesses contribute to their cost and we all know how that works out over the long haul. The taxpayer picks up that tab too to some degree when the losses are claimed by the business against income.
So, given a rational business plan it really makes no difference whether the consumer funds business development by purchases or taxes. Really it doesn't.
The only difference is who decides what gets built.
Public expenditures made for what one might think are private capital interests are not fundamentally different. Business has notoriously short sight and requires much faster returns on capital. Leave some stuff to the private sector and it doesn't get built. Government investment can be very remunerative for the consumer.
I estimate that all modern railroads were originally built using a combination of tax payer funding and investment losses suffered by many of those tax payers who invested their after tax dollars in uneconomic railroads. Those failed railroads did not disappear, they're still being used today.
If you're talking about the funding of an entire society's needs, treating them like schools of fish to be managed as a group, then yes, the funding all washes. Going further, if every person in the world owned shares of stock in all 50 companies that owned everything in the world, then there would be no distinction between shareholder, taxpayer, and voter. It's then simply up to somebody somewhere who thinks they're smarter than the collective to manage the whole thing. But when you measure it on an individual basis, individual liberties compared to other individual's liberties, the school of fish approach with the so-called smart guy at the top calling the shots tends to get in the way of free decisions, causing individual companies to squabble with others over special treatment. In academic terms, the free market is the collective. In theory, the free market tells the school of fish managers what the collective actually wants, and then produces it. The managers at the top don't have to do much decision making at all.
We're talking about the 40s and 50s era, and mildly introducing how it compares to more modern eras. Government picking winners and losers for what ever non-free market motivations it had/has does impact what we see today, and what we can model.
- Douglas
Sure, I model the Transition Era, plus or minus. I'm not particular. I was born in 1947 so it matches me. It's a time I liked and I still remember well.
I like the engines and the rolling stock. I like roofwalks and I LIKE CABOOSES. I like the buildings and the vehicles. To be honest, I really think many of the visual aspects of railroading have deteriorated since then. Railroads evolve, and in ways they became better, but at a cost. The Transition Era, to me, was perhaps the high point where the rich history of the railroads that developed our nation gave way to today's more commercialized and dollar-oriented lines.
LastspikemikeWe all pay for everything. Business pays nothing, including no taxes. It's all paid for by the individual consumer. Only money losing businesses contribute to their cost and we all know how that works out over the long haul. The taxpayer picks up that tab too to some degree when the losses are claimed by the business against income.
Please be careful.
This is a thread about why people model the transition era.
Now it is drifting into politics, which is forbidden. We do not discuss general tax policy in here at all.
OvermodI could point out just as easily 'could you imagine if the railroads didn't have to fund their tracks, maintenance, dispatching, local taxation, etc.?' (I leave trains out, but 'airplanes' are only indirectly subsidized insofar as military considerations apply to civilian product)
Perhaps I don't understand railroad funding like I thought, but its my assumption that signals, crossing gates, steel for the rails, (okay the land for the ROW was initially stolen from Native Americans by our military, so to speak), bridges over hiways, locomotive and conductor training, etc, are not funded by general tax payer dollars; compared to the bond issues for airports, military training of pilots, the FAA paid air traffic controllers, etc. all of which factor into the rates UPS and Fed Ex can charge to fly cargo across the country as opposed to what BNSF might have to charge.
DoughlessCould you imagine if the airline industry had to fund their airports, airplanes, air control systems as they do their employees, extremely high safety measures, pollution controls, noise controls; solely by airline ticket prices?
I could point out just as easily 'could you imagine if the railroads didn't have to fund their tracks, maintenance, dispatching, local taxation, etc.?' (I leave trains out, but 'airplanes' are only indirectly subsidized insofar as military considerations apply to civilian product)
That was the probable situation right up to passage of the Esch Act in the early '20s, the decision to return the railroads to private control. It would have been relatively easy to have 'split' the industry along the lines Kneiling would later advocate, with the track infrastructure treated just as airlines treat 'the sky' -- not exactly open access, but an 'iron ocean' devoid of property-rights and huge stranded-capital concerns. Since civil seems always at war with mechanical T&E this might allow more sensible allocation of expansion (or resist expedient contraction like all that unfortunate Conrail double-track shucking) without the issue of contributing national tax-based revenue to the sole benefit of 'owning' railroads...
Lastspikemike Many people believe railroads were not paid for by government but in many if not most cases that is illusory. Subsidization of railroad construction was widespread. Ubiquitous up here in Canada. The extent of subsidization is staggering up here. I have just finished "The Last Spike" and the descriptions of the financing are amazing. Then of course there is the public utility case supporting such subsidization which is very easy to defend. Competing airport locations funded by competing entrepreneurs are not even advantageous theoretically. Neither are train stations. Regulated interstate commerce was a subsidy system. It worked for railroads. It did not work for road freight. Reason? Roads were the subsidy. Road freight did not need the additional subsidy provided by operating authorities. That was pork barrelling taken to the extreme. Ditto taxi licensing. Uber's greatest contribution to our economy was to illuminate just how corrupt the taxi licensing schemes became. Doubt that? Check out the pricing of sales of taxi businesses. Historically, the sums exchanged for trucking outfits just to acquire their operating authorities were staggering. So, I suspect that the popularity of modelling the transition era is unconnected to the economics of the times. Many of us were born during that era. Travel by train was still not only feasible, economic and relatively pleasant it was still in many ways superior to plane travel and way better than a Greyhound bus. It still is in Europe. The private car is the main competition to passenger rail in Europe. Freight by rail still competed with road haulage leading to interesting short trains with short cars, small classification yards and repair and service shops everywhere and the ubiquitos branch line so beloved of current hobbyists.
Many people believe railroads were not paid for by government but in many if not most cases that is illusory. Subsidization of railroad construction was widespread. Ubiquitous up here in Canada. The extent of subsidization is staggering up here. I have just finished "The Last Spike" and the descriptions of the financing are amazing.
Then of course there is the public utility case supporting such subsidization which is very easy to defend. Competing airport locations funded by competing entrepreneurs are not even advantageous theoretically. Neither are train stations.
Regulated interstate commerce was a subsidy system. It worked for railroads. It did not work for road freight. Reason? Roads were the subsidy. Road freight did not need the additional subsidy provided by operating authorities. That was pork barrelling taken to the extreme. Ditto taxi licensing. Uber's greatest contribution to our economy was to illuminate just how corrupt the taxi licensing schemes became. Doubt that? Check out the pricing of sales of taxi businesses. Historically, the sums exchanged for trucking outfits just to acquire their operating authorities were staggering.
So, I suspect that the popularity of modelling the transition era is unconnected to the economics of the times. Many of us were born during that era. Travel by train was still not only feasible, economic and relatively pleasant it was still in many ways superior to plane travel and way better than a Greyhound bus. It still is in Europe. The private car is the main competition to passenger rail in Europe.
Freight by rail still competed with road haulage leading to interesting short trains with short cars, small classification yards and repair and service shops everywhere and the ubiquitos branch line so beloved of current hobbyists.
I agree with how Sheldon put it at let me explain my take on it.
True, government gets into the subsidy/regulation business when it feels that any privately owned company deserves to have a monopoly in a market. Example: A utility company gets awarded an area....and in turn is highly regulated....because its not a good idea to have three purely capitalist companies string three different sets of power lines on three different towers down city streets.
We don't want United, Delta, America, etc, building three different airports, so the government gets involved in building, managing, and sometimes propping up the airlines.
My beef, and I think what Sheldon was saying, was how are those things are paid for. Airports, control towers, pilot training (military), aircraft evolution (military reasons too), IOW, general tax dollars; all go to support the airlines, allowing ticket prices to be artificially low.
OTOH, railroads own everything they run, and run on, and AFAIK, are solely supported by the fees they charge. Not by tax dollars.
Could you imagine if the airline industry had to fund their airports, airplanes, air control systems as they do their employees, extremely high safety measures, pollution controls, noise controls; solely by airline ticket prices? My guess is that the minimum fare would be about $2,000 for any flight anywhere.
Cargo flights could not compete with railroads.
So if we never had the subtle assistance that went into the airline industry, I think railroads today would look different.
Shock Control ATLANTIC CENTRAL You call it the modern era, but most readers on here are not going to understand. They will, think you are talking about present day. You are correct. But misuse of the word "modern" is really jarring to me.
ATLANTIC CENTRAL You call it the modern era, but most readers on here are not going to understand. They will, think you are talking about present day.
You are correct. But misuse of the word "modern" is really jarring to me.
Well, the first definition in the dictionary is:
1 : of or characteristic of the present time or times not long past modern machinery.
So that is how people not trained in Architecture read that word.
azrail Most of vestiges of 50s railroading were with us all the way up until the late 60s..most of the freight car fleet was still 40-50 ft, the paint jobs of the 50s were still visible, we still had the REA and its green trucks everywhere, mail (until 1968) still moved by train, we had rr operated passenger service (ableit less of it), there were still depots and freight houses, except for the dime stores and dept stores, small towns had mostly local businesses, the design of large trucks didn't change much from the 50s (Kenworths, Macks, Whites). So even if you model the 60s you can still have things from the 50s. (except for steam)
Most of vestiges of 50s railroading were with us all the way up until the late 60s..most of the freight car fleet was still 40-50 ft, the paint jobs of the 50s were still visible, we still had the REA and its green trucks everywhere, mail (until 1968) still moved by train, we had rr operated passenger service (ableit less of it), there were still depots and freight houses, except for the dime stores and dept stores, small towns had mostly local businesses, the design of large trucks didn't change much from the 50s (Kenworths, Macks, Whites). So even if you model the 60s you can still have things from the 50s. (except for steam)
In some cases even longer - Carolina Freight was still using early 50's Mack B models for local deliveries in the late 70's..........
NittanyLion Lastspikemike Plus more stuff was moved by rail until the highway system Freight's decline started way earlier than that. Trucking put the knife into railroads in the 1930s, but peak mileage was hit in 1916. Track mileage decreased more between 1916 and 1945 than 1945 to 1965. If you like passenger train movements the transition era pretty much maximizes that aspect. The transition era was the era of massive passenger cuts. The 60s gets the coverage because that's when the patient died, but passenger service was admitted to hospice care in the 1950s. Peak passenger service was 1920. The transition era came after a generation of decline. World War II simply interrupted a decline for about 10 years. The problems of the late 60s and early 70s actually started in the 50s, but were caused by events in the 30s that were modestly delayed in the 40s. The era was hardly a golden age like it is depicted.
Lastspikemike Plus more stuff was moved by rail until the highway system
Plus more stuff was moved by rail until the highway system
Freight's decline started way earlier than that. Trucking put the knife into railroads in the 1930s, but peak mileage was hit in 1916. Track mileage decreased more between 1916 and 1945 than 1945 to 1965.
If you like passenger train movements the transition era pretty much maximizes that aspect.
The transition era was the era of massive passenger cuts. The 60s gets the coverage because that's when the patient died, but passenger service was admitted to hospice care in the 1950s. Peak passenger service was 1920. The transition era came after a generation of decline.
World War II simply interrupted a decline for about 10 years. The problems of the late 60s and early 70s actually started in the 50s, but were caused by events in the 30s that were modestly delayed in the 40s. The era was hardly a golden age like it is depicted.
Here is what all the negative Nancy's don't understand.
It is not about the numbers or the outcomes at the end of the decade or early in the next decade.
It is about renewal, hope and optimism.
The war was hard on the railroads infrastructure, the 50's was a time of rebuilding, looking forward, new ideas, new technolgy.
Diesel locomotives
New freight equipment, some of it with bright new optimistic paint schemes.
New ideas like piggyback, express freight trains, open auto racks, the beginning of better bulk cars like covered hoppers.
Ideas, failed or not, to compete with highways and airlines, like the RDC.
And, the last and best of steam trying to hold its own against the diesel.
Roller bearings, better trucks, better brakes, longer trains, faster trains, radios, bigger freight cars, and more.
Did they know how it would all play out in 1954 as Chevrolet debuted the 265 Small Block V8 at the Detroit Auto Show? No.
But the railroads were optimistic. So was most of the country about most everything.
Was it some sort of utopian paradise? No, no period of time ever is.
But if you pretend in your head that it is 1954 so you can built this little model world, you don't know yet what is going to happen in 1963.
Here is what should have happened in 1954.
They should have de-regulated the trucks and the trains then rather than three decades later. And by doing so they would have fostered intergration of trucks and trains from the beginning of that technolgy.
They should have held the line with tractor trailer length and weight just on the basis of safety.
They should have compelled the air line industry to build their own infrastructure - the government never built the train stations?
But who cares? It was an interesting time for railroading, and one with a hopeful, outlook.
LastspikemikeComtemporary railroads are exceptionally difficult to model convincingly unless you have lots of space (and money to fill it with) or prefer N scale.
There are several members of this forum convincingly modeling contemporary railroads in small spaces.
Maybe they are just unusually good at overcoming exceptional difficulties.
It all depends on what your goals are. Sheldon needs a basement to model 1954 to his liking, but many model 2010 beautifully on a shelf.
I settled on the mid 50's for my switching layout for a number of reasons:
1) Absolutely LOVE the Great Northern paint scheme of that period.
2) Smaller diesel engines, more smaller industries served by rail, more LTL freight and colorful 40' cars.
3) Really enjoy looking at the many cars and trucks of the day that are a part of the scenery. It became 1957 specifically so I could include the Ford C model tilt cabs (1957-1990) in my scenes.