Do you run "local" railroads?

Z

Zug

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Do you run local railroads on your layout or locos from a different area?

I started out with Santa Fe when I got back into trains 1.5 years ago, I then got a couple CP's a couple months ago, while they great looking (SD90 & SD40-2) and run well, I can see real CP at the local CP yards, SF on the other hand I have never seen in person.
 
I model a fallen flag railroad. The Western Pacific hasn't been seen here for 20 years or better. I also use a freelanced railroad for the power that WP didn't own and that I like. :D

Greg
 
I model a Rock Island regional road in 1996, but my fictional RI has the same "business" as the real IMRL and Iowa Interstate roads had in that year.
 
I'm building a fictitious narrow gauge line in the Colorado Rockies, with a connection to a standard gauge line. Of course the prototypes RGS and D&RGW are showing through!

There is some mining (Fantasium ore :D) involved, and so I am borrowing also some ideas and rolling stock items from the EBT (e.g. some metal hopper cars).

Ron
 
For a long time (years!), I tried modeling prototype roads - some of which I had never laid eyes on outside of a magazine - and in parts of the country I had never seen. It just didn't work, at least not for me.

When my current layout is finished, I will have two railroads, the Central Missouri & Southern and it's subsidiary, the Osage Valley Tie & Lumber. The CM&S is/will be based on a combination of M-K-T and Mo. Pacific practices. The OVT&L is/will be based on typical Ozarks logging and tie rafting practices. So I guess I could say mine is "local."
 
I model mostly fallen flag railroads. Don't need to keep up with the latest motivepower and changing paint scemes.
There isn't a railroad for miles in this area anymore . All the tracks are ripped up.
 
The closest answer for me is "No...", but I do run names that would have been seen "around here" - CN in south/east Ontario, in the 1920s and 30s. However, I do not go as far as to check if the locomotives I have actually carry numbers form the engines that worked here. They could have been assigned to work in Winnipeg...?!

Andrew
 
I run locos from local railroads on my layout. They just happen to be from a different era.

I grew up next the B&O, then Chessie, now CSX Philadelphia Subdivision in Delaware County, PA during the sixties and seventies. Back then the B&O owned a big part of the Reading and CNJ, and of course the C&O owed a part of the B&O and Western Maryland. As a result I would see locomotives from the B&O, C&O, Western Maryland, Reading, and CNJ. Since my model railroad connects with the Philadelphia Subdivision I run all of them or will once I get a CNJ locomotive. I also run Lehigh & New England power. I never saw any LNE power but they ran in the Lehigh Valley and northern New Jersey. When I run trains from the seventies and eighties I run Chessie locomotives. Since the PRR now Amtrak NEC was a five minute walk from my house I also run PRR. Penn Central, Amtrak, and SEPTA. At some point I hope to acquire some Conrail power.
 
My layout is based around a very specific local industry, the now-demolished Massey Ferguson plant, so I have almost entirely CN motive power. Like Andrew I don't concern myself with road numbers - if it's CN it's close enough. Rolling stock in these parts (at least nowadays) is from all over, so I have wide leeway there.

However, when I extend the layout into the surrounding "countryside" I plan to run a NYC Hudson passenger train - I think they passed through some part of Canada at some point in time - so that's justification enough for me.

Also, if I could ever think of a road name that I like for more than a day, I plan to create a fictional RR as well.

cheers
Val
 
I model British trains in Canada, so that's at least a 6-hour flight away. And at least a 55 year time jump to the era I model.
But I still have a few models of CP, CN and TTC stock that don't run very often!
And I model some fictitious stations in Britain.
 
Seeing as how I am so new to railroading, I decided if I invernt my own road, I will make fewer mistakes. I run the Canyon States RR, and borrow equipment from many other roads until we become financially solvent. :cool: I saw on another forum where people were taken to task for having the wrong shade of a color for "that road, and that model engine", or for using the wrong equipment. :rolleyes: I couldn't allow myself to bear that burden, so now no one but me judges whether my paint scheme or the equipment used is correct.:D :D :D :D

Don
 
I model Santa Fe on the modular club, which is local. My switching layout in the spare bedroom will be Los Angeles Junction. also local, and definately a "local" railroad since the entire railroad is located in an area 5 miles wide by 5 miles long.
How ever, my next railroad project will be the Arkansas & Misouri, including some modules with scenery modeled after the ptototype, if I can locate enough pictures or get the opportunity to visit the area and take my own pictures. I like th local railroads, but I like the idea of a contemporary railroad running a 100% Alco fleet.
 
Originally posted by ezdays
[I saw on another forum where people were taken to task for having the wrong shade of a color for "that road, and that model engine", or for using the wrong equipment. :rolleyes: I couldn't allow myself to bear that burden, so now no one but me judges whether my paint scheme or the equipment used is correct.:D :D :D :D

Don [/B]
Click to expand...

I ran into a couple of those nitpickers once on a layout tour. I asked them about their layouts and mentioned that I'd really enjoy seeing one such as they must have. They got sort of quiet and then admitted that neither had a layout. I freelance, although I do rely on Soo Line plans and practices quite a bit. I have also done some contest modeling. I simply enjoy seeing other folks layouts because I can appreciate what an effort goes into one that runs well and looks decent. 100% true-to-prototype has never been a big deal for me. And most of those critics, well, their hobby seems to be criticizing the work of others rather than doing any themselves! --Stu--
 
I started out in my planning with a specific railroad and era to model and abandoned the idea about 20 minutes into the beginning of construction of my layout. I grew up in a community where you just took your choice of railroads: UPRR, CNW, CGW, Milwaukee, Rock Island, Wabash, IC and CB&Q. I have mostly UPRR motive power, both steam and desiel and basically run whatever I want without much concern about era. I'm sure that makes the purists faint away, but I got back into it to have fun and I'm having a ball:D :D

Bob

Hi UP_STEVE; Certainly enjoyed my visit to your fair city a couple of months ago to attend the Rotary International Convention. The folks in Brisbane, and all of Australia were great hosts.
 
I live in Texas; what a thrill just after moving here from Canada to walk into the local hobby shop for the first time and finding those CN and CP N scale boxcars and locomotives (and what a hit the poor old cr card took that week!). Even ones with 'Winnipeg' and 'Manitoba' on them (my old stompin' grounds). Also model SP (local proto RR) in N and Z, and GN in Z scale; but have been known to mix a few odd roadnames into the consists from time to time. I'm not a proto perfectionist; I just like to see trains run for the pure pleasure of seeing trains run.
 
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