A One Industry Railroad Operation

[Mike Kieran]

I love the Kendallville Terminal Railroad because it is a one industry railroad operation. It serves a marshmallow factory for Kraft Foods on 1.1 miles of track and takes no more than a dozen cars per day. What would be your ideas for a one industry layout that takes less than a dozen cars per day.

I figured that for a marshmallow plant, the following traffic pattern would occur every day:

Inbound 3-4 corn syrup tank cars, 1-2 covered hoppers of granulated sugar, 1-2 boxcars of packaging, and even hoppers to bring in coal to supply heat for the marshmallow manufacturing (and maybe to toast them later).

Outbound - 1-2 boxcars of marshmallows

[iis612]

A recycling plant.
You would have inbound scrap metal, plastic, rubber, glass and coal.
Outbound would be paper rolls, or pulp. Metal Blanks, Plastic Blanks, etc

Matt

[nachoman]

My narrow gauge railroad only serves a copper mine and its associated company-owned town. I think that qualifies as one industry.

Inbound:
Raw materials for town and mine construction
machinery/tools
coal (for the smelter)
firewood (for the town)
people
food
chemicals

outbound:
copper and other mined metals
people
miscellaneous refuse (other smelter by-products)

Comparing to your Kraft list above, your plant may irregularly receive machinery or other raw materials related to the plant upkeep and maintenance.

[Brakie]

A one industry railroad I often considered is a mill operation..

In empty boxcars,centerbeams,bulkhead flat cars and wood chip cars.

Out lumber and wood chips..

Locomotive: A EMD SW type switcher or a Alco switcher.

I figured 7-10 cars daily.

Milage 2 miles including mill track.
-------------------------------
I also thought of back dating to 1950 and it would look like this.

In: Empty boxcars,gons and flats.

Out lumber.

Locomotive..Either a 2 truck shay or a 0-6-0T.

Mileage 2 including mill trackage.

[Tom]

One of my customers down in Jamaica is a modern railroad with GP40-2 and GP38-3 locomotives for power, but is all there for one reason: Aluminum mining. One customer. Two trains at a time, one running from the refinery north with empty ore cars to pick up 3 dozen loads of bauxite clay (12 miles out) and one train going south from the refinery with 2 dozen loads of powdered aluminum in covered hoppers with a few empty tank cars for caustic and fuel at the port, another 12 mile run.

[FCIN]

I'd personally model one of the bourbon whiskey distilleries that we used to work here in Kentucky. Large car variety and plenty of switching involved.

Inbound:
Hoppers of coal for the power house.
Covered Hoppers (and the occasional 40ft box car) of corn, rye and malt
Empties for loading out the DDG (distillers dried grain) - 50ft XM box cars for bagged product and covered hoppers for bulk product
50ft XM box cars of new barrels
Empty 50ft XM box cars for shipping out used barrels (they can only be used one time)
Empty 50ft XL box cars for shipping out case whiskey
Tank cars of grain alcohol that is cut and bottled as gin/vodka

Outbound:
Box cars/covered hoppers of DDG
Box cars of used barrels
Box cars of case whiskey

Cars must be spotted at specific locations and sometimes inbound box cars of new barrels are reloaded with the used barrels. Also some inbound covered hoppers of grain might be re-spotted for shipping out DDG. Note that cars were often spotted on both case house tracks opposite the doors and loaded by moving through the inside cars to the outside cars. Tank cars of alcohol were spotted on the outside track opposite the bottling house, and unloaded by simply connecting a hose to the tank car.

Here's a reduced size diagram of the track arrangement at the Old Grandad Distillery as it existed in 1984 that I made up for a local history buff.
   
Twice a year when the distillery was in production (making the bourbon), it would often take us 4 or 5 hours to switch this one plant. Rest of the time, it varied from day to day depending on how much whiskey was being shipped out, how many tank cars of alcohol and cars of coal they might receive.

As you can see from the track arrangement, the plan could be adapted as a complete ISL using the spur as your staging track. Even scaled down with fewer car spots, it would still have plenty of switching. Had considered something like this myself, but since I spent quite a few years switching the prototype, I just wanted something different, rather than try to duplicate the good old days.

Several others in the same area: Old Crow - Old Taylor - Schenley (Ancient Age) that varied is size and track arrangements, but all with the same thing in common - car variety and plenty of switching involved.

[MountainMan]

Technically speaking, any mining railroad qualifies as a "one-industry" layout, particularly coal mines, which bring empties in and loaded cars out, the simplest operation of all. This could also include a railroad servicing a paper mill, almost any manufacturing plant, a distillery of any kind and so forth.

If length of track is a factor, then a steel mill railroad that moves fuel and raw ore to the smelters and molten steel out to the rolling plant would be the same. Others in this category would be brick factories, tie manufacturing plants and so forth. Basic raw materials in and finished product out.

A quarry would be an even better example, bringing empties in and quarried stone out to the plant, to be trucked elsewhere as a variety of finished products.

And, of course, the tourist railroad remains the ultimate one-industry railroad - the "raw materials transport themselves to the "factory"., are hauled around for a while and then sent home on their own!!

I have always wanted to do a military railroad swerving the trenches of WWI or the German Atlantic Wall of WWII - a very specific example of a one-industry road. The best of these that I have read about was a former Russian coastal defense fortress, spread out over a relatively large area on a peninsula. The narrow gauge line that served the fort carried construction supplies, iron, steel and concrete mostly but also cannon to be installed, and also wood for the barracks, camp supplies and troops, and hauled ammo to the batteries. The only time it ever took anything away from the fortress came when the fort was decommissioned, and cannon and other items were moved to a connection with the regular Russian railroad for transport elsewhere. If the various turrets, cranes and other equipment were animated, this would be a very satisfactory one-industry layout.

[railohio]

Last I knew the Kendallville Terminal had two customers. There is a salt transload facility located on the runaround at Rush Street.

[Mike Kieran]

Last I knew the Kendallville Terminal had two customers. There is a salt transload facility located on the runaround at Rush Street.

Oh yeah, I forgot about that one. But in all honesty, the traffic going to the salt transload is minimal.

[Mike Kieran]

My narrow gauge railroad only serves a copper mine and its associated company-owned town. I think that qualifies as one industry.

Inbound:
Raw materials for town and mine construction
machinery/tools
coal (for the smelter)
firewood (for the town)
people
food
chemicals

outbound:
copper and other mined metals
people
miscellaneous refuse (other smelter by-products)

Comparing to your Kraft list above, your plant may irregularly receive machinery or other raw materials related to the plant upkeep and maintenance.

I actually have 8 cars going in and 2 cars going out, so I can receive the machinery & other stuff intermittently.

[Mike Kieran]

I'd personally model one of the bourbon whiskey distilleries that we used to work here in Kentucky. Large car variety and plenty of switching involved.

Inbound:
Hoppers of coal for the power house.
Covered Hoppers (and the occasional 40ft box car) of corn, rye and malt
Empties for loading out the DDG (distillers dried grain) - 50ft XM box cars for bagged product and covered hoppers for bulk product
50ft XM box cars of new barrels
Empty 50ft XM box cars for shipping out used barrels (they can only be used one time)
Empty 50ft XL box cars for shipping out case whiskey
Tank cars of grain alcohol that is cut and bottled as gin/vodka

Outbound:
Box cars/covered hoppers of DDG
Box cars of used barrels
Box cars of case whiskey

Cars must be spotted at specific locations and sometimes inbound box cars of new barrels are reloaded with the used barrels. Also some inbound covered hoppers of grain might be re-spotted for shipping out DDG. Note that cars were often spotted on both case house tracks opposite the doors and loaded by moving through the inside cars to the outside cars. Tank cars of alcohol were spotted on the outside track opposite the bottling house, and unloaded by simply connecting a hose to the tank car.

Here's a reduced size diagram of the track arrangement at the Old Grandad Distillery as it existed in 1984 that I made up for a local history buff.
[ATTACHMENT NOT FOUND]
Twice a year when the distillery was in production (making the bourbon), it would often take us 4 or 5 hours to switch this one plant. Rest of the time, it varied from day to day depending on how much whiskey was being shipped out, how many tank cars of alcohol and cars of coal they might receive.

As you can see from the track arrangement, the plan could be adapted as a complete ISL using the spur as your staging track. Even scaled down with fewer car spots, it would still have plenty of switching. Had considered something like this myself, but since I spent quite a few years switching the prototype, I just wanted something different, rather than try to duplicate the good old days.

Several others in the same area: Old Crow - Old Taylor - Schenley (Ancient Age) that varied is size and track arrangements, but all with the same thing in common - car variety and plenty of switching involved.

As an Irishman, you've named an industry close to my heart.

[Mr Fixit]

Re; Mountain Man's comments about a Russian Narrow Guage Millitary railroad to a fort.

Carl Arendt's website had a feature about a now disused Soviet era secret submarine base built into the cliffs and hills of one of the former Soviet States. The facility was more like a James Bond movie 'bad guy hideout' complete with blast proof doors for the subs to transit through, a canal in the mountain leading to a submarine base like what the Nazis built on the coast of Occupied France, except it was all underground and totally Top Secret.

The narrow guage railway ran through the tunnel system with blast proof doors at strategic locations, car sized turntables, and some points. There were no photos of the railway equipment, but narrow guage battery powered mining engines and a range of flat cars to handle torpedos, gondolas for munitions, flat cars with lead lined containers for nuclear materials and waste, food stores, general stores, rubbish, building materials and waste, personnel, water and sanitation requirements, and medical requirements, medical waste plus possibly sick people due to radiation sickness, machinery. Basically everything you might possibly need to run a Top Secret Submarine Base underground inside a mountain.

Remember even though service personel are cleared for service in the facility, security demands [and Soviet paranoia] meant that things had to be kept secret even there.

One other good thing about such a layout is that as long as you use logic and common sense in organising the facility, nitpickers and rivet counters cant be critical as most have never served/never will and haveno idea what would look right.

Mark

[Mike Kieran]

Mr. Fixit,
Wouldn't that make for an interesting layout?

[Mike Kieran]

LET'S UP THE ANTE!

What about a railroad customer that would handle no more than six cars per day, but be enough to justify the railroad's existence.

I was thinking of a Sewage Treatment Plant. It would receive tank cars and covered hoppers of chemicals and ship out tank cars (sewage), covered hoppers (de-watered bulk waste), hoppers (dewatered bulk for landfill), and box cars (also for municipal waste).

[Sumpter250]

This discussion brings to mind a plausible switching layout, which might not be a "one industry railroad operation", but would be a "rail operation", where only one of many industries is modeled.
In its early years, Sag Harbor Shipbuilding & Drydock Company, received most of its materials by coastal freighters. Its industrial Narrow Gauge, moved the goods from the Docks, to the shipyard complex.
The standard gauge Sagaponack Montauk RR, was built as a connecting line between the Long island RR, and the Narrow gauge, to supplement, and later replace the freighters. ( there's still an occasional freighter shipment ).
The trans shipment point, ( standard to narrow ) still exists. ( regional growth over the years precluded replacing the Narrow Gauge line, as property that could be used for Standard Gauge right of way no longer can be acquired ).
The switching layout industry, then, would be that trans shipment point. Served by the New York & Atlantic, parts and materials would come in, and transfer to Narrow Gauge. Manufactured items, and parts for the Museum operated Sagaponack Montauk & Cindys Harbor RR, would transfer to, and be delivered by the NY&A.
There's 24" X 14' of space available ( was intended to be an On30 switchback ), that could be "re-dedicated".

MP-15s on one side, Narrow Gauge Steam on the other, with a plausible reason ( the shipyard owner loves steam locomotives ) for their co-existence in the middle.

Products in -- ( bulk ) Steel, scrap iron, paint, chemicals, rope, chain, welding supplies, maritime quality lumber, etc.
Products out -- Maritime hardware, repair parts for ships / boats built by the yard, and for the museum locomotives maintained by the yard, subcontracted manufactured items, and Small Craft, manufactured, or rebuilt, etc.