One person Passenger Operations?

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

Anyone here doing one person operations with their layout?

I am trying to do some Amtrak and Metra Chicago operations using Fred Soop’s techniques, albiet on a much smaller scale. One person operations for me is in a large bedroom around the walls dog bone layout.

I can switch between modern and 1950s at a moments notice, with the only thing unable to change is the modern backdrop. Which is just cosmetic.

Right now just as Fred Soop did, I have Metra leaving Chicago in the early morning to pick up passengers at their stations. 15 minutes to arrive at destination and 5 minutes to load/unload passengers. On the way back into Chicago Union Station, the Metra trains “back in” since they are push pull just as in the prototype. Then they go into hidden staging until evening rush hour, where they once again leave Union Station and head out to the suburbs, and then finally return to staging to await the next morning rush hour.

I am trying to figure out how to incorporate the CNW 400 commuter train into this, which is also “push/pull”. Since it ran until 1963 this should be fine to run with my NYC 20th Century Limited and Olympia Hiawatha for the 1950s, but not with modern Metra. Instead I will use Amtrak to run along with Metra for modern.

The reason, I asked about one person operations, is that I am assuming you like I are running 2 physical Amtrak locomotives with 12 passenger cars to create named trains from and 2 Metra with 9 passenger cars to choose from.

Where it gets rough is the older named trains such as the NYC 20th century (11 cars), BN Zephyrs ( 2 locos) 4 cars, and Hiawatha (11 cars).

How do you handle passenger operations like this?

2

One point: the CNW 400 that ran Chicago to the Twin Cities did indeed end in the early 1960s but it was a traditional single level passenger car train. The CNW Flambeau 400 that ran with bi-level cars (similar looking to commuter bi levels but different cars and differently equipped) north into northern Wisconsin continued basically right up to 1971 and the introduction of Amtrak. There was also a Chicago to Milwaukee train that sometimes ran with bi level cars, and it was sometimes informally called the Milwaukee Commuter train. Those might have been commuter bi levels.

The CNW bi level commuter cars ran well into the Metra era and gradually the CNW green and yellow colors were repainted into Metra’s older paint schemes, and then were replaced by newer cars. I don’t know if this changes your planning or thinking but I thought you might appreciate the info (which I have greatly simplified here for clarity’s sake).

If you are asking how to deal with the “interference” between trains and who waits for who when there is one person operation, one thought might be to take a page from Bill Darnaby’s Ohio-themed layout which is a single track main with many “dummy” crossings by other railroads which in fact are not modeled. As I understand it, Darnaby as programmed signal systems so that at various time his railroad’s trains are stopped at these crossings by a red signal because the “other” railroad’s trains got the crossing by being there first – all fictional by the way, no real opposing trains, but the red signals and thus the need to stop are real. I do not know what sets off these red signals, pe

3

I’ve always been a lone-wolf operator, but visiting friends (and grandkids) can take the throttle once in a while if they wish.
Usually for the friends, they’re more interested in taking pictures of their latest locomotive purchase, with their chosen locale on my layout as the backdrop setting.

I built my layout solely as a one-person operation, as I have no interest in having more than one train moving at any given time.

Wayne

4

One person operations are generally best done with sequence operations imo, which makes a lot of the “challenge” of passenger operations: clearing the track for them, following timetables, etc. a lot less compelling. But if you want to run trains and not have a “puzzle” of running a railroad it can definitely be part of your sequence operations.

Something like

  1. Morning Yard Job
  2. Morning Commuter
  3. Morning Wayfreight
  4. Afternoon Local
  5. Afternoon Commuter
  6. Evening Yard Job
  7. Evening Wayfreight

as an example, fitting it into your sequence operation. Adding in the name trains would be pretty similar. The main issue I’d foresee is staging space at both ends if you don’t use fiddle tracks. Even then, sometimes having to fiddle to run your next sequence can disrupt the fun.

5

When the grandchildren are not here, I operate the layout similar to allegedlynerdy. Some days I add ‘diverted trains’ from the main lines giving extra interest.

David

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I have a single track one person layout operation. I can run two or three trains at the same time, all in the same direction, but I usually only run one at a time. I am railfanning my own trains in basically wide-open western terrain. Buildings are minimal on the layout. It is supposed to represent southwestern desert.

I only have an El Capitan passenger consist, and a Santa Fe mechanical reefer consist, plus some extra UP passenger cars (son likes UP). Son also has a big coal train, but that is pretty much it. We just don’t need to own a lot of stuff, or rather not anymore.

7

I am a lone wolf operator with a fairly large layout focusing on passenger train operations. My layout is set in the 1950s with Dearborn Station as the centerpiece.

In its heyday, Dearborn Station handled nearly 125 trains per day in and out of the station’s 10 tracks, with 6 different railroads competing for space to load and unload. Access to the station was on a 4-track mainline, so there could be a lot of coming and going at any given time, more than one operator can deal with.

On my layout, the 4-track mainline reduces to two main tracks into the station, so as a lone operator I am running one inbound and one outbound train into and out of the station. My layout also features 13 large freight houses for LCL freight, just like the prototype, but as a lone wolf, I can only operate one switcher at a time on a third mainline track to service the warehouses.

Dearborbn Station was a stub track station without a wye or balloon track, so all trains pulled in head-in first and never backed out under their own power. So, that is a big part of operations.

Switchers pulled the passenger car consists to a designated coach yard where the cars were serviced and reversed. The loco consists backed out of the station and moved to service facilities for washing and refueling.

Switchers then pushed the passenger car consists back into the station and the loco consists turned around in the service facility and headed back to the station in reverse. That way, the completed train could pull head first out of the station. Those various movements occupy a good deal of the operator’s time.

I am a bit confused by your comment about “the older named trains”.

Are you implying that there is conflict between the commuter trains and the name trains?

[quote user=“chipset35”]

The reason, I asked about one person operations, is that I am assuming you like I are running 2 physical Amtrak locomotives with 12 passenger cars to create name

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You have given yourself a big challenge with running commuter trains in a big city like Chicago, and on a bedroom layout no less. Adding Amtrak trains to the mix presents an additional challenge. The push-pull movement technique is prototypical of course and simplifies your passenger train operations somewhat.

As I am sure you know, CNW ran its commuter trains in and out of its own station and did not use Union Station for this purpose. Union Station trains depart south, while CNW trains depart north. So, you will need to take some liberties if you are modeling Union Station on your layout, but no matter. As we say, it is your railroad.

Rich

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Wow Dave! Great information! Thanks!

10

Alton,

Older named trains such as E and F unit motive power led trains from the 50s and 60s before Amtrak.

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Correction:

E8 units led Amtrak trains well into 1978.

E9 units led Amtrak trains into 1982.

Plenty of both E and F units pulled Amtrak trains.

Penn Central had at least internally rebuilt 9 E8 units in the time before Amtrak hoping that Amtrak would buy them, which they actually did. One of those units was chosen for the opening day Amtrack black paint scheme with the red/white/blue striping worn by E8 4316 for a little over a year before it was repainted into what became the official platinum mist paint scheme.

A number of UP/SP E8 and E9 units were still in very good condition at the time of the Amtrak takeover, as well as the large fleet of Penn Central E units which were still at least operable (excepting the 9 rebuilds which were in better condition). There also were E units from other roads like Seaboard Coast Line which had been well maintained.

The best of the inherited E units made it to either 1978 or 1982.

Respectfully submitted–

John

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Thats good, I don’t have to worry about running them all together.

Thank you everyone!

13

While push-pull movements were, and remain commonplace at Chicago Union Station, some trains backed into CUS, using the Canal Street wye at 16th Street. Trains arriving at CUS from the east used a wye at 40th and Normal St. to back in.

Rich

14

It’s funny you should mention this, as I was thinking about something which is perhaps not too dissimilar (at least I hope it’s not for the sake of this conversation).

It was about spicing up passenger operations on our club/museum layout, which is not a one-person place (though it can be) – but where passenger trains generally just run from one end of the layout to the other.

I’ve been thinking not just about milk train operation, but about picking up and setting out sleepers on the way. We’ve got a 28-scale-mile main line, and I was going to try to do some planning – a given passenger train that has drop-offs and pick-ups along the way, and perhaps a second train, going the other direction, that interacts with some of those same cars. Then, perhaps, a third train that picks up milk cars (and carries a couple of coaches) back in the original direction and a fourth to get everything back to its starting point.

It’s a thing I can run on my own without anyone, or on operating days among other traffic, or that other members can help operate.

Dunno if it applies to your situation, but it might be workable, and I know from my friends’ layout, which does freight ops, that a little switching along the way can really make things more interesting.

As for single-handing 2 or 3 trains – I have done it at our layout. Very do-able, but not as interesting for me as you have to really concentrate on the dispatch computer (we’re mostly single-track w/ passing sidings) rather than the throttles, so its more of a challenge to pretend I’m the engineer. :slight_smile:

Aaron

15

This kind of en-route switching went on much more than most modelers realise. Besides sleeping cars and some head-end cars, diners were often set out mid-route and usually worked on the return counterpart of the train.

In addition some routes that split off, say the Boston section of many NYC trains at Albany or for the Pennsy at Harrisburg with sections going to D.C. and New York. In Cleveland some trains were split and portions headed toward St. Louis on the Big Four likewise the PRR split some trains at Pittsburgh with some continuing to St. Louis on the Pan Handle.

The Lackawanna and Nickel Plate handed off cars at Buffalo, Wabash and Pennsy at Toledo. Lots more switching than most people are aware of.

E-L_coach setout-Huntington-IN by Edmund, on Flickr

NYC_Rensseleaer by Edmund, on Flickr

I do a lot of shuffeling to my passenger trains before the road power is tied on. Adds a lot to the fun.

CNW_Bilevel-station by Edmund, on Flickr

Union_Sta_departure3 by Edmund, on Flickr

[url=https://flic.kr

16

Great thread!

To read most of the US model railroading media these days, modeling passenger train operations are non-existent. This is very enlightening … and encouraging!

17

Ed, you are a magnificent font of information!

I was clueless about this until a friend pointed it out, and I started reading the NYC train schedules more carefully (since I know the geography of NY State, it made more sense to me). A train might depart a given city at 2 am, but the sleeper was open at 9 pm. Lots of switching to be done enroute.

I did not realize that about the diners, though. How would that work? Would they cut the diner out at night and return it on a daytime train?

Hope I’m not hijacking this thread too badly.

That biz car train order is fascinating. I don’t have any (yet) but I think it’s time to look into one. A friend has a couple of private cars for his modern Amtrak Coast Starlight, but he does’t take them on or off the train. It would certainly add interest to the operation.

Aaron

18

Chipset,

A couple articles I like are:

Kato track plan “Let’s DCC with Amtrak”

Model Railroader “Modeling Commuter Rail Service” Dec 2007

Model Railroader Bay Junction and Troy Branch Series

Model Railroader “Big City in Two Decks” June 2016

Railway Model Craftsman “Consider The Commuter”

I don’t think it’s hard to believe the Amtrak or mainline trains are midday departures from the city when commuter traffic is down. During the day, the Metra cars need serviced.

19

As a kid, I was the proud owner of an American Flyer layout, with a steam engine, diesel switcher, and a small collection of freight cars. So, when I got into HO scale modeling back in early 2004, I naturally leaned toward freight trains and freight operations.

But, a chance purchase of an Athearn Genesis Santa Fe Super Chief F7AB at my LHS and a set of Athearn shorty passenger cars changed my interest from freight operations to passenger operations. I have never looked back. Most of my locomotives and rolling stock are passenger oriented which is both challenging and fun to operate.

But, yes, we are in the minority.

Rich

20

Chicago Union Station has trains departing from both north and south. The Milwaukee used the north end and Metra’s service on the old Milwaukee lines still use it. Amtrak also uses the north end for its Hiawatha service to Wisconsin, and the Empire Builder.