Hi
I have a question about disembarking passengers at a small town depot.
I have an “HO” train with
1 express refer.
1 REPO car
1 baggage car
1 dining car and.
3 passenger cars. The consist measures 70" The depot measures 9" Do I need to provide a walkway the length of the train? Would passengers be ask to walk to the head passenger car to disembark? The layout is only 30’ by 5’. I’m curious as to how a small depot would handle this. [%-)]
Thanks
Lee
Passengers for such a station would be asked to move to a specific door. Likely the RPO would be lined up with the platform and the folks would load/unload to the first set of doors for the lead passenger car. Railroads took this into consideration in issuing tickets, and folks destined for a specific small town were put into the coach that would have door(s) used for that stop.
Some of our problem stems from condensing things down for modeling, but I have seen this done on the IC and NYC at smaller platforms. If possible, you might want to extend a bit of a walkway (dirt or cinders, but appearing somewhat traveled) beyond the end of the formal platform, as members of the train crew would likely walk beside the train for a visual inspection while the train was stopped at the station.
Bill
Probably the cars would actually be lined up:
Engine - RPO - Reefer - Baggage - Coach - Coach - Diner - Coach
The RPO always goes close to the engines, USPS requirement.
You want the diner between the coaches so there is less movement through the cars for the passengers to reach the dining car. The local passengers would probably be seated in the first coach and long distance passengers in the two coaches next to the diner.
The platform minimally would reach from the baggage car door to the first vestibule of the first coach.
If the station was big enough to handle more mail than could be handed up on the fly, then there would have to be some sort of platform to get a baggage cart to the RPO or the train would have to make two spots.
Passangers can load at one door and walk through to the other cars- that is the reason there are walkways and diaphragms between the cars. Many small towns had a depot with a bit of a platform if they were lucky, most train stations were (and still are in many places) little more than a bus stop shelter with a short of wood stairs and a platform the size of a fork lift pallet.
Small platforms are usually a pain for the train crews. I remember the East Winona platform: all of about 3 cars long. We many times had to make double stops(and took delays) to get passengers off/on long trains like the combined Twin Zephyr/EB/NCL.
I was unaware of any postal requirement to keep the working RPO next to the engines. The NP’s NCL had a Dormitory-RPO just ahead of the 1st coach(and express/water baggage cars ahead of it). The GN had steam-line TOFC ahead of the working International mail RPO on the Winnipeg train, and the RPO’s could be either on the head end or the back end of the combined Fast Mail/Western Star. If there was a rule, it got changed in the late 60’s on the Hill Lines. My parents neighbor was an RPO clerk on that run - sometimes they would have an extra baggage/express car to hold the sorted mail.
For the most part, by the 50’s most long distance trains only made major stops. Any local passenger trains were usually short and could fit at the depots they stopped at.
Jim
For the most part, by the 50’s most long distance trains only made major stops. Any local passenger trains were usually short and could fit at the depots they stopped at.
Jim
Thanks guys.
I think I’ve backed my self into a corner. Not having enough room for a large platform area we will have to assume the Heavy mountain 4-8-2 pulling the Empire Builder doesn’t stop at this small station and mail will be handled on the fly.
I appreciate the responses.
Lee
OK, if we’re specifically talking about the heavyweight Empire Builder… I’m not sure when you say “passenger cars” if you mean coaches specifically, or if they include Pullman sleepers?? The Builder normally carried mostly sleeping cars, with a few coaches towards the front for “shorts” - local passengers just travelling on the train for part of the trip.
A “model railroad-sized” 1930’s Empire Builder might be:
Baggage-Coach-Coach-Diner-Pullman-Pullman- Observation car.
After 1929 the Observation car would normally be a Solarium car, and would be a Pullman car with sleeping sections too. If you add more cars, you’d add more Pullman cars. The real train would have 10-14 cars usually. BTW Diners were often used to separate coach passengers from first class (sleeping car) passengers.
The Builder didn’t usually carry mail, that was usually handled by another train like the Fast Mail or in steamliner days, the Western Star. Generally railroads didn’t carry mail on their top trains, as the longish stops to load and unload mail slowed down the trains times. A mail train typically would have one or more RPO to sort mail, often with a Baggage car with sacked mail on either side of it, along with sealed Baggage or express boxcars carrying mail and express that was already sorted. Often at the end of the train would be an old coach or combine for the employees to use on their breaks, and for the few passengers that might choose to ride the train rather than some other one.
The Empire Builder often ran in several sections - sometimes during WW2, six or seven separate “Empire Builders” rolled along one after another. Sometimes the Baggage and Coach cars would make up one section, with just Pullmans in another.
You might be better breaking it down to two trains - one with a Baggage car or combine, several coaches, and a diner, and another train for mail and express with a coach at the rear.
From my observations during the late 50s-late 60s.
Engine - Reefer(or several express boxcars) -RPO (if any) Baggage(some times 3 or 4 for mail/express) - Coach - Coach -Dinner(or snack car)- Coach…
The “local” passengers would be seated in the first coach.
The main thing to remember in the 50/60s the rail passenger business was fading into the sunset and once proud name trains was reduce to mail/express trains with 2-3 coachs and a snack car and in order to save more money these trains replaced the passenger locals…
Perhaps you could make a Flag Stop at the small station once in a while for a special reason?
Also, there were some small stations like Waterloo, Indiana, for example, on the New York Central in the 50s that had a stop for a major flag Ship train, the New England States for General Electric employees that worked at GE in Fort Wayne to the south. GE had another major plant on the NYC in Massachusets and perhaps others in New York state. I think this was a regular stop for the NES. Waterloo, located in northeast Indiana, had a popluaton of under 2000 I beleive and perhaps still does. And it is interesting to note that this place is a stop for Amtrak with no service to the second largest city in the state, Fort Wayne, It is also interesting as Amtrak is now going to reuse the old station again though it had been moved down the track below its original location. They had used an “Amshack” for quite a few years.
Hey Guys
Stix
Brackie
Wabash
I am absolutely fascinated by what I learn on this forum. I had an uncle that started as fireman on the Missouri Pacific during ww2 and if only I had known then, what I would be interested in now. I missed golden opportunity.
I have The heavy weight cars.
2 passenger # 969
1 passenger #959 they all appear to be coach.
1 dining car named New York
1 mail storage car #254
1 RPO #32
1 Railroad Express #239 I picked the cars up as I found them available and it might be that they would not all be on the same train. I would think the Heavy mountain steam would be appropriate for the heavy weight cars.
Keep them trains a rolling. [(-D]
Lee
MR’s “How to Build Realistic Scenery” had a section by David Popp entitled “Build a commuter station” that shows a depot similar to the size you’re talking about, only with a passenger platform the length of several passenger cars. It wouldn’t be uncommon for a small station to still have some sort of platform long enough for at least a couple of passenger cars to be able to load and unload at the same time. It could be something as simple as a paved area or even a long section of gravel.
Maybe someone remembers the issue, but MR not too long ago did something on adding a platform to a small station. As I remember, they used one or two Walthers covered platforms, but didn’t use the cover. The holes in the platform have to be opened up to attach the covered sections, so they just used the platform part. Looked nice as I recall.
You are, of course, prepared to give a citation for this USPS requirement. I, for one, am waiting with bated breath for this citation.
Of course the US Postal Service didn’t come into being until after mail was taken off the trains in the early/mid sixties. Before the Nixon administration, it was the US Post Office.
The issue with RPO’s wasn’t so much regulation as it was that passengers or railroad crewmen couldn’t walk thru them. Generally they either didn’t have working end doors, or if they did, they were locked. Only Post Office personnel were allowed in the RPO. So, if you had an RPO in the middle of a train, you would effectively cut the train in half. By putting the RPO first, passengers or crew could travel from the second car of the train all the way to the back. BTW some baggage/RPO combines had a small hatch - kinda like a doggy door - that could be used to access the RPO section while the train was in motion.
Federal regulations re RPOs did have a lot to do with the conversion from wood to steel passenger cars however. The gov’t required RPOs to have steel underframes in I think the late 19th century, then required the cars to have steel underframes, roofs and ends, and finally by about 1910 or so required RPOs to be all steel. This was done for the safety of the Post Office workers in case of a crash, and was in place long before any similar requirements for regular passenger cars. It was kinda embarassing for railroads to explain why they still used wood passenger cars when the same train had an all-steel RPO because all steel cars…it made it look like the railroads didn’t care so much about passenger safety.