Hi
I would like to know if there is a good source somewhere (free? I hope) for drawings and plans for various structures. I am particularly looking for steam servicing facilities, roundhouses, and also passenger and freight stations. I would also be interested in other structures for railside industries. I know there are books available for this and have already bought several, but I am wondering if there might be some other sources?
Thanks
wdcrvr
If you’re looking for typical american structures, you best bet will the the Preservation funds (I don’t remember the name, something with “national” somewhere!). It’s a survey program that started in the USA in the 30’s to give job to architects. It’s still going on and the great thing is that they surveyed almost anything, small or large, ugly or not. I used their information (free) to plan a brick work facility years ago. I’m pretty sure someone on this forum knows what I’m talking about and will provide you the link.
Also, in Canada, we have access to a good number of scanned insurance maps. They are a great load of value to scale industries and learn how they work. I’m pretty sure they can also be found in numeric format in USA (they are called Sanborn Maps). Habitually, any large city library that respects itself have a copy of them for their respective area.
Good luck!
Matt
That would be the National Trust for Historic Preservation. You could also check your favorite prototype’s historical society, and any railroad museums that might operate in your area.
Lee
There is some stuff available in the HABS/HAER (Historic American Building Survey/Historical American Engineering Records) collection of the Library of Congress.
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/habs_haer/
Smile,
Stein
Model Railroader published a lot of good structure drawings in the 1940s to 1980s, often together with a construction article. Back issues might not be free right now – but once those DVDs of MR going back to 1934 hit the market I bet there will be boxes of free or super cheap MRs at swap meets.
Dave Nelson
The HABS-HAER has literally thousands of pictures of buildings of all types, industrial, commercial, agricultural, residential. Many have plans, some have histories, some have pictures of the machinery inside of them or floor plans.
Excellent site. Search for the area or your interest and/or for the type of building or industry in which you are interested. Often they will not have a lan for the specific area, but a similar one someplace else.
If you are interested in Canadian Steam, the CPR Historical Society has on line drawings of a number of stations in Canada showing the overall r/w plan, the location of the station, location of industries located on the railroad r/w such as cattle pens, grain elevators, track locations etc.
They also have on line copies of railroad station plans, roundhouses, turntables, coal bins and other misc buildings.
You have to join the site but it is free.
Coal towers are called coaling plants.
I am also looking for downloadable structure plans online. I found one website that is nice:
I’d like to find more, if anyone has any links to share. I only found a few on the MR site.
[:D]
How far back does your Model Railroader Mag collection go??
Back in the 70’s and 80’s and even further back when it was a proper model railroad mag there where lots of drawings and how to articles that will be very helpful.
They will also be suitable for model railroads[:D] and should be easy to adapt to your railroad.
Also look for the older out of print structure books at train shows these not only have the drawing but suggest how the building could be made…
Forget the current batch of structure books if you plan on doing a lot of scratch building they don’t cater for it that well.
regards John