Model Railroad Lessons Learned #2: It Takes Work

Under construction: The CP Rail M & M Sub. getting
started.

If the first lesson learned is that anyone can build a model railroad, the second lesson is that it still takes work.

Compared to model railroaders of a previous generation, we have it pretty good today, what with ready-to-run locomotives and rolling stock and pre-built structures. But to make a layout you still have to actually cut the wood, screw it together, lay the track and make scenery.

Work, in other words.

I wonder if that's why so many model railroaders never actually build a layout. Sure, they want one, and many say they plan to build one—some day. But that "some day" never seems to come.


Same scene a few years later: Coming along.

I remember long days and nights cutting lumber, making L-girders, screwing benchwork together, cutting roadbed—all before laying a single piece of track and running a train. Was it fun? Not really. Was it worth it? Absolutely: The CP Rail Manitoba & Minnesota Subdivision would not be possible without it.

Yes, model railroading is a hobby, not a job. It's supposed to be fun, and it is. But like anything else worth doing, it takes time and effort to get good results.

Hard work, in other words.


Done. Total time elapsed: About 12 years.