Prototype Parallels Two…

I love the Claremont and Concord. I love GE 44t locomotives nearly as much as I love the humble British Rail class 08. Prototype Parallels have been discussed previously on the blog and today we revisit the idea, this time around it’s a defunct North American short-line and a thriving British freight business…

TOP: Claremont and Concord, Ron Wood photo (https://flic.kr/p/RxrJAF)
BOTTOM: AV Dawson, Nick Jones photo (https://www.branchline.uk/pastevent-alt.php?eventid=292#) 

We don’t have any interesting modern Railfreight operation left in the United Kingdom - or so I thought. I have been aware of the rail / road / sea operation at AV Dawson in Middlesbrough but it seems to be omitted from my collection of British rail freight books. Does this mean that the possibilities of modelling this multi-modal site, with it’s collection of smart red (and yellow) Class 08s and varied traffic, are not as well known as you might imagine?

AV Dawson is a family owned business that was established in 1938, expansion throughout the 70s and 80s led to the opening of rail sidings in 1987. In 2014 they secured a 99 year lease on the adjacent goods yard and through further investment are now the largest and most diverse privately owned rail terminal in the North East. Traffic in recent years has included potash, salt, aggregates, chemicals, and steel coil for the automotive industry.

The Branchline Society visited and toured the facility and have produced two very informative and well written reports from 2017 and 2018. These not only provide an excellent resource for modelling detail within the property but also a good idea about how the facility is operated.

AV Dawson, Ex-Potter Group 08598 with single JIA wagon, June 2020. Tom O’Donnell photo (https://flic.kr/p/2jazmcY)

This sort of multi-modal facility has parallels across the Atlantic, plenty of shortlines today operate in a similar manner offering last mile connection between customer and larger railroads. However, my love of the GE 44t takes us to the last days of the Claremont Concord Railroad, post 1988 and under La Valley ownership, hauling road salt and building supplies from Claremont Junction to Claremont. A pair of the diminutive Switchers, one red, one yellow, hustle loaded salt up from the junction, a combination of rail condition and weight of the loaded cars means only a few can be handled at one time… Today at AV Dawson, here in the UK, bright blue covered hoppers are moved by either yellow or red 08s from the yard to the unloading point, the sharp curves limiting train length for similar reasons. 

Yellow and red shunters. Salt in covered hoppers. Short trains. Last mile operation… prototype parallels.

Illustration James Hilton 2023

I am enjoying modern N gauge immensely at present, yet current layout schemes are period layouts (1980s on Gerald Road, 1990s on Paxton Road) and so the lure of modern stock and liveries has been resisted. Until now… a Farish 08 in Network Rail yellow (I’ll add Hilton Mears markings) and a selection of modern stock from EFE and Revolution kick things off. 

Revolution Cargowagon, EFE JIA and Farish 08, all currently being reworked to ‘fit’ the scheme. The JIA has a blue roof and the Imerys logo and name removed, and it has been lightly faded ahead of weathering. The 08 has had the ladders and spurious end marker lights removed, and the wasp striping completed on the fuel tanks. Decals have been ordered for this to show it on lease to a certain Hilton Mears who provide contract shunting to various locations…

Thoughts of how these wonderful models could be incorporated into a small project with both home and exhibition potential brought out the sketch book, whose notes formed the basis of this illustration. In my own layout design sketches I tend to focus on a crop of the prototypes, how to represent the whole in a smaller space. Again I am drawn to both forked and turnout free layout schemes, the fork offering good shunting potential and the turnout free significantly reducing cost as well as ensuring a compact form. Considering N gauge here not for its ability to run longer trains in a given space but for its compact size allowing even smaller cameo style layouts.

In the first Prototype Parallels we reinterpreted a British prototype through a North American operation, considering customers and typical commodities. In this case, could you find an interesting or attractive North American shortline or terminal operator and reverse that? Whilst I’ve drawn parallels between the Claremont and Concord and AV Dawson I’m proposing a freelance interpretation. Perhaps you could do the same?

For a freight based layout, operation from one end is could be considered a little boring by some, but suits my space and attention span. Paxton Road, Gerald Road, even Beaverbrook make use of the same premise. Turnout free is a massive space saver too… the character of the AV Dawson site where the long parallel sidings in the yard and steel shed sharply contrast with the wheel screachingly tight curve to the original rail sidings and covered unloading sheds are the elements I want to capture, not the long ladder of turnouts. I can also see the operation of this layout being possible from the front but also behind the fiddle stick sector plate, meaning exhibition use is possible and the corner setting would provide and interesting shaped layout different from the usual boxes. If you have a larger layout with a ‘wasted’ corner, then a scheme like this could provide you with an interesting and realistic backdrop to the mainline, a modern ‘gap filler’ rather than the old cliche of a brewery or goods yard?

For me, what next? Well as you can see the stock is here, the desire to build something is strong but the perennial lack of space means there are questions to answer. I’ve learnt the hard way about building projects with no home in mind and they end up unused or unfinished in a box. In the meantime I’ve more than enough to enjoy and get on with. I wonder what you may come up with if you adopt the prototype? Do let me know! In the meantime, more soon…

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