I am torn between doing a real section of local RR, but is is rather unexciting scenery to model, or another part of the country that has great scenery. And I don’t like many of the plans that I have seen. However, some folks seem to have designed their own generic RR, and have some spectacular scenery. Granted, it is all personal choice, but I would like to know what the stats are on each type of layout. Is there one that stands out, and why?
Not sure exactly what you meant by “generic railroad,” which is the one I clicked on. I’ve made up my own railroad name, and roughly follow the paint scheme of the Reading RR. I don’t try to duplicate any sections of a real railroad, but I do try to make the layout believable (ie, not spagetti bow track plans).
Well, at this moment in time, I am working on my own model railroad plan. It is a freelanced road, so I have nothing to base the plan off of. And, this also gives me more freedom to mold the railroad to my liking, instead of following prototypical boundaries.[:D]
I made up the name 40 years ago, and copied so many plans in my hybrid it is pretty original. I used pictures to stimulate my imagination.
I model a free lance section of railroad based an BNSF practices and equipment.
I would like to model a real part of the railroad but space just isn’t availble.
At this point it is my own design. Some features will be representations of the real world in my area, but not enough that I would say I was modelling an actual section of the railroad. I also borrowed a fair part of my yard design from Andy Sperandeo’s Freight Yard book with some inspriration from Wayne Roderick’s Teton Short Line Malfunction Juction ( http://www.ida.net/users/tetonsl/railroad/mfjhome.htm )and Craig Bisgeier’s Ten Commandments of Yard Design ( http://www.housatonicrr.com/yard_des.html ) Of course John Armstrong’s Track Planning for Realistic Operation, and other of his plan books were referred to.
So maybe it is really a hybrid, but I’m sticking to generic!
First was freelanced (and not that great, all things considered), but the next will be done with an eclectic approach…a little this, a little that…
I almost said other, but voted for Generic (my own). My RR (the Seneca Lake, Ontario, and Western or SLOW) is mostly created from a figment. You know, like in imagination. The plan came from a figment my imagination had and has, and probably will continue to have, hopefully…
So many great RRs, so little basement, so little time !!
Will
prr, but semi freelanced, and some prototype locations
I’ve built a few small layouts, and assisted on some large home and club layouts. Some were “generic”, but most were “Hybrids”. I did build one from a published plan, John Allen’s Timesaver.
I am currently planning a basement layout, that will be mostly “home grown”, but will have elements adapted from some layout design books and a little bit of a real RR. I voted for “Other” with a heavy emphasis on the hybrid aspect.
Hybrid ***! I’m designing part, and using parts of several other layouts. Of course, I’m dreaming up my big around the wall basement layout for years down the road.
Howmus -
Living out in Geneva, do you follow the FGLK RR at all? I live in Syracuse and see them on occassion out in Solvey switching Solvey Paperboard.
JP
Modeling a section of a real railroad is almost always going to be pretty boring because real railroads take up so much space. Compressing a section of a real railroad is even hard for the same reason. Totally smushing a section of a real railroad starts getting a bit interesting if one has choosen a busy section with lots of real traffic and industries.
i picked hybrid . haven’t finished a track plan , or even figured out exactly how much space i’ll have available , but my railroad will be based primarily on the Sante Fe , Prescott and Phoenix Rail Road in the 1900 - 1910 era . i probably won’t copy the prototype track arrangements . staging will represent Phoenix (and interchange with the SP) in the south and Ash Fork (and interchange with the ATSF) in the north , and i’ll also include some of the copper mining district around Jerome that was actually served by narrow guage railroads that will be standard guaged on my layout . unless i get really ambitious and try some narrow guage modelling
The layout I am building now is completely freelanced. You might say I have no plan at all beyond the basic shape of the mainline and the shape and number of the sections that will go into the layout. I am trying to make it look realistic and logical. As logical and a railroad with less than 5 miles or track can be.
I am doing I guess a hybrid. A co-owned RR by UP and BNSF and soon GW. It is a bridge route for UP from Villa Grove to South Pekin in IL and BNSF out of Prairie City IL to the power plant.
I see quite a bit of them down on 5 & 20. Hard to stop and just watch on a major highway though. LOL I have pulled into the Finger Lakes Trail parking area in Canandaigua and some other places to watch them. Very friendly crews. They are doing very well building up RR business in the area and are expanding and improving quite a bit of the line. The LHS has decals and other items in their colors.
An unofficial website about them: http://fglk.railfan.net/
and the “official” one: http://bnle.railfan.net/flmap-ct.htm
Generic all the way for me - with a little help from AbraCAData! I’d need an entire gymnasium to get an exact model of a Great lakes steel mill, so I just focused on the scenic elements I really liked, and found ways to fit them into the available space [a 22’ by 22’ garage].
I model ILLINOIS CENTRAL but I don’t model a specific part of IC. I also have my own railroad that I’m working on.
ICMR
Happy railroading.[:)]
I model CSX and Conrail along with CP and NS in Grand Rapids, MI. I have a fictional museum on my layout so I can run my steam[:)] and a fictional railroad called the Midwestern RR that shares CSX’s yard in Grand Rapids.