I’ve got a small spot in the corner of my 4x8 layout for one more industry. Since I’m freelance modeling Pittsburgh, I would like it to be steel related, but steel mills are monstrous. Area is about 10-12" (80 scale feet) square. Does anyone know of something related to the industry that would fit in that area? Worst case scenario I will just make it look like a dirty factory and have some ore cars running around.
How about a scrap dealer? Fence in a yard, fill it with piles of junk, add a small shack office and a crane with a grabber and/or magnet. Or if the space is big enough, make it a metal recycler by adding a small electric furnace building with an overhead crane to unload gons and dump in the scrap.
Alternately, ore cars and steel mill gons get pretty heavily used. You could use a building like Walthers’ Union Crane & Shovel to model a car rebuilder. Put a traveling crane and a track full of replacement wheelsets outside for extra visual interest.
Both good suggestions Steven; I especially like the ore car repair/rebuilder idea.
It just so happens my dad sent out a group email to friends/family this morning with a link to an article about the slag pits/mountains in Pittsburgh. Both he and my mother recall driving with the family to park and watch the ladle cars dump the molten slag, especially at night when it resembled fireworks or a volcano.
I think modeling those slag sites will work for me for a few reaons: 1) this railroad is kind of a connection between generations of my family (mom’s father was a big MR guy), 2) the site in question on the layout is already lower than the track and would have to be built up to install an industry, but is perfect for dumping slag, and 3) I’m trying to make up for the lack of switches/sidings and overall railroad action with visual interest in the form of lighting. I think I can light the molten slag so it glows just like those evening viewing sessions my parents remember.
Two ideas come to mind off hand.
You could model a repair/reconditioning area for the bottle and slag cars and the special ingot and slab cars used around the mill, sort of a RIP track for the specialized equipment.
Or, a specialized rolling and slitting operation. Near my employer there is a specialty steel supplier that recieves hundreds of coils of steel a week by rail, much of the high-priced stainless is wrapped in protective material, and is further rolled, slit, sized and crated for shipment by truck or rail. Not very glamorous but it could generate traffic just the same.
I’ll take the opportunity here to plug our host’s “M-R’s Guide To Steel Mills” by Bernard Kempinski and you can see the variety of structures on the outlying fringes of the mill property.
[edit] I see Steven and I were on the same train of thought on the repair facility! I’ll pay more attention in the future [:$]
Have Fun, Ed
Ed, thanks for the response. It looks like that book gets great reviews. One person even said it was useful for those who imagined a steel mill off their layout and wanted to include some related/accessory facilities on the layout.
“When” is really important and informative when it comes to Western PA and the steel industry. For instance, the ore cars stopped running decades ago and were replaced by half filled hoppers.
NittanyLion, you are correct. I’m generally going for that 50’s-60’s period, but there’s going to be some modern stuff too. I’m not taking the time period very seriously.
A steel fabricator uses everything from structural steel to plates fabricating tanks, ducts, structural members. Whatever a customer wants or needs. That would allow rail delivery of steel and flatcar loads out.
If you don’t mind my asking…is your name taken from the town of Carnegie?
Jim
The only thing that’s tricky about the slag heaps is that they were beyond massive. I don’t know when you decamped from Pittsburgh to Tampa, but if you remember the Century III Mall…that whole thing is built on one of the slag heaps.
If one was so inclined, you could do a layout that’s nothing but the slag heaps.
Jim, I had a page filled with Pittsburgh/Pennsylvania words and it seemed that every combination was already used somewhere in the state. This actually ended up being a cool history lesson as I learned more about Carnegie and how he named the Edgar Thomson Steel Works after the owner of the PRR, as well as all the other usual suspects (Frick, Mellon, Westinghouse, Forbes, etc.). I realize Carnegie is an actual town but my choice wasn’t related to that area specifically. I chose to use Carnegie based on his accomplishments and his philosophies. And a big waterfall is going to be a centerpiece of my layout - so there it is - Carnegie Falls.
NittanyLion, Century III was built the year before I was born I think, but I lived closer to the pile at Nine Mile Run by the Squirrel Hill Tunnels. That pile was just being developed into a housing area when I left I think. You are right, I could not really do a scale version of a slag pile but I’ve seen a few other modelers do a scaled down version. Also, this will be on the corner of my layout and will extend to the edge on two sides, hopefully giving the impression that it continues on to a greater area.
I just wondered since we live in Carnegie. Of course, it was named after Andrew Carnegie and he owned Carnegie Steel, so they are all related anyway.
Interestingly, Carnegie, Pa was named in his honor even though he wasn’t from here and never had a plant here. But naming the town after him got them a library. In fact, it is the only library in the US to bear his first name.
We don’t have a waterfall here, but there is Chartiers Creek and it’s tributaries that flood from time to time. Carnegie Falls sounds much more picturesque than Carnegie. I can just picture a beautiful waterfall running down your slag heap. : )
HA! A waterfall gently cascading down a slag heap. How beautiful. To show how freelance this model is, the waterfall/rapids are inspired by the Yough around the Ohiopyle area a couple hours to the east. But in my little world, those waterfalls are right between downtown and Mount Washington!
I’m curious what else you have, industry-wise, on your layout. I’m also building a Pittsburgh layout (Lawrenceville-Bloomfield) and may be the only Pittsburgh-themed layout anywhere that doesn’t have steel or coal.
Steel manufactured at Johnstown, PA, Cambria Iron Company (1852) ended up in much of the rails of the Civil War Era, including the transcontinental railroad. Take special note of the extensive references, pictures, drawings, at the bottom of the Wikipedia article to the U.S. Library of Congress to structures that survive to this day.
Cambria Iron Company became Cambria Steel Company, and then was incorporated into Bethlehem Steel’s Johnstown Operations with 20+ miles of mills, including the Car Shop Division (now Freightcar America) of Bethgon fame.
Johnstown Area Heritage Association is putting the unique octagonal Blacksmith Shop (1864) back into its original operations. Again, refer to the Library of Congress pictures and plans.
Bethlehem Steel put many smaller (rectangular) brick buildings into needed operation(s), and; the only way you knew what was inside was the “White Sign w/Black Letters” on the outside of the building such as “Machine Parts Repair Shop.” Note the “Smith Shop” sign on the Blacksmith Shop picture in the Wikipedia article.
This “small building” direction such as a carpenter shop, pattern shop, blacksmith shop, etc. doesn’t have to take much layout space. A steel mill can be depicted behind this small brick structure in a backdrop.
Nittanylion as of now the only industry I have planned is a brewery. It might be fictional or might end being iron city. The other line is a passenger train. Also plan for a trolley in the town and an incline.
Tgindy thanks for the info. Lots of good photos in those links. I like the idea of those smaller accessory shops but I won’t be able to take advantage of a backdrop since this is a front corner of a rectangle layout.
Now you have me curious. What are you modeling in the Lawrenceville/Bloomfield area?
Jim
I’m interested too. I know the old Bellefield boiler house id there but it was converted to natural gas and no longer needs loads of coal.
Joe
TThere used to be a lot more down in those hollows. I fudged things quite a bit but basically I’m going from the Herron St overpass to the north end of the Scheneley Tunnel. Pittsburgh Brewing, which is still in busy, is shipping product to a distribution center, a fictional printing company is located just east of them, and I decided to also move a glass recycling business down there.
Some day I hope to have the space to do everything from Penn Station to Glenwood, and move the printer to Liberty Ave, pick up Bellefield, move the glass to the brownfield just west of Glenwood, and revive a few other businesses.
Just wondered because I used to work in the Lawrenceville area. At the time, Universal Cyclops had a finishing mill down near 32nd St and right across the street was where they fabricated Lectromelt electric arc furnaces. And, of course, there was always a lot of produce moving down to the strip district food wholesalers.
And, I believe at one time, the huge building on Baum Boulevard (next to the railroad tracks) served as an asembly building for Ford automobiles. But that was much earlier than the other items I mentioned.
Jim