Hello everybody I would like to know what kind of freight traffic you use for trains. I mostly have mixed freight. What freight traffic do you have on your layout?
Sincerely
Ryan LaPlaca
Well I’ll be modeling modern traffic in NJ, so there will be a ton of intermodal, car carriers, and mixed freight.
I’ve got a number of coal hoppers. They are old Mantuas, with operating clamshell doors on the bottom. I’ve also got an old building that will dump coal into the hoppers, so I can fill up the cars on one side of the layout and run them around to the other side and dump them. (Yeah, that puts a big premium on good trackwork so the loaded cars don’t derail and spill the coal all over the place.)
I’ve also got a lot of reefers, most of which have beer logos on the side. I’ve got a lot of mixed freight, and also a nice old MOW train.
My C&HV handles Grain,Lumber,coal,coke,steel,fly-ash,food stuffs,sand,glass,corn sweetener,corn starch,vegetable oils,scrap,pipe,chemicals,paints,news print,pulpwood,wood chips and other general freight.Total cars handle 32,584 a year…
Considering the various industries I plan to model my freight will consist of the following, no pun intended:
65’ LPG tank cars - Propane and Liquefied Petroleum Gas from off site industry to gas tank farm
Thrall Door Box Cars - Lumber loads from timber mill to lumber company
50’ Pulpwood cars - Pulpwood loads from timber industry to paper mill
Wood chip cars - timber mill to lumber manufacturer
Coal Hoppers - Coal loads from coal mine to power plant
Refer box cars - Produce loads from off site industry to food distributor
Flat cars - Steel from mill to steel fabrication plant
Box cars (various) - food manufacturers to distribution warehouses
I model New York Central but run a variety of road names as far as rolling stock is concerned. As fas as type of rolling stock:
- 40’ boxcars (wood and metal)
- 40’ reefers
- 46’ gondolas
- 8K and 10K tankers
- coal hoppers
- crane
- flat car
- cabooses
Tom
I model the Kansas City Southern, so I run some mixed freights. The KCS ran a lot of unit coal trains so I am in the process of collecting enough coal cars to run several unit coal trains.
Jim
Traffic on my Penn Lake System looks like:
Unit coal (open hoppers) and iron ore (ore jennies) trains.
A vast amount of boxcars carrying paper, building products, food stuffs adn anything else you can put in a boxcar.
2 bay covered hoppers hauling cement.
Gondolas (open and covered) for stone, scrap metal, and finished metal.
And a few 3 and 4 bay covered hoppers carrying grain and plastic pellets.
Nick
I model mostly Santa Fe and BNSF. I use loads I see passing through Oklahoma such as grain, coal, intermodel, and mixed freight. I just run what ever sounds good for that particular session.
George
Well, right now I have mostly power, but I am currently working on a Coal unit train. Im modeling a ficticious version of SP, in a world where SP and UP run together and neither have ever bought each other. I also plan on making a Fruit and Parashable goods train that SP/UP co-ops with CSX.
I also plan to run train resembling Central Oregon and Pacific (CORP), wich usually consists of 60’ TTX High cube cars and 72’ center beams.
Falls Valley Railroad Steam/Early Desiel, the railroad has heavy Reefer and Boxcar rolling stock, some other types such as gons, covered hoppers and flats. There is even local commuter service and a long haul sleeper/express service availible.
Focus is on bridge traffic and generates some industry for export (Apple cider anyone?) and has a seaport addition planned for a future construction.
I also have worked on a single modern era train consist so that I can change eras by switching between Steam era stock and modern stock.
The railroad has been in a state of change and planning these last two years, only now am I finalizing the industries and operations schedule.
Mixed Freight, a Couple Coal trains, Roadrailers and Intermodal for Vehicle trains(Autoracks and parts boxcars) and the Occosional Iron Ore train
I’m modeling 1949/1950, on the NKP’s mainline to Peoria. Besides two online cities (Bloomington and Hoopeston), there was very little online switching, besides interchanges and the occasional grain elevator. So my freights are mostly through runs, with only one daily (and one way) local.
The mainline freights are varied. Westbound to Peoria, the trains were mostly empty reefers heading back west and loaded boxes of finished goods from the East Coast. Eastbounds were more frequent, and almost always full of loaded cars. The morning fast freight was mostly beer, whiskey and petrochemicals. The afternoon through freight started out with steel products and Caterpillar tractors, and picked up as much interchange traffic as it could along the way (interchange cars could be anything, but were mostly boxcars). The evening through freight took finished goods out of Peoria, and also worked the interchanges.
The once a day local switched everything that the through freights didn’t, and performed most of the online drops and pickups. Bloomington was a major industrial center and had it’s own dedicated switch engine, so the local would just pick up westbounds from the yard and continue on. In Hoopeston and Paxton, the local switched the occasional finished goods factory, but spent most of its time working the canning plants in town (during the several mini-rushes each year, the NKP sent out an extra local just to handle the two plants). The rest of the online towns usually only had an elevator or two (as is typical for the Midwest), so would only see sporadic switching, mostly of boxcars for grain service, boxcars full of grain dors to be delivered, and the occasional twin hopper of coal to be unloaded for the local coal dealer (“unloaded” by dumping the coal right on the tracks, and hand shoveling it into trucks or a coal bin. You’d be amazed at how low-tech work was before the passing of the minimum-wage act!)
Cars vary, and can include just about anything. 40’ boxcars dominate by a large margin,
I model conrail in the 1990s. My trains are coal, intermodal, and mixed freights. I hope to some day add autoracks too.
I run one intermodal train consisting of doublestack containers and trailer-on-flat-car (TOFC) setups. I also run one mixed freight (boxcars, covered hoppers, gondolas, etc). Also, it’s not rare to see one big orange CSX Maintenence Of Way train, consisting of ballast hoppers, dump cars, and misc. flat cars.
-Brandon
I mainly model the B&O,Chessie and some WM. The majority of my freight is coal. Being in a club setting I’m not that concerned with covering all other aspects of freight. I just love pulling a 40-50 hopper train w/ F units, SD7s or SD50s.
The type of freight moved is very much based on your era. If you run a modern day railroad, there should be intermodal on your layout. Modern day traffic is also very auto-heavy. Another thing to consider in modern traffic is that much of today’s traffic has become unit trains. Even if traffic isn’t moving in unit trains, bunches of cars are moving together. In the interest of more action with less space, we might overlook that. This is how I approached the traffic on my railroad. Since I am modeling something close to present day (With older era items thrown in every now and then), my layout will feature intermodal, auto, and coal traffic. Most of the industries I chose use more than one type of car. If they don’t, then I used them because they don’t take much room or I enjoy the cars used or the visual aspects of the industry (e.g. refrigerated foodstuffs and grain). I included a paper mill in my plan because I like them visually and they require different types of supplies like woodchips, pulpwood, and slurries like Kaolin. I also have planned a stamping plant which will require cushion-coil cars, auto-service boxcars, and regular boxcars. I use cars for my RIP track and fueling station. I also serve a team track. Consensus, my traffic includes all types of mixed freight, automobiles, coal, and intermodal traffic. The one thing I won’t have much of is oil-based fuel.
Chemicals/non hazard chemicals/powdered chemicals/corn products/grain/paper/wood chips/scrap/newsprint/coils/coal/auto/intermodal and lots of boxcars with anything in them.
Hmmm, funny you should ask… My 1990s-era layout is centered around a Great Lakes steel mill, so that is the primary destination or origin for 90% of my freight traffic.
Erie Steel Corp., Intra-Mill traffic
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Bottle cars - Hot metal, from blast furnace to converter (oxygen furnace)
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Slag pots - Liquid slag/cinders, from blast furnace to reclamation pit
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Ingot buggies - steel ingots, from teeming platform to stripper crane
Main line traffic to/from Erie Steel
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Unit coal train - from Sabo Mining & Mineral Co. to Erie Steel coke ovens
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Boxcars - firebrick & additives, from off-layout to receiving warehouse on Erie Steel grounds
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Covered hoppers - bulk additives from off-layout to dumphouse on Erie Steel property
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Gondolas - scrap steel/iron from various sources (on/off layout) to Erie Steel oxygen furnace
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Tank cars - tar, a coke by-product, from Erie Steel coke ovens to off-layout cutomers
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Cushioned coil flatcars/gons - rolled steel coils, from Erie Steel to off-layout customers
Main line traffic, local lineside industries
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Whale-belly LP gas tankers - propane, from off-layout to Star Propane Company
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Boxcars - newsprint, from off-layout to Allied Printing Co.
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Gondolas - scrap iron/steel, from Houghschnaegel Metal Recycling to Erie Steel (+ off-layout customers)
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Mechanical Reefers - pershiable foods, from off-layout to R.T. Rifenberry Wholesale Produce Co.
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Tank cars - animal fat, from off-layout to a bulk liquids team track, into trucks for shipment to an off-layout dog food factory
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Open hoppers - coal and gravel, interchange track from industries on an off-layout short line to othe
I will have just about everything.
33,500 gallon pressure tankcars to haul LPG and gasoline from my oil refinery. Yes those tankcars do carry gasoline. I even saw one on my way home today, I wish I had my camera ready.
Various size general service tankcars to haul gasoline, diesel fuel, benzene, toluene, hexane, asphalt, and sulfur from my refinery. As well as bring in catalysts, hydrofluoric acid, sulfuric acid, and sodium hydroxide.
GATX Tank Train tankcars to bring crude oil to the refinery.
Open top hoppers to haul petroleum coke from my refinery.
Various size covered hoppers, Pressureaide hoppers, Airslide hoppers, and Pressure Differential hoppers to bring in various load to the dry bulk terminal and catalysts to the refinery.
Boxcars, bulkhead flatcars, center-beam flatcars, and possible regular flatcars to haul various lumber products from the lumber mill.
Woodchip gondolas to haul woodchips from the lumber mill.
Insulated boxcars (RBLs) and uninsulated boxcars to haul chopped tomatos, tomato paste, tomato suace, katchup, barbeque sauce, pizza sauce, etc. packaged in cans, drums/barrels, bag-in-box, and pouches from the tomato processing plant.
Reefers to haul produce from the packing plant and orange juice and pulp from the citrus processing plant.
TOFC flatcars, spine cars, container cars, and auto carriers from the intermodal and auto terminal.
Whatever I want on the the team track.
Once I can expand my layout I plan to add more industries which will allow for more cars.
Mini-Mill (Steel Mill): Gondolas to bring in scrap metal. Bulkead flatcars and gondolas to haul out beams, pipes, and steel plate. Coil cars to haul out coiled steel.
Some type of (unprototypical) food processing plant. Covered hoppers to bring in corn. Pressureaide and Airslide hoppers to bring in flour and sugar. Tankcars to bring in vegetable oils and corn syrup. Reefers to bring in meat, fruits, and vegetable