Growing the Lehigh Susquehanna & Western ...

[P5se Camelback]

Sharing Your Living Space With a Model Railroad …
… or …
… How Much are You into the Hobby of Model Railroading?

There has been so much discussion about track planning, much of it relating to this newish trend towards Industrial Switching Layouts (which in my not-so-humble opinion is a natural off-shoot of the apparent “non-directionality” of the small switching diesel.) Do not mistake my initial statement … there is not one thing wrong with ISL’s!! Were I a younger man and just beginning to get serious about the hobby, did not have several thousand dollars invested in decidedly “different” steam locomotives and a veritable plethora of rolling stock common to the first thirty years of the last century, I’d probably be deep into modeling the Reading Company along the Philadelphia waterfront … I’ve often thought about doing just that anyway … selling off everything but the A5a 0-4-0’s and the B8 0-6-0’s, getting a couple more of each, and doing an “On the Philly Waterfront” switching layout … or maybe selling absolutely everything, acquiring a couple of exquisite brass Reading Company diesels, dressing them in the ubiquitous faded Pullman Green, with that general patina of filth and grime that was Reading motive power along the river, and building the gritty urban scenes that are Philly’s waterfront along the Delaware. But too much time has passed since I started planning the Lehigh Susquehanna & Western and I’m in too deep now to make that kind of change.

I have from time to time discussed my own layout planning efforts with a couple members of this forum. At the suggestion of one of them, I will offer my efforts to date here.

First, the “initial’ initial plan was developed for a 28’-6” x 38’-4” basement in a cute little white Cape Cod style home in Lansdale, PA. That was long ago and far away. Two 2’-6” x 6’-0” sections still exist from that aborted start at a layout, wrapped in bubble wrap and plastic sheet, and have lived like that in storage units since 1989. With any luck, I’ll be able to incorporate the hand-laid track and turnouts laid in place as I got to them into this final attempt at building a layout.

I rented this house because of the very large, wide open space in what is the “Living Room” or “Great Room,” or whatever you would like to call it. Since I live by myself, have few, if any visitors other than family (who will tell me to my face that I’ve always been “different”,) and own only a couple of pieces of furniture (divorce can leave you with little) I decided that I could easily share my living space with a model railroad.

Having measured the room and drawn it up to scale, I first identified areas that, were I unable to stand there, it would not be a great loss. Those areas have been assigned as Right-of-Way for the Lehigh Susquehanna & Western Railroad. Unfortunately, these areas are not contiguous! So armed with both a 12” and an 18” roll of Canary Tracing paper (we used to use it to do visualization overlays in the architect’s office) I started tearing off hunks of paper and doing overlay after overlay, sketching track arrangement possibilities when I was sitting at the breakfast area table after a meal, as the spirit moved.

Then I found Big Blue, got involved in the 2010 Summer Structure Challenge, the breakfast area table became a serious workbench, I rediscovered my zeal for the hobby and I’m now I’m on the verge of making the trip to the Home Depot for the necessary materials to begin construction of what will in all like likelihood be my last layout, and the first one to look like much more than an ill-fated attempt at crude basement shelving construction since I was 17 years old … (again, that’s long ago and far away!)



The first image is the overall room floor plan, with the areas designated for railroad surrounded with “heavy-up” outlines. The open area in the right center is the area that I currently use as living area. The “wall” on the right is a bank of sliding glass doors … with a nice view of a canal constantly fished by all kinds of local waterfowl. The area below that is the breakfast area. Along the upper right side of the plan is Weissport, PA, an actual small upstate PA town on the upper Lehigh River. The town will carry the name but try to capture the flavor of the area without trying to replicate the town of Weissport itself.

The 30” to 36” x 13’-6” “shelf will have a mix of business and residential along the back with a two track end-of-branch terminal having track long enough to accommodate a four car passenger train (served primarily by LS&W, with a single daily connection from “beyond the basement” by both Reading and PRR.) A three to four track freight yard will occupy the foreground, running almost the whole length of the “shelf” but also accessing a couple of businesses/industries on the east end of the town. Freight interchange (again, utilizing “beyond the basement,”) will be with the three previously mentioned roads, plus the NYO&W coming down from Scranton (modeler’s license … that never really happened, but I have an NYO&W Camelback Mogul.)

In the middle of the room is a “rounded corner” rectangle that is the Weissport Engine Servicing Facility. The terminal itself has been the subject of most of my planning efforts, as the space is relatively compact, and it must provide certain identifiable functions during the servicing of steam locomotives. The fact that the terminal is in the center of the room, will be viewable from at least three of its sides and also will be one of the first things seen by someone entering my home, its physical arrangement is of the utmost importance.



The Weissport Engine Servicing Terminal will service all motive power into Weissport regardless of owner road... After cutting off its train, the locomotive will travel to the facility over a removable, roll-away section of layout to the terminal in the center of the room … what better place to showcase a roster of some 16 Camelbacks and assorted other Wooten and Belpaire fire boxed locomotives, a turntable, roundhouse, coaling tower, sand drying, ash removal and service to all of those functions except right smack dab in the center of the room! Just for a bit of depth to the scene and some human interest, the front edge of that section will have a street and a row of tenements which back up to the terminal … should be cool for photography, shooting the congested terminal in the middle of a residential neighborhood!

Leaving Weissport, trains cross another “roll-away” that will be scenicked as the Lehigh River with a bascule bridge (… no real need for it as the water isn’t all that navigable there but …) and pass through Lehighton Junction to arrive at Lehighton, another actual place, (actually across the river from Weissport) but again, no attempt will be made to replicate that town either. In the corner, upper left on the plan is the future site of the now-infamous GERN plant of the many corrugated mock-ups. There will be one or two more small industries, including a Portland Cement plant near Lehighton Junction, plus an indication of some of Lehighton’s residential area.

At Lehighton Junction trains either continue on the West Branch to Tamaqua, or take the North Branch passing between an existing stone factory (purchased by GERN) and the new GERN structures to the west of the branch tracks to travel north to Scranton (north staging behind Lehighton, above west staging.)



[Note: Names on this drawing were early ... they do not reflect current name selections.]

For trains continuing to travel west, a few changes have been made that are not indicated here (a couple new pieces of Canary have been generated) and trackage will climb to enter the Hocklebernie Tunnel, to emerge in the whistle stop village of, what else, Hocklebernie (an actual little village along the route I “surveyed” on a USGS map … and don’t you just love these small-town upstate Pennsylvania town names?!!) Passing through Hocklebernie, track again dives into a tunnel (# 9) to emerge in Nesquehoning. Here, a couple of switching opportunities will include a coal yard, a general store, possibly another one or two very small businesses and possibly a small beer distributor … (this is upstate Pennsylvania, after all.) Trains will continue on from Nesquehoning by again cutting under the mountains through Tunnel #8 towards the connection with the main section of the Scranton-Sunbury Division (western staging under Lehighton.)

All town names are authentic and will appear in the correct order and the general geography of the locale but reality ends there and freelanced prototyping takes over. I want the flavor of the area but not dedicated slavery to actual reality.

[P5se Camelback]

So … I intend to start construction with Weissport, and once its an established “work area, begin the construction of the Engine Facility, as that, being right in the center, is to be a showplace … a conversation starter for all the non-existent visitors to my home (that is a sick joke …) Plus I want to be able to see all of my “little darlings” poking out of the roundhouse, under the coaling tower, getting their ashes hauled (sorry, bad joke) and generally lounging in the sun, awaiting their next assignment! I can’t do that without the Terminal. I think building stuff like the tenements will be fun, too, (see Earl Smallshaw’s tenements for the general Idea, but his are New England and mine will be upstate PA, slightly different architecture,)

I had originally intended to use the tried and true “L”-girder method of construction. It’s rock solid! Two sections built like than have been wrapped in bubble wrap (to protect the handlaid track – see attached image #3) for twenty years and are still “as built!” But they are heavy as well as strong and I am not the Young Turk I once was! So my concept is that since there is very little elevation change in Weissport (the station/terminal tracks are to be slightly higher than the yard as the terrain slopes towards the river (justification) and mainly because it will visually separate the two functions. The town will physically slope up towards the wall.

The plans for the two roll-away sections (a concept that I thought was so original and so genius … and then all of a sudden, E-Paw is doing the same thing … great minds really [b]do[/b/] think alike!) It's all figured out, including positive locating (notice they are both trapezoidal and will wedge in place and then be held secure with latches. Power to the roll-aways will be through plugs.

The terminal will also essentially be essentially flat … but the street in the foreground will climb away from the river, going up from left to right as viewed from the front (the aisle) so maybe that could also be the “box-frame-quarter-ply-foam construction. I’m not sure of the availability of 2” foam … they don’t do things here like anywhere else. (I had to actually seek the help of the Southeastern Division Rep for the Homosote Company to find a place where I could get the damn stuff, and it’s about 46 or so miles away, down in Naples, almost to the entrance of Alligator Alley! They usually only carry a few sheets as a “bulletin board” product but the Rep assured me that if I wanted three or four sheets, he would insure that they had it for me.

[That’s better than trying to get sheet styrene … the best I could do for a single 4x8 sheet of 0.060” was to buy a hundred sheets … “I’m sorry … that’s our policy.” The parent company (in Tampa) was no more helpful! Back up in Philly, I could buy a single sheet of any thickness from 0.010” to 0.080” any day of the week from any one of half a dozen vendors, cross the river into Jersey and find another dozen vendors more than happy to deliver across the river if you would buy that single sheet from them. Down here the attitude is that your job is to buy whatever the hell they feel like selling. You want 0.060” styrene … they’ve only got ¼” Plexiglas, and they want you to buy that! Self-important Southern asses!]

The layout in the rest of the room I’m kinda up in the air about how to construct. There is elevation change and hidden track on a couple of levels ...I might just stay with the “L”-Girder, joists and risers, as that construction will accommodate damn near anything you want to do! And I am not sure about other ways to handle the two directions of “off-layout staging. You see, I’ve had twenty years to continue the development of the LS&W concept since I last did any physical work on any of it … and that follows about 12 or 13 years of research and concept development prior to that! The initial Charter of the Lehigh Susquehanna & Western Railroad rose from the grave of the still-borne Susquehanna Valley Railway in April of 1979, with the Herald being developed the same month. The first locomotive to be purchased was a Gem Reading I10sa Consolidation; I became enamored with the fat Wooten firebox and started combing brass cases for Camelbacks. When a new one was announced, I ordered one, and when it came in, I would buy two. (I was single, making very good money, didn’t date much and, hey, I was having a good time with my hobby. When I got married, my bride liked that I wasn’t hanging out “with the boys” but usually either working on the house or just down those basement steps, “doing his model railroad thing.”

And as they say, the rest is history. With 16 or 17 camelbacks now (I’ll have to get them out and count them,) plus maybe a half dozen conventional rear-cab locomotives, lots of hoppers and bunches of “Reading flavored” stuff, I’m in too deep to change now. That’s why I took offense at being told that I should give up on “old brass steamers,” but a couple DCC-ready plastic diesels and have some fun. That’s like telling the guy that his prized MG-TC that he rebuilt from the ground up is no way to have automotive fun …that he should buy a Honda Civic, throw a turbo on it and go drag racing! I say, “Go pound sand!”

The Lehigh Susquehanna & Western has been with me, as a part of my life, for so long now, the name sounds like a prototype road to me! And in many respects ... it is ... to me, at least.

So there you have it, then. In general that’s where I am, that’s where I plan to go, and if I can stay healthy enough, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. It’ll be fun, it'll keep my mind occupied, shouldn’t tax me physically, and should keep me out of trouble.

I’ll make a concerted effort to provide better photos (I realize that these are difficult to read.)

So with all of that having been explained, until I have some “Lumber in the Living Room” to post here, I’ll “sign” off for now …

[scubadude]

Looks like a well thought out plan. I really like the free flowing peninsula vs. the usual square or rectangle protrudiing out. You had me convinced the LS&W was a prototype. Looking forward to watching this one develop. Need your inspiration, I've got benchwork done, just haven't taken the next plunge.......been underwater too much this year....

[Gary S]

WOOHOO biL!

Great plan, love the "non-linearity" of the benchwork, and as Richard says, a well-thought-out plan. And I agree, the roundhose and turntable will be a marvelous place to show off the Canelbacks!

You've created a realistic overall plan for the LS&W, and it should be enjoyable and rewarding to build it. And, I can't leave out that you also get to share it all with The Gauge! So be sure to take plenty of pictures of the build!

Now.... get down to the lumber yard and let's get crankin'!

Woohoo again!

[tetters]

Right on BiL. Looking forward to your progress on this one. Looks like a really solid idea/concept you have going on there.

I second Gary's motion to get cranking!