Converting prototype to HO

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

I know HO scale is 1/87. Is it as easy as dividing by 87?

I am intrigued by Chicago’s Grand Central Station. If I choose to model it in HO, the prototype is 470’ x 225’, with a 555’ train shed. That translates to 5.4’ x 2.6’ with a 6.4’ trainshed.

Am I on the right track or is that too simplistic?

2

No you are on the right track although the nitpickers will tell you that you should actually divide by 87.1.

I’m not that particular. 87 is close enough for me.

3

It’s exactly that simple (with the comment above about 87.1), but you might find that size to be awkwardly large. You probably want to scale it down a bit, and if you do, I think the most effective way is to keep the proportional relations of the building’s sides and the trainshed the same.

4

As you realize, from your own calculations, major urban buildings and major rail facilities have HUGE footprints if built exactly to the same scale as the trains that use them.

Several tricks, which can be used singly or in combination to reduce the humongous to a more manageable size:

  • Build to a smaller scale. For a building with oversize doors and windows, reducing the scale to 1:96 is a distinct possibility.
  • Deliberately squeeze horizontal dimensions, but not vertical.
  • Selectively omit repeating architectural features. If a wall has six windows, build it with four.
  • Pull the old furniture drawing trick - facing side full size, ends (and thus depth) half size.

No matter how you slice and dice it, a major city station is going to dominate everything in its area. If you can build it on its own peninsula, or on one side of a ‘round the walls’ layout, you might be able to keep it from overwhelming the entire railroad.

Lots of luck with the design. If you ever build it, be sure to post photos (says he, who isn’t equipped to!)

Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)

5

I have seen a scale model of St Louis Union Station, and it was HUGE (I wished I could find the link again). My thought is (as alluded to previously) that if you could scale it down and maintain the overall “essence” of the facility, you would be good to go. I would concentrate on the highlights of the station, and make sure those are where you concentrate most of your effort. From what I have observed, St Louis being a great example, is that the trainshed is a bulk of the footprint. That would be easy enough to “cut corners” on.

But, if you have the means and room to model the whole works, go for it and have fun!!

6

As others have suggested, unless you want this model to be the dominating feature of your layout, almost to the exclusion of everything else, it makes sense to selectively compress. Take Walthers Union Station kit. It is actually a model of Omaha’s Burlington Station, not the Union Station. It is a fairly faithful reproduction but where has the prototype is has five window sections to either side of the central section, the model has just three. They also reversed the front and back. On the prototype, the columns are trackside but they built it with the columns on the entrance side.

7

Thank you for all of the responses. The more numbers I ran, the more horrifying the prospect became. Built to an exact scale would dwarf the surrounding buildings like freight houses and towers, making them way out of proportion. I need to keep the term “Selective Compression” in my thoughts.

A little research on the internet revealed someone had modeled Grand Central Chicago in N scale. There are also photos out there of a GC model on a layout on (I think) a German website.