Just Lucky, I Guess

Sometimes, you just get lucky. Like today, when I was hanging around Ritchie, Manitoba. I was able to catch three trains at once. Two were headed west to Winnipeg, and one—with a caboose!—was on its way to Fort Frances and points east.

Normally, I'm not so fortunate. Usually, when I am out railfanning and see something worth photographing, I don't have my camera. And when I do have the camera, nothing worth photographing happens. Until today!

Misty Morning

It's a misty morning on the CP Rail Manitoba & Minnesota Subdivision. I'm in the valley down below as an eastbound train makes its way downgrade towards Fort Frances, Ont.

Actually, I have no idea why or how the photo turned out this way. It's probably the result of overhead flourescent lights. However it happened, I thought it looked pretty cool.

Now That's a Tight Radius!

Who would believe it?

They say there's a prototype for everything. But does that include curves of 18 inch radius on a layout depicting a modern railway?

The answer is yes, as you can see from the photo above. The grain elevator is located in Portland, Oregon. Unbelievable!

Actually, that's what someone would say if they saw it on your layout. But then all you'd need to do is show them this photo for proof.

Thanks to Scott Lothes for permission to post the photo. See more of Scott's photos at http://www.railpictures.net/showphotos.php?userid=36075, or on his website at http://www.scottlothes.com/.

The Peace River Paper Mill

A freight passes by on the mainline as the switcher
works the small yard at the Peace River mill.

I may not enjoy switching cars, but I have friends that do. The Peace River paper mill was built just for them—although I occasionally like operating it, too.

The mill occupies a space about eight feet long in one corner of the layout. When envisioning the CP Rail Manitoba & Minnesota Sub., which is set in the early to mid-1990s, I realized that it would require a few big industries—no small buildings that look like they could barely fill up one small truck on a good day, much less a whole boxcar. By the time period I am modelling, railways had long-ceased serving most of those small customers.


Another shot of the mill; the walls are styrene on foamcore.

The mill itself is entirely scratchbuilt. Which sounds more impressive than it really is; the building is almost entirely flat and possesses few details. (It exists more to give the impression of a large building, rather than really be a replica of one.)

The building is made of foamcore and Evergreen siding and strip styrene. (A lot of Evergreen siding and strip styrene . . . I kept my local hobby shop in business when buying styrene for the mill.)


Looking down the mill trackage from yard.

One feature of the complex is a mirror that makes the pulpwood receiving tracks look longer than they are.

The mill itself features a runaround track, five spurs and a two-track yard. It is served by it's own locomotive—an old unpainted Atlas S-2 that I bought used. I decided to leave it in "primer," and just re-number the unit.


S-2 #2 pulls a string of cars at the mill.

The left side of the mill is for receiving inbound recycled paper, pulpwood and chemicals. The right side is for shipping out finished product.

It can take about 40-45 minutes to switch out the mill—remove the outbound cars and replace with the inbound cars. It's great for keeping my operations-minded friends entertained. And I even operate it occasionally, too.


An overview of the Peace River paper mill.

Operations . . . Or Not

SW9 7400 switches a car in the Fort Frances yard.

I have a confession to make: I don’t really like operations.

I have operated on friend’s layouts. It’s OK. But moving car A from industry B to yard track C has never really intrigued or intereseted me. Juggling a stack of car cards has never been that appealing, either.

I tried to make my first layout operations-oriented. I had a card for each car (colour-coded by type), a timetable, even a John Allen-like timesaver industrial area. But it always ended up that I’d rather just run trains.

When I built the CP Rail Manitoba & Subdivision, I decided not to worry about operations. Which isn’t the same as saying the layout can’t be operated—it can. But the goal isn’t switching individual cars; rather, it’s the movement of trains across the layout.

The layout is set up to represent the coming together of two lines into one line (like a Y). One line of the two lines goes east to Thunder Bay; the other goes south to Duluth, MN. They join in Fort Frances, Ont., where a single track goes west to Winnipeg. (This is the real-life route of CN’s former Duluth, Winnipeg & Pacific line, still in operation today.)

At Fort Frances, cars from the three destinations are taken off trains and added to them. Trains are blocked so that the cars that need to be removed or added are at the rear of each consist. I use a version of Jim Heidiger’s wheel report system to keep things moving: Operators are instructed to take off or add X number of cars from each train as it enters the yard. Cars taken off of trains can be put into any yard track they want. Operators can also take off as many or as few cars if they want, too—it doesn’t matter.

I also have an interchange at Nance, MN with the Peace River Northern (PNR). Cars for the PNR are dropped off at the interchange track for the various industries in Nance and beyond. After dropping off the cars for the PNR, the local picks up the cars headed back to Fort Frances and takes them back to the yard. The next time around, those same cars are taken back to Nance and dropped off at the interchange. The cars dropped off on the previous trip are taken back to Fort Frances—and so the cycle repeats itself.

In fact, no cars ever actually gets switched at an industry, yet it seems like there is lots of action. Simple, eh?

In fact, simplicity is my goal when it comes to operations. My approach isn’t for everyone; some purists, I’m sure, would be aghast. But it works for me.