I’ve decided, this is the year where I finally stop building the small modules and dioramas and start work on the basement empire I’ve wanted for years. In the last few years of my railr
Gidday ComradeTom, [#welcome] to the forum.
Please do not let an apparent slip of the finger put you off from sharing your vision.While I’m aware that the Pere Marquette existed I really know nothing about it.
Cheers, the Bear.
Alright, round two, on a computer, rather than an Iphone
As I was saying, the last few years of my railroad interests have been focused around the Pere Marquette in Michigan, recently Ive been starting to consider a branch to model. Ive been pouring through my copy of THE PERE MARQUETTE IN 1945 - 1990 Chesapeake & Ohio Historical Society, looking for the line that best matches my interests for a PM model railroad (local freight service with medium sized steam power, and passenger service along with timetable and train order operations). and I am looking for some input on potential operations, and other general layout building primers.
The space for the railroad has yet to be cleared out and refinished, but this leaves me with the opportunity to design the space to best fit my railroad. After doing some basic calculations Ive determined I would probably have anywhere from 110-150ft of track, so after thinking about it and reading a bit more, the logical choice was to go to double or tripple deck. with the rough knowledge of the track length and the design I was going to be able to accommodate, I began looking for a medium sized line with a steady gradient and enough traffic in a small area to create an enjoyable railroad.
Looking through my book, I found what seems to be a great line to model, The Pere Marquette’s Petoskey Division. The line is 226.24 miles long and stretches from Grand Rapids MI to Bay View Michigan, rail is all 90lb except for 2.62 miles of 75lb. The general overview of the line in THE PERE MARQUETTE IN 1945 lists the line as having the greatest rise and fall and curvature per mile, on average the line experiences 11 feet of elevation change and 28 degrees of curvature per mile. Ruling grade on the line is 1.6% for about a mile.
Traffic on the Petoskey Division is rather light, there are only two cities of size located on it, the first being Traverse City, and the second being Petoskey. Interchanged cars on the railroad are
Tom,
Looks like you’ve done some real nice research, and thought all the operations out. I wish I would have done more of that, instead of just wingin’ it and getting the layout up and running as fast as possible.
Looking forward to seeing your trackplan.
ahh, the Pere Marquette !
One of my favorites.
I run a PM Berkshire on my layout as a reminder of my youth in Chicago.
Every Sunday after Church, our family ate breakfast at the Pere Marquette restaurant at 67th and Western with a view of the PM line running north and south, to and from Grand Central Station. And, Grand Central Station was a stone’s throw away from my beloved Dearborn Station. PM passenger trains backed into GCS across the B&OCT bascule bridge at 16th Street. Those bascule bridges make up my avatar.
Your planned route from Grand Rapids to Bay View in Michigan is, of course, on the other side of Lake Michigan in some beautiful Midwestern country. The lake shoreline from Traverse City, up through Petoskey and Harbor Springs, and northward to Mackinac City and across the bridge to St. Ignace, is some of the most beautiful area of the entire country.
Tom, where are you from and where do you live now? What is the size of the space available to you for your layout? Your planned layout seems magnificent. Keep us posted on your progress.
Rich
Rich, I am from Port Huron and have lived here my entire 21 years. I always had an interest in the railroads that served my area, and after a long time studying the Grand Trunk Western, A fellow member in the HO scale club I was organizing really got me into the Pere Marquette.
I also lucked out when I took a day trip to Owosso to see the Pere Marquette 1225 and found the locomotive steamed up and ready to go, however the day trip for the day had been canceled. My father and I were the only two people visiting that day, so the engineer and fireman invited us into the cab to get a hands on tour. After probably 30 minutes my dad and the engineer stepped down out of the cab to look around the outside of the locomotive. While they were gone, the fireman checked the firebox and found there needed to be some coal added to the corners of the firebox where the steam coal injectors could not reach. Without the help of the engineer he looked over to me and saw I had a pair of work gloves in my coat pocked and asked me to open the firebox doors as he got coal. At that moment something clicked. A unique Michigan railroad with some of the biggest power to run the Midwestern rails and some of the most beautiful streamlined E-units I had ever seen, I had to model it.
After looking through many books about Michigan railroading I thought I wanted to model a main stretch of either the Toledo sub or the Chicago to Grand Rapids sub, but after doing some serious thinking I don’t have enough people in the area to operate a mainline sub, or enough room to do it justice.
After I made my decision I got some really interesting family history, apparently my great grandfather was a fireman on the PM on the Port Huron to Saginaw (via Bad Axe) line (another line I thought of modeling). the more I think of it the more the railroad seems to scream at me to be modeled.
As for my room, my measurements are rough, and the space will have to share the space with a bar, however I’m willing to sacrifice s
So, essentially, the room is 22’x25’x11’x15 ?
What about windows and doors and other obstacles or appliances?
Rich
Bob Osborn (a Michigan native) has built a couple of fine HO layouts covering your general area, although he proto-freelanced his own railroad, the The Chicago & Mackinac. He somewhat based his layout on the Pennsy subsidiary Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad (later Michigan Northern).
In a similar fashion to your ideas, both of these layouts featured a grade from end to end. Each of the layouts was up and running well before being lost to moves.
The first layout was about 30’ X 40’ overall and used multiple tiers, the second measured about 20’ X 21’ and featured multi-deck and partial mushroom-style construction.
Bob described the design process for each layout in the Layout Design Journal #48 and #49. A short sampler of each of these issues is available for download here (scroll to the bottom of the page). The LDJ is published by the Layout Design SIG, and back issues are available.
For anyone designing a layout, an essential reference is John Armstrong’s Track Planning for Realistic Operation. For multi-deck designs, Tony Koester’s Designing & Building Multi-Deck Model Railroads is very helpful.
Best of luck with your layout.
The railroad will have to navigate up and over, or around a small set of stairs about 6 or 7 feet in on the 25 foot long wall. trains should also stay below about 6.5 feet to keep access to clear glass block windows open (this may or may not be negotiable) along with a door that leads to the rest of the basement. The railroad also has to be built so it does not interfere too much with the proposed bar, depending about location and use, the tracks may have to duck behind a refrigerator/kegarator for a short amount of time.
I had never heard of the Chicago&Mackinaw before, what time period was the railroad based in?
You wouldn’t have heard of the Chicago & Mackinac* before. It is a “prototype freelance” railroad, in other words, inspired by a real-life railroad (in this case, the Grand Rapids & Indiana Railroad/Michigan Northern), but with freelanced elements, revised routing, created paint scheme, etc.
1967 or so
Bob explained the process of imagineering the proto-freelance railroad and planning the layouts pretty completely in the articles referenced above…
- Bob took that unusual spelling from yet another prototype railroad, the Detroit & Mackinac Railroad
You might find some of the information here to be of use in researching the Pere Marquette. I plan to post an updated version of the Pere Marquette HO Modelers’ Reference Guide to the PMHS site in the next couple of weeks.
Interesting stretch of railroad to model, there. The traffic is certainly manageable for single-person operation, though you can increase the amount of traffic, if you want/need to, by simulating the seasonal fruit rush.
Kaleva has a very distinctive depot where the PM and the M&NE crossed. The last remaining M&NE locomotive (M&NE NW2 #3) is currently on display there. In fact, a good number of the depots are still standing along that line, including Alden, Irons, Charlevoix, Petoskey and Traverse City. The Suttons Bay and Northport depots are also standing on the Northport branch.
Is there a particular year that you’re considering? Between 1945 and 1955 (the last year for the Manistee River bridge), the equipment changed quite a bit. The scenery did not change much until the bridge was removed and trains were rerouted through Manistee.
For motive power, the USRA (light) Mikados were very common on that stretch, though Consolidations still held down some of the local work, and Traverse City had an 0-6-0. The E7s began appearing in mid-1947. The GE 70-ton switchers that were delivered in early 1947 spent much time in the Traverse City area before they left the roster in 1952, as did M&NE GE 44-ton switcher #1.
I have two PM-based layouts in the works. The more immediate one is a switching layout based on the PM’s “Furniture Spur” in Grand Rapids. The longer-term plan is for a layout based on a piece of the Chicago Division, starting at New Buffalo and going as far north past Benton Harbor-St. Joseph as I can fit into the basement.
Fmilhaupt I was hoping to set the layout in 1946 at the earliest, I do not wish to go much earlier because I would like to have a PM diesel switcher in the blue striped paint scheme,1946 also would allow me to model the summer resort specials that resumed post war. In reality though, I anticipate the layout progressively moving backwards in time, initially the layout will probably be set in 1952 to allow me to use the 5700 series GP7’s along with a few e-units until I fine tune a few mikados, my Proto 2000 0-8-0, and develop enough resources and skills to build a couple of appropriate Pacific’s (maybe a SP-2 and an SP-3) along with finding a close stand in for the consolidations. I just received a copy of the track maps from the C&O Historical Society, they are not perfect, but they should be a huge help. I hope to draw up a track plan somewhat soon, but I’m already fearing that my proposed railroad will be too long. -Tom
Your reasoning is similar to why I’m planning on 1953 for my New Buffalo-based layout: There’s not enough suitable steam available for what I want to do, otherwise, and decent GP7s are available. I’ve decided to build my 5700s on older Atlas/Kato models.
Aside from the 0-8-0s, Berkshires and USRA light Mikes, there’s not a lot out there that’s really a close match for the PM’s steam. The usual shortcut on the Pacifics is to use a USRA light Pacific, but it’s not a very close match. There is a class of Southern Pacific 4-6-2 that has a closer profile to one of the PM’s classes of Pacifics, but it’s an oil-burner so, if you can find one (in brass only, it turns out), it needs to be converted to a coal-burner.
In the short run, I plan to convert a BLI light Mike into one of the two “passenger Mikes”, #1016 and 1018.
The IHC 2-8-0 is actually not too bad a stand-in for one series of the PM’s Consolidations, and by replacing the rather over-size headlight, it can be made to look decently like a PM Class C from the #619-623 series.
Cabooses have gotten a lot easier, with the Atlas C&O-style one out. I’d still like to see a laser-cut HO kit for the “three-window” A200-A600-series wood cabooses (there’s one out in O scale).
If things go well, I ought to have the switcher decals back in production this fall.
Yeah, it sounds like the mileage you want to cover would be a lot for the space you have, especially if you want to run trains longer than, say, ten cars/six feet. Perhaps omitting some of the smaller towns, or cutting back to Traverse City as the north end would be an option?
I remember originally reading your list of HO PM equipment and hearing about the IHC 2-8-0’s. I’m determined to set the layout firmly in the steam era, so equipment like this will be vital to my layout, I’ll just have to figure out how to make the drivetrain better.
I look forward to seeing your switcher decals out soon. I have a GE 70 tonner locomotive looking for PM paint for quite a while now, I may have a couple of EMD switchers lying in wait too.
After looking through the track charts I received in the mail earlier this week, the millage simply is not going to fit with the 8-10 foot train length I want. I fear that if I start chopping up the division, I am going to ruin the operational value of the layout. Terminating the layout at Traverse City would be the best choice of anything, however trying to turn one of the passenger Mikes on the 65 foot Traverse City turntable I know would be absolutely impossible.
My next option before chopping up the Petoskey Division is to try Saginaw to Port Huron via Vasser. Port Huron is my home town and I have many pictures of the old PM yard, this also has the added benifit of modeling a major interchange with the Grand Trunk Western and Port Huron and Detroit Railroad. By modeling the riverfront and GTW yard on the way out of Port Huron, that adds the job of a GTW switcher. The line to Port Huron is only about 50 miles shorter than my proposed Kaleva to Bay View layout, however the stations on the route are much fewer. The main challenge will be finding a way to build the Port Huron/Toleto-Luddington side of the yard, Including Potter Street Station. I feel the Port Huron to Saginaw branch may be much better, allowing road crews to run from point to point, taking their locomotives from the Port Huron roundhouse, all the way over to Saginaw roundhouse. Port Huron branch also allows for some better equipment choices such as the orriginal diesel switchers, along with a few Mikados (I assume based on the 85 foot turntable at Port Huron
Nope, the PMHS doesn’t have any employment records. Few RR historical societies do.
There are some fun things you could do with modeling Port Huron. According to Orville Swick, the PM briefly double-headed the SW1s up the hill going north out of town on the line to Bad Axe and Port Austin. There was some street running, too, once you got past Pine Grove Park. Having the drawbridge as one end of the yard to use as part of the switching lead adds interest, as would the river ferries.
It might be an idea to start at the Port Huron end and just go as far west as you can fit in the available space. That way, you can avoid having to build any part of the large yard at Saginaw. The Port Huron yard would be much easier to model and would be a better fit for one- or two-person operation.
Hi Comrade Tom!
Congratulations on your new layout! I’ve been following this thread for a few days, and it sounds like you’re off to a great start.[Y][Y]
I took a look at some references for the PMRR, and it looks like a great choice for modeling. Of course, I’m a SPF and would never change, but the PMRR has the makings for a great model railroad.
It sounds like you may be taking the railroad aspect of model railroading a little bit too literally. You seem to be trying to find a section of the real railroad that can be modeled and become a complete railroad all by itself. Unfortunately, unless you are modeling a 15 mile long narrow gauge line in the 1880s, it just isn’t possible. All railroads require outside contact in one way or another, and trying to cut up a real railroad with realistic end points just isn’t going to do it.[:(]
The solution is simple: staging.
Since you are going to build a multiple deck railroad, I’d suggest two staging yards - one at each end of the railroad. Provided that you staging has bulletproof trackwork, the yards themselves do not need to have the easiest access. The yards could become the 3rd deck on your railroad (offset of course so that most of the railroad is two decks) with one lower than optimum height and the other higher. Trains would be railed on the layout and then run into staging before an operating session. This way you don’t have to worry about turning trains - they just go off the layout and onto another part of the PMRR system.[8-|]
You also mentioned that you were concerned about trying to fit what you wanted to model into the space available. Since a mile scales to 60 feet in HO scale, some compression and modeler’s license is required. Use Layout Design Elements to determine the basic scenes for your layout.
Choose a section of the railroad that you find most interesting and has the most operational potent
Very nice job researching the PM. I have been researching the C&O around Detroit in the late 60’s with a focus on the busy junction at Delray. It’s not easy to find information covering my area/time. My layout (still very much in the design phase) would cover Rougemere yard through Delray and into Fort Street Union Depot. Rougemere gives me a good sized yard to work in, the junction allows many trains running through, creating operational interest (not to mention modeling of several other railroads), the FSUD area provides passenger traffic not to mention ferry traffic (another opportunity for staging), freight house switching and a few local industries in Detroit itself.
You sound like you have pretty much settled on an area to model, but if you have time, check out the Detroit area (although I bet you have already investigated it in doing your extensive research of the PM).
I chose the C&O because that’s what I remember from driving around there with my dad (we live in Dearborn) and their seemingly random use of power on their trains. I actually remember the Chessie days more, but back-dated to inclued passenger traffic and a few more of their more interesting locos/paint schemes.
Hi Tom —
It appears you’ve already done an awful lot more research than most modelers do, and that’s a good thing. You’ve also been getting some really good advice, so I don’t have a lot to add. I would like to remind you of some things that have been said many times about traffic on a model railroad:
1, Staging is one of the best things you can have to enhance operational possibilities. You already get that, so I won’t belabor it.
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Interchanges with other roads are "universal industries’. They often require very little track and take up relatively little space, but they allow you to move a wide variety of car types and ladings on and off your railroad. So the towns where interchange takes place are definite keepers. They also give you an excuse for owning equipment that was used by the neighbor road (PRR H10s engines like the one coming from Paragon were used up that way).
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When deciding which stations to delete, look first at operating possibilities: Which towns had the biggest, or most typical industries in the region? If 2 small towns are more or less equal, you can keep the one that appeals to you most and drop the other. You can engage in a little sentimentality here and go for the scenes that have “charm appeal”, but don’t let sentiment get in the way when it comes to keeping or losing important customers for the railroad.
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One person posted a suggestion that you might want to make a turntable larger than the prototype turntable. That’s a tossup. I think I, personally, would retain the limitations that existed on the prototype unless there’s a compelling reason not to. Employee timetables are shot through with specific instructions for dealing with particular operating problems at certain places. Some folks see these as limiting their options; I see them as interesting challeng
Tom,
Are you doing your railroad in HO or N Scale? N scale would be great, and there are some nice N-Scale Berks out there.
You better holler louder, Comrade Tom hasn’t been in these parts since August of 2013. [swg]
Mike.