Jolly good show!

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
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I took advantage of the Fall Flurry of train show activities here in New England. Today, I decided to go to the North Shore Model Railroad Club in Wakefield, Massachusetts. (No, they did not rename the town after knuckleballer Tim Wakefield of the Boston Red Sox, but it’s a nice thought.)

This was an open house for the club. They’ve had the advantage, I discovered, of being in the same building for 30 years. The club has a good deal of space, and they use it well. They have a number of continuous loops, and they set things up in “Open House Mode” so that they were able to run about 15 trains. Westbound trains were staged in one yard, while Eastbounds were staged in another. One direction, incidentally was running DCC while the other was running DC.

I think these guys like to run trains. All of their track is meticulously hand laid, and their bridges are works of art in themselves. Still, much of the layout lacks scenery, which I assume is, like most layouts, still under construction. There was a section of narrow gauge, and part of it was sharing a right of way with the full-gauge track. The completed scenery was great, and the club was clearly taking the time to do things right.

The club’s web site, with photos, is at http://www.nsmrc.org/. I’m not associated with them, by the way, but I thought other might be interested.

So, visit your LHS and pick up any fliers about local open houses in your area. Hey, the Patriots were up 42-7 when I came out of the club. I had a much more interesting time walking around that railroad than I would have sitting in front of the box with a beer.

Thumbs up all around for this club! Anyone else visited any open houses lately?

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I missed their open house???[banghead]

I’ve been there a few times, they have a great layout!

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Well, the South Shore Model Railroad has their open house next weekend:

http://www.ssmrc.org/

They’re in Hingham, MA. We’ve seen some of bogp40’s pics of this club, so I’m looking forward to seeing it in person.

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I saw their layout a few years ago when I was helping out with the Northeast N-Trak layout. A little strange having the vendors/exhibits in a different location (down the street from the club), but it was a nice show.

Their layout was very nice, and a good portion of the far end was still under construction at the time. I saw some of the hand-laid track in various stages of installation. I imagine that the whole section is done by now.

The one particular thing that sticks out in my mind (not sure why) was a campfire scene on the layout. The campfire was animated in a way that made it look like a fire.

Another layout to watch for an open house is the Bay State Model Railroad Museum in Roslindale. They have four layouts (O, HO, HOn3, and N). I’m partial to their outstanding N-scale layout. I think they’re having a holiday open house in early December.