I’ve been musing about the “big one,” i.e., the layout I plan to build after I retire from the Air Force. All of my plans seemed to involve some compromise like a compressed or an abbreviated Horseshoe Curve or something. Even in N, it’s not easy to do justice to the 4-track Standard Railroad of the World.
My latest idea is simpler. I have a book called Lewistown and the Pennsylvania Railroad with a wealth of great photos and maps of the Lewistown, PA area. I used to drive through Lewistown frequently between and . So, why not model just Lewistown, and make the rest of the Middle Division staging? Sounds limiting, but the more I think about it the more I realize it’s not. I don’t have a drawing done yet, but:
Envision an 8x10 cockpit style N scale layout with a shelf that wraps around the outside wall. 8x10 part is basically a 4-track loop (i.e., the Pennsy mainline). Along one 8’ edge is Lewistown Junction, with the depot and the hotel and the American Viscose Corp Rayon factory. Curving toward the 10’ section is a small freight yard. There’s the 3-stall Lewistown enginehouse, the turntable, and small coaling tower (all there even up to the Penn Central era!). Now, curving back into the next 8’ section is LEWIS Interlocking and the Granville stone arch bridge. The remaining 10’ section is visible staging for Enola/Harrisburg/Philadelphia and Altoona/Pittsburgh. The shelf peels away from the freight yard and heads to the Standard Steel Corporation’s Burnham steel mill on the PRR Milroy secondary.
Yep, I’ll scan one in tomorrow. No reversing loop. Picture a giant 6, with the loop part of the 6 a full circle 4-track mainline and the top part is the Milroy secondary.
The key to modeling the PRR is to keep whacking it down to a manageable amount. Horseshoe is nice but there is virtually no switching in the area and it is massive and not practical. You are on the right track in my opinion. I started with wanting to model 30th street station through Trenton. The reason for 30th ST. is the separation of passenger tracks on the lower level and the high line for freight going behind the station. This leaves a natural and convoncing way to hide the staging loops. This also meant I would have to model Zoo somehow. I finally knocked thos down to something east of Zoo and came up with North Philadelphia to Frankford Junction. Even then there are four branchs and almost 100 industries so I reconsidered this idea. By moving the west end to Margie yard just west of North Philly I could have a pretty major yard as well as two smaller ones. three of rthf our branchs had to go also - Chestnut Hill, Stifetown and Oxford. Any one of ethose would make a great layout in themselves but I wanted mainline action. The Chestnut hill branch had Midvale Steel Co., Stifetown had perhaps fifteen industries and the Oxford branch had 48 industries including the Sears eastern region warehouse getting alomst 100 cars per day and the US Navy supply depot getting almost 100 cars daily. I will model C street yard and some of the traffic to those branchs but the 87 on line industries will be the bulk of the traffic. I am going to try and find a place for the Fairhill branch from Fairhill yard because of street running and Wetsern electric and Philco plants plus it was only a mile long. The point of all this is I am now down to about a mile and a half of railroad being built in full scale. Building will be much more massive than on a typical model railroad and there will be a real clock instead of a fast clock. Since I moved east of Zoo I can now run east west traffic as well as north south traffic and PRSL
Hi, Dave. Growing up in Mifflin County and living in Perry County now, I know exactly what you mean. I think it would work pretty good. I have that book too and it has a lot of nice information in it.
My father worked at Standard Steel and I’m using the through plate girder bridge over the Juniata River at Walnut Street as a guide for one on my current (experimental) layout. Of course if you do model it you HAVE to include the tracks down the middle of Water Street in Lewistown. And the freight station on South Dorcas Street.
Thanks! I’ll definitely do the Water Street trackage. While I believe in real life that trackage was just for the Milroy secondary, it will probably double for me as the Selinsgrove and Lewistown branch (which I think connected below Water Street). The S&L will be staging behind the Standard Steel plant.
Oddly enough, there was a Pennsy track down Water Street in Lancaster, PA, on the former Oxford branch. Those tracks were torn out when I was a kid, but the branch ran through the town of Willow Street. You can still see the roof of the old Willow Street depot from my uncle’s farm across the valley in New Danville, PA.
I think I’ll have more time tomorrow to refine the plan and post it. In the meantime, keep those suggestions coming! I’ve also been considering C&O Fan’s idea of reversing loops instead of one big loop. The one big loop will necessitate either a duckunder or a lift-out section, neither of which thrill me. A reversing loop on 4-track main doesn’t thrill me either, unless I make it double-track so the two westbound mains curve around to become the two eastbound mains. Then I have to wire for the reversing loop where the center tracks cross over at LEWIS Interlocking.
I’m many years from military retirement, but my idea is that if I start scratchbuilding now, I’ll be ready to build when I get there (9 years to go!). So, I’ll gradually replace the structures on my current layout with scratchbuilt structures for the future one, starting with LEWIS Tower and the Lewistown Junction depot. The PRR Pro modeling group will start working on Pennsy towers in January, so mine will be LEWIS.
One great advantage that you’ll have is if you’re modeling the transition era Pennsy had an enourmous variety of locomotives from GM, Alco, FM, Baldwin, and GE produced.
Summer 1956, in fact. That’s the era of my current Pennsy layout. Chosen both for the reason you state (although I don’t think GE was producing locos for the Pennsy until the 60s) and because that was the last full year of steam operations on the PRR. I’m still hoping PCM comes out with that N scale M1 4-8-2, the flagship of the PRR Middle Division.
Hi, again. I’m not sure but I think the track running down Water St. in Lewistown splits just past the S. Dorcas St. freight station. The diverging track at the switch parallels Pannebaker Ave. for the Milroy secondary and the through track parallels Railroad St., crosses Kishacoquillas Creek, then parallels Jacks Creek to Sitkin’s (now Krentzman’s) scrap yard and on to Selinsgrove.
My earlier post was also in error, the Milroy secondary crosses Kishacoquillas Creek at Walnut St., not the Juniata.
If memory serves the main track passed right next to the loading docks of the S. Dorcas St. freight station. There was passing siding so cars could be spotted for loading and unloading and trains could pass on the siding. On the opposite side of the passing siding was(is?) a team track that was in use up till at least 1980.
hopefully this board will still be here in 9 years so i can see the photos as your layout progresses! it sounds like a fun layout with lots of work to be done!
Okay, here’s the plan, based on actual PRR track diagrams and maps:
I see two major issues with this plan that didn’t seem as bad before I put it on paper…
Duckunder. My back isn’t great now, and it ain’t gettin’ better as I get older!
Lots of turnouts! The full 4-track interlocking plant at LEWIS tower requires 12 turnouts alone. Compare that with 11 total on my current layout. With all the track and switches on this layout, that’s a lot of Tortoise machines… …and lots of cash!
Dave - Out of curiosity, are you planning to handlay all those switches (forgive me if this point was already covered by you and I missed it). Since nearly every one is both curved and/or highly truncated as shown in your drawing, it looks like a truly challenging project indeed!
Well, it’s not quite to scale. Handlaying is not out of the question, but not my ideal choice. I’m hoping Atlas will come out with some Code 55 curved switches. Most of the switches on the mains would be #7 standard (not curved). The yard tracks would be mostly curved. Tracklaying is a skill I’m still mastering!
Just brainstorming at this point… Of course, having done a few layouts already, I know how things that magically fit on paper don’t often fit as well in reality. I would definitly work this out with planning tools long before I’d start construction.
The main motivator here was to see if I could fit something resembling a section of the Pennsy mainline into a reasonable space. Now that it looks like I could do justice to Lewistown (as opposed to Harrisburg, Altoona, Pittsburgh, etc.), I can start to scratchbuild structures for Lewistown. My first would be LEWIS tower, which will fit nicely on my current layout until its new home is built.
C&O, that’s a good idea on the backdrop on the inside.
I am presently building an HO Pennsy layout. I chose an abbreviated version to include certain PRR features such as Horseshoe Curve (3 Track), Rockville Bridge, Galitzin Tunnel, South Amboy Yard, a freight yard and a few stations.
I have four passenger lines (2 East & 2 West bound), a freight line and a commuter line. I wanted to see a lot of train operations at the same time so I made each line (6 lines) a separate block. This way you could watch all trains running at the same time while you are working in one of the yards. The blocks are connected so if you wanted to get ambitious you could switch trains to other blocks and run on those tracks.
I find it easier to keep track of one train or yard while the rest run by themselves. The multiple tracks in your proposed layout would work well using the same technique.
It would seem to the Old Dog that one would need a good deal of staging to allow for the traffic on a four track main line such as Horse Shoe curve. On most layouts it is difficult for the yards to create trains fast enough to keep the mainline busy. You might want to consider one the the Pennsy’s secondary lines, say the Philadephia and Erie, the Pittsburgh and Buffalo, or the Pittsburgh and Erie.
You’re right about that. I’m not sure I could even afford enough locomotives to keep the trains rolling on the Middle Division. One alternative I’ve given much thought to is the double-track Harrisburg to Buffalo line. I considered modeling the Sunbury and Northumberland portions.
Another option in completely the opposite direction is the Bald Eagle Branch. It was at one time the busiest single track in the US. Mostly coal coming down from Clearfield and bridge traffic between Lock Haven and Tyrone.
