Recently, a memorial operating session was run in honor of Jim Richards, who sadly, all too soon, passed away this year. Jim published several articles in Model Railroader including hand built movable frog turnouts, scratchbuilt bridges, and buildings. Jim’s layout was designed by John Armstrong. It was Jim’s wish to have people over, build, enjoy, and run the layout. Visiting and operating this layout has been a highlight in my life. And so, in honor of Jim, I present to you a photo tour of the Athabaska Railroad.
The Athabaska Railroad connects Edmonton to Vancouver, represented by staging. It passes through two major towns Grande Riviere and Prince Arthur climbing over the Canadian Rockies along the way. The tour will proceed from Edmonton to Vancouver, east to west.
So sad to see this magnificant layout not quite completed, what is to become of this great system in the future?? I noticed the names of the Cities actually do not exist and also the names he spelled ATHABASKA with a “K” instead of a “C”
What a beautiful layout even though it is not finished! The Pacific coast backdrops are very evocative. The mountains are extraordinary! I find them to be very inspiring in that I have mountains in my plan but I was having a hard time imagining the profiles.
Very nice pictures. Thank you for sharing. It was finished enough that the white plaster looks like snow which is cool. I’m sure it was fun to operate.
Yes, its a fictional layout other than Vancouver and Edmonton. Its very well built and operates superbly. Jim painted the backdrops. I think he hand built most of the switches. One of Jim’s friends did a lot of work putting the operations plans together and there were a few others that were helping with track and scenery. There’s talk of continuing to work on and run the layout, which would be great, and was something Jim wanted.
It was incredible to operate on this model railroad. I also live in SW Colorado and got to do a couple operating sessions here. Jim was a mastermind and it is so cool that the house was built specifically to accommodate this huge layout in his basement. Within this past year however I heard there was a water leak and they had to box up all the rolling stock and locomotives for safe keeping and they had to tear out a wall to fix the issue. Not sure what impact it had on the layout itself but hopefully none of his unbelievably detailed, hand-painted backdrops were disturbed. Hard to say if this layout will ever truly get finished now that he is gone, but my understanding is there is still a small group of individuals who are working on the scenery and getting it done when they can. Just difficult to do since it is in the basement and there is no external entrance, you have to go through the house to get to it which is a bit intrusive of Jim’s wife who still lives there.
FJX200: That is correct there was a water leak in the house. Some of the guys that live closer got the rolling stock and models rescued as best as possible. I live a couple hours away and so, its about an all day deal for me to get up there unfortunately. It got real humid in there and the guys did what they could to dry it out. I’m told there was some issues with the contractors and getting things fixed. If I remember correctly, they had to cut into the backdrop at Prince Arthur. I think the layout itself is ok. We are hoping this summer to get it back up and running. Hopefully the electronics are ok.
And for reminiscing, here is a video a friend of mine did. More progress was made on the layout since this video. Near the end, we go over Jim’s famous Black Bear Bridge.
The layout is a John Armstrong design with Jim’s modifications. Jim had several MRR articles. His bridgework is outstanding. All the bridges you see are scratch built. His turnouts were amazing. Movable frogs. (I guess I said this already)
Thanks for the post. Great video and photos. I luckily live just under an hour away and would love to get over there and help this summer if I can to get it up and running. I’ve been doing a bunch of work to finish our own club layout but Van in my club helped quite a bit in getting Jim’s layout operations a lot more organized and I’m sure would be involved.
Fictional sure, but for Canadian Rockies Railroaders the route includes easily recognizable places and routes. Interestingly, the original routes contemplated for Canada’s first transcontinental railroad might have included some of the fictional Athabasca route.
Spiral tunnels exist at the Big Hill at Field BC and that Black Bear steel bridge is a dead ringer for the second Stoney Creek bridge in the Beaver River approaches to Rogers Pass. Both on the CPR mainline but between Calgary and Vancouver. The lift bridge could easily be the Johnston St bridge over Victoria Harbour into Esquimault, just paint it light blue, on the Esquimault and Nanaimo part of the CPR system, West of Vancouver though and on an island.
There’s a modeller somewhere up here building a mammoth Calgary to Vancouver layout.
The routes from Edmonton or Calgary to Vancouver are each longer than 600 miles (1,000 km). Anyway you model any of that is going to have to be fictional!!!
Lastspikemike: I’m rather embarrassed, it is the Stoney Creek Bridge. I don’t know where I got Black Bear from? I will blame my head being full of too many technical details that I work with. My go to excuse LOL. I would not doubt that Jim modelled that lift bridge from the prototype you mention.
FJX2000: I tried to PM you but it does not seem to work. I’m wondering if you are talking about the McElmo Western Railroad club. Are you on Van’s Athabaska email list? If you would like to get on our Silver San Juan Division NMRA email list, (for Athabaska stuff and other online and area events) please do. (Unless you already are?) Feel free to contact me through here:
Edmonton Left Vancouver Right Staging by Eric Miller, on Flickr
Edmonton Staging West Bound by Eric Miller, on Flickr
