New York Rome'ance...
New York, New York, there is just something special about classic shortline railroading in the region. Smoking Alco’s and infrastructure that has seen better days, ex-mainline low slung GP9s crawling along uneven grass infested trackage. Whilst sharing video on the Mohawk Adirondack and Northern's Boonville switch with Chris he commented on the model-ability of both this and other scenes in the centre of the state, specifically the Rome area...
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| Mohawk, Adirondack and Northern Railroad GE 80-tonner 1670 switching at the Sovena plant, Griffis, Rome. Photo: Dave Blazejewski, Flickr: https://flic.kr/p/2mGiapV |
I love choreographing a prototype into a workable scheme and my pen had initially focused on the Boonville mill in my usual cameo style but as our conversation developed, thoughts turned to a larger layout. In Chris’s 'My Favourite Prince Street' you will find a wonderfully evocative description of rail-fanning a New England layout and I know that Chris considers this the best layout he has never built. Once you've taken a look at where this started, come join us as we railfan the Mohawk Adirondack and Northern...
Their operation in Rome just begs to be a fantastic small layout project. Scenes like this remind us of the Claremont & Concord or Springfield Terminal, but perhaps where they forgot about the light rail and just started running the bigger engines anyway... now that we’re talking about it, this scene is both a real one from a real place you can visit to railfan a real railroad. The true definition of prototype railroading with no need to wander beyond that frame but at the same time this same place easily reminds every one of us of similar scenarios from our own railfan experience that it’s as much a stimulus as much as focal point. Seems we all have that friend who makes everyone feel at home no matter how new the relationship is. Does it need to be exact to be correct? Maybe this is where our summer Rome-ance starts?
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| Mohawk Adirondack & Northern's Rome turn heads back to Utica with three. The C425 was built in October 1964 (50 years ago this month!) for Erie Lackawanna; it served BC Rail before coming back east. Photo: Mike Yuhas, Flickr:https://flic.kr/p/pt64Xo |
I do have a bit of thing for Alcos. When I was a child I always wished for an Atlas Century in BC Rail to arrive under the tree at Christmas after I saw similar locomotives, aged 9, north of Vancouver. I've been aware that many of them, upon retirement from BCR/CN have found a second home in New England but it wasn't until Chris pointed our how many 'model able' scenes present themselves in this part of the world that I considered it a layout project. New York and ‘New' England. I guess I've always had a blind spot to this part of the world, passing over to the Prairies of Canada or Rocky Mountains in both Alberta and Colorado... That said, thinking back we've been in this neck of the woods before, as another favourite of mine, the Susquehanna, has the street running in Utica on Schuyler Street. Things began innocently with Chris suggesting a different take on the feed mill...
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| Chris's sketch for the mill, left, and my own sketch for the mill, and what came next, in front of the fire with the dog beside me. |
Rather than a pure cameo, I had in mind an around the room layout that also featured the wonderful road/rail bridge in Rome. The operating sessions are more about rail fanning with just a spur at the mill and the only other trackage on layout being a single double-ended siding just after the bridge to act as a kind of yard. James McNab had one like this on his Grimes Line and I loved how well it worked...
And for the cast? I’d set this in the early 1990’s and typical power is Lamoille Valley stuff. Last year the hobby shop here had one of those Atlas RS32’s with the chop noses in LV “paint” and I second-guessed myself and someone else bought it. I was not my best Mears in that moment.
I love the things Chris describes in this composition, especially the round the room nature - I do miss letting trains just run and sitting back to rail fan. I'd considered a similar scheme (see my doodle above, in front of the fire) when I'd sketched out the Boonville cameo. For added interest and because I love it I added one extra scene - the street running in Utica and the Matt FX brewery. |
| The railway room - sketch by James |
I imagine my work bench and library, along with my stereo, underneath the layout. This is a windowless room, a luxurious library with deep warm carpet and the railway brightly lit by hidden pelmet lighting. A nice comfy sofa and reading light, to finish it off. The sort of place we all dream of escaping too after a day at work, where minutes become hours with a good book and a train running, or sharing a cup of tea or beer with a good friend.
This aesthetic exactly as you describe down to the couch and meandering style of operating session. Absolutely engaging but still passively railfanning. I originally thought of this as an operating session high on intimacy and that’s still not wrong but also an operating session that acts like a good host inviting in a variety of operators regardless of the path that brought them here. We tend to think of the operating session as one having a defined start state followed by a linear progression of codependent events that terminate when all the requirements requested have been satisfied. But James was talking about all those different Alco’s and there’s no reason you couldn’t just as easily use this beautiful room-sized layout to host a series of part-operating sessions while a friend visits some Sunday afternoon. Instead of dedicating to one script in an operating session you could explore various in a kind of freeform version. Maybe once through with one on the ground and the other in the cab? Maybe on the third time we swap out the motive power? Maybe we run one for the railfans so replay spotting that one car until the right frame is exposed?
Hi James
ReplyDeleteVery taken with you recent blog which finishes with the question
What is behind your chosen location, period and railway or railroad?
This seems a development of the queries and comments posed in “Why are you here” blog on 7 May
Having never been a train spotter but got back into railways looking at industrial railways I thought to “paint” in 3D what I was seeing back in the late 1960’s and onwards, as well as the industrial history and operations I am always interested in. I wanted to model an industrial system which could have rural as well as urban components, so a plant in the country was my aim and also one that brought in raw materials ( some over a private haul ) and shipped products in a variety of cars( wagons). Initially for me this was an iron and steel plant or cement mill and in the UK. However the then 1970’s poor running of small 00-scale locos got me dissatisfied. I had a brief swerve into “colonial” mining railways as I was researching the history of the Rio Tinto railway in Spain but was having the same problems. However a visit to Victors, London’s premium US model retailer at the time, led me into the world of logging and shortline railroads. These had all I wanted, often a location in or near the woods, trains of raw logs and various wood products being shipped out. Finding two prototypes Simpson Lumber at Shelton and Weyerhaeuser at Longview set me off down the satisfying track that is shortline railroad modelling and operation. It also allowed me to model late steam and early diesel and as a result of visits, and the fact that things move slowly in small towns, to model the late 1980’s at well.
Best regards
Alan
Thanks Alan. I wonder if you can go deeper than ‘what I was seeing’ as a reason? Why do you make models, and why have you chosen these prototypes? What is it about industrial railways and in particular logging in the Pacific North-West that came together to manifest itself with enough focus drive an momentum to build a model railway?
DeleteHi James
DeleteWill put some thoughts together and see if I can distil 50 years of modelling decisions
Might take a little time!!!
Alan
Hi James
ReplyDeleteHope this answers some of your question.
What attracted me to industrial railways in the late 1960’s and still does, although there are less around now in the UK, was that they served their owners, and their industry, in a way which was more focussed than the mainline or even branch lines of the big national companies, especially here in the UK. It was often seeing a complete system and being able to photograph it, understand why it was there and talk to the staff that drew me in. Often it was possible to see equipment specific to that industry and the plants themselves could be in some interesting places and sometimes surprisingly rural . While many in railways even into the 1970’s were using steam that was not the main attraction. An interesting diesel system would be as big, if not a bigger draw, than just seeing a steam loco, strange as that might seem now
Every industrial railway was in some degree unusual and wanting to have a personal bit of that in three dimensions led to modelling. However as I have said the small 00-gauge locos in the 1970’s were relatively poor running and made operating somewhat frustrating and although I was and am happy building rolling stock I could never get locomotives right to my satisfaction.
I had acquired some books on overseas colonial railways and with a few visits to Europe started layout built around a mining railway but some of the same issues arose. At some time I had acquired the book “Pino Grande” on the Michigan-California Lumber Company but had not thought much about the US. However ,again as I said, I visited Victors models in London acquired a US loco and a few cars but more importantly some books. This led me to realise how railroads were, and are, tied into the North American forest industry and how wide spread this was. These railroads, had for want of a better word, the aura I was wanting. I quickly realised I could buy equipment appropriate to the industry without scratch building but could still do that if I wanted and, in H0 locos, ran better and had a better scale/gauge ratio than UK 00-scale. I also had acquired Beebe and Clegg’s “Mixed Train Daily” and realised a whole world of local shortline railroads existed I knew almost nothing about
Having started to do more research and slowly developed some contacts in the US it was apparent in the Pacific Northwest logging railroads and their associated shortlines developed to probably the greatest extent and this would be a great place to set my modelling. Visiting, photographing and in one case riding the Simpson Timber and Weyerhaeuser operations just confirmed this. Through research I have been conscious not to get drawn into the “its all homemade, run down, rolling rust buckets” which seems too common in modelling and realised good equipment and necessary maintenance was the basis of successful operations and while weathering is important to portray the effects of use it should not be overdone.
Best regards
Alan
Thank you Alan, a long and considered read.
DeleteI wonder quite what it is about these prototypes that resonates so strongly with us, as I too find these topics incredibly engaging. It is difficult to distill why that down at heals look of overgrown weed strewed track down a so appealing. I do wonder if it’s a very early child hood fascination with the Bristol Harbour railways remains that I spent some time with in the summer of 1984 when I was young and my parents were moving from London to Chester via Dad’s parents in Bristol… the warm endless summer, the sticky ice lollies, the standing on the foot bridge being fascinated by these tracks and wondering where they went. So close and personal to you in a way that the mainline always felt more distant. Stood on a platform we’re segregated (and for good reason). These ‘industrial’ style systems had a more relatable feeling. At Bristol I could even walk along the rails on the harbour… I think, as I’ve shared before, it is that which has fuelled my life long passion for this type of prototype and recreating it through the medium of modelling, although I think that has more to do with shared learning and hobbies with my best friend in primary school, Tim.