I picked up my copy of Great Model Railroads 2004 yesterday at the LHS and must say that I found John Fultz’s knock-off of Malcolm Furlow’s Carbondale Central an outstandingly impressive example of a complex-looking, yet compact, layout.
Fultz’s version is certainly visually more impressive and realistic than Malcolm’s was. But then John obviously had no deadline to meet. While the trackplan is simple, you have the advantage of seeing the entire layout at one time and, in fact, you are almost surround by it in most instances. Yet, it avoids the awful problems associated with most duck-under designs that allow a similar perspective.
As I’ve believed ever since I first saw the Carbondale Central in the pages of MR 15 years ago, this is an excellent layout for the modeler who likes building complex urban scenes, scratchbuilding, or kitbashing, and who is not particularly concerned with extensive operations. If you are one of those “rail-fan” modelers or someone who wants to express the frustrated architect in them while impressing friends with your work without taking up the entire first floor of your home (or building one million scale trees!), then this is the layout design to follow. Great job John!
CNJ831