New York Harbor Model Railroading

[CAR_FLOATER]

Good afternoon, all......In the spirit of both Stein's Minneapolis Warehouse District layout, Tetters' CP Scarborough Branch Line layout, and cnw1961's NW58th St Miami layout, I though I'd grace these pages by sharing my HO-scale Lehigh Valley Harbor Terminal Railway layout, set in 1951 on the banks of the Hudson River in Jersey City, NJ.

I'm not sure how many if any of you are familiar with the locale or the railroad in question, so I will be brief in the "backstory", unless some of you guys wanna know more (so in other words, just ask!).
The railroad (actually railroads) I am modeling are the end terminals and industrial trackage of the Lehigh Valley (LVRR) and Central Railroad of New Jersey (CNJ). Now, without even knowing the "lay of the land" or the railroads in question, you are probably thinking that I must have a giant space in order to model a terminal operation, let alone one set in the New York City area. Well, as luck would have it, I chose a yard that was very skinny (only about 500 yards wide) and only two miles long, and I am only modeling about a mile of that total length. Before I go any further, let me share one particular map of the area in question. this is a Port Series Map of the area from the 1950's, and I have tried to circle the area I am focusing on on the layout -

I appologize for the sloppy circle around the map, but I want to show you that, no, I am not tyring to fill all the track in my basement! yes, it is still a lot of track, but as you read on, you hopefully get a better idea of how I have made it all fit.

My layout is different in the regards that it consists of only yard and industrial trackage, much like the more famous Kansas City Terminal RR layout of Jim Senese, and the Argentine Terminal layout of Chuck Hitchcock. There is no "main line running" like most of us are accustomed to in the traditional sense. My layout is approx 11 feet wide and about 26 feet long. I do not have a formal track plan (I prefer to let the photos do the talking), but I do have two basic line diagrams of it to share -




As for the layout itself, I am using NCE DCC, and I use a mix of Peco and Atlas turnouts (codes 100, 75 and 83), and Atlas and Micro Engineering track (code 83). I am into operation, so things are "scripted" to run like the real thing did. The cars arrive/depart at one end of the layout via carfloats, and the other end is a 4 track, double decked fiddle yard. I plan to have a max of 13 guys to run it (as of this writing, it is 85% finished enough to begin operating sessions). Well, I have teased you long enough, let me share a few pictures!

Here is the east, or Hudson River end of the layout. Four float bridges will be placed here (there were 6 in the real world). You can see a mock up of one in the lower righthand corner -


This yard was not a classification yard, but rather a holding/marshalling yard, so I do not need to model the pre-requisite roundhouse/engine service facilities (the real RR didn't really have much of anything like that here anyway) -


I like crossing diamonds, and this railroad has a lot of them (13) - Here's a few that really did exist at one time, crammed into a very small area -

This happens to be where the CNJ industrial branch crossed the LVRR mainline, and two legs of a wye.

Now before, I sign off for a while, I'll leave you with a couple more photos. Here's a small tram track yard that I actually salvaged from a friend's layout that had to be torn down -


And here's one of the LVRR industrial Edgewater Branch -


And one of the CNJ Henderson St. branch -


Plenty more to come later!

RAH, aka Car Floater

[steinjr]

sharing my HO-scale Lehigh Valley Harbor Terminal Railway layout, set in 1951 on the banks of the Hudson River in Jersey City, NJ.

I am really looking forward to the posts in this thread - urban switching on the waterfront in the transition era - it can't get any better than that!

Smile,
Stein

[CAR_FLOATER]

Thanks, Stein.......I just finished my first post, and I see the photos are waaaaaaayyyyy B-I-G!!!

I don not have time to fix them now, so I appologize for that (in other words, deal with it! LOL!).....I will try to fix them later or tomorrow, whichever comes first.

RAH

[CAR_FLOATER]

OK, all fixed, much easier on the eyes........Enjoy guys, more to come.

RAH

[steinjr]

OK, all fixed, much easier on the eyes........Enjoy guys, more to come.

RAH

Weird - I don't see any pictures now ?

Stein

[faraway]

OK, all fixed, much easier on the eyes........Enjoy guys, more to come.

RAH

Weird - I don't see any pictures now ?

Stein

Some thing bad happened. I saw them 5 minutes ago. He has a huge room for the layout....

[shortliner]

Looking forward to this, as I'm modelling a representation of the Erie RR "Harlem Station" yard at 149th Street - ATM I am not seeing any pictures in the OP.
This is mine (a little smaller than the OPs - 46" x 33" in HO) The carfloat will attach bottom left and be off-stage and simulated using two, double-length, Peco Locolifts. BTW, the February edition of Continental Modeller (due out 21st January 2010, will have an article covering a model of the NY Fulton Terminal.

[CAR_FLOATER]

Guys - Don't know what the problem is.....I can see them fine (maybe because they are here locally on my computer?)......They are linked to/from a Yahoo group's file section (don't know if that matters or not). Is there a better suggestion to link my photos to this thread, other than joining yet ANOTHER photo-hosting group? I do NOT want to do that, can you tell?

RAH

[TCWORLD]

Ahh right. you'll be able to see them as you are probably logged in to the group. The rest of ow wont be able to.

[CAR_FLOATER]

Ahh right. you'll be able to see them as you are probably logged in to the group. The rest of ow wont be able to.

Problem is, I am not currently logged in to where they are stored on that server.........They were linked the same way yesterday when everybody could see them, so I am at a connundrum.......I'll see what I can do to fix things (in otherwords, somewhere lese I can link from that I am already a member of), but it may be a while before I do. Your patience will be rewarded.

RAH

[doctorwayne]

If you belong to photobucket, you can easily show your pictures here by copying the "img" tag line, then pasting it here. We also have a Gallery here at Big Blue, although it's intended to host photos only for this site.

Wayne

[steinjr]

Ahh right. you'll be able to see them as you are probably logged in to the group. The rest of ow wont be able to.

Problem is, I am not currently logged in to where they are stored on that server.........They were linked the same way yesterday when everybody could see them, so I am at a connundrum.......I'll see what I can do to fix things (in otherwords, somewhere lese I can link from that I am already a member of), but it may be a while before I do. Your patience will be rewarded.

RAH

Well, for whatever it is worth - I only saw the first picture yesterday (the map) - the link that ended in .jpg. The other images had links ending in something else, and I didn't see them. Today I don't see any of them.

If I do a "quote" on your message and grab the URLs and paste them into a browser URL bar, I get "Document not found" or words to that effect.

Is Yahoo filesystem intended for sharing of files, or just remote storage of files ?

Anyways - looking forward to seeing your images when you get them up somewhere where they can stay permanently and can be viewed by all.

Smile,
Stein

[CAR_FLOATER]

Thanks Stein........OK, I moved them all over to a more public server/host. Let's see if it helps.....Feel free to PM me if y'all still have problems.

RAH

[Tom]

WOW! THAT is an IMPRESSIVE layout. Please do keep us posted, I am eagerly awaiting updates, as I am sure countless others are too.

VERY nicely done so far!

[tomustang]

Very nice work! I would like too see more