ATSF LA "the patch" my version

[porthos]

There are a couple of sources of inspiration for my version of this portion of the patch in LA. The first came from stumbling across Bob Smaus' website and pictures there of the "brick canyon" in the alley between 7th Street and Industrial Street running from Alameda to Mateo. Bob talked about Keith Jordan's version of the patch and Keith kindly provided some reference materials for me to use. I wanted something as close as possible to the actual track configuration but as always space is always the deciding factor. What I really wanted to do was to be able to recreate the scene of a diminutive CF7 emerging through the narrow entrance between two brick buildings and the brick canyon feel.

Construction has not started and won't start until my job situation clears up. Taking a page from Lance Mindheim I'll be using 16" wide hollow core doors as the base resting on adjustable shelf brackets. The main section will run along one wall and the peninsula portion will really act as a large cassette and will be stored underneath the main portion when not in use. The reason this section is so wide is so that I can recreate the scene I described above. My biggest concern with this particular section is that the separation between the wall section of the layout. This transition is on a curve so alignment will be critical. I'll make the buildings on the front edge of the layout removable so if it becomes to difficult to switch the industries with the structures in place I can just take them off for that session.

The basic track configuration is pretty faithful from what I can see from pictures and insurance maps, including the curved turnout as the track emerges from between the two buildings on the cassette. The only thing I added was the pair of turnouts towards the right (north) end to provide a long run around for the track closest to the wall.

I haven't decided on car spots yet. Commonwealth Steel gets two, and the Walnut Exchange gets at least one. Not every building will be rail served. Time frame will be mid to late 70's. Motive power will be provided by two CF7s, the bulk of the freight cars will be boxcars with a few reefers added into the mix. There is at least one spot for tank cars at least according to a picture from Bob Smaus' website. I haven't really been able to tracked the location where that particular picture was taken or what might have been delivered in a tank car. Here is the current version of the plan and suggestions are welcome.

[faraway]

That looks very interesting. Did you got sufficient detailed material of the prototype to model the fronts of all the buildings after? May be you could share the source. The information available on the two web sites about the patch are great but not sufficient to model so many buildings .
As you did not start the layout yet, you might start doing the fronts of some buildings now and store them in the mean time.

[Tyson Rayles]

Reminds me of the "timesaver" but with the extension for the staging yard and scenery. Should be fun!

[Brakie]

Reminds me of the "timesaver" but with the extension for the staging yard and scenery. Should be fun!

My thoughts exactly but,its a much better design.

I really like that short runaround.

[Green_Elite_Cab]

Looks cool! Can you provide a link to Bob's Website?

[Russ Bellinis]

I was working in the area of the "patch" by 1976. I wasn't into trains at that time, but my memory seems to be that most of the industries in the area were gone by that time and in fact more of the warehouses in that area were vacant or abandoned than were active. Most freight that moved in and out of that area in the 1970's was moved by truck. When Reinhard was visiting here a couple of months ago he, Andy Jackson, and I drove around that area. So much of the track is covered or removed that it is difficult to even figure out where the rails once went, and I can't remember it being a lot different when I was working there in the 1970's. I think the area may have started into decline in the late 1950's with the advent of the interstate highway system when the trucking industry took away so much of the railroad business. At about that same time, the companies that were still in business started moving out to Ontario, Fontana, and Riverside and San Bernardino Counties where there was a lot of vacant land available to build bigger warehouses.

[porthos]

That looks very interesting. Did you got sufficient detailed material of the prototype to model the fronts of all the buildings after? May be you could share the source. The information available on the two web sites about the patch are great but not sufficient to model so many buildings .
As you did not start the layout yet, you might start doing the fronts of some buildings now and store them in the mean time.

Well, yes and no. The most significant structures are still standing and I can get pretty good looks from most sides of them using Bing maps and Google Earth. At least half a block of buildings has been replaced with a single massive structure so the only shots I have of those are from Bob Smaus' site http://www.bobsgardenpath.com/trains.html. So there is really only two pictures one in color and one in black & white for them and they pretty much the only two-story buildings lining the alley. So there is going to be a lot of guessing on the looks for some of these. Architecture style for these buildings really dates from the turn of the century. Lots of brick work and I can see enough examples of other buildings in the area that I can get something that is probably going to be pretty close. The key structures for me are the Walnut Exchange, Phillips Poultry and the two buildings that form that narrow alley all of these are still there and I have enough reference to start on that structure. In fact most of the buildings along the Alameda side are still there as are the buildings on the south side of Mill street. I need to make a trip to LA to get some pictures of my own.

So the main sources right now are:
Bob Smaus: http://www.bobsgardenpath.com/trains.html
Keith Jordan: http://web.mac.com/ckjordan/The_Patch/Patch_Home.html
Bing Maps: http://www.bing.com/maps/#JnE9LmluZHVzdH...k5NDYyODU= Then click on birds eye view
If that link doesn't work for the bing maps just go to bing or google maps and enter industrial street and mill street los angeles CA and it will take you to the right intersection

Its an interesting area to model and I wouldn't want to be the driving my car while bumping across the five sections of track that cross Mill Street.

[porthos]

I was working in the area of the "patch" by 1976. I wasn't into trains at that time, but my memory seems to be that most of the industries in the area were gone by that time and in fact more of the warehouses in that area were vacant or abandoned than were active. Most freight that moved in and out of that area in the 1970's was moved by truck. When Reinhard was visiting here a couple of months ago he, Andy Jackson, and I drove around that area. So much of the track is covered or removed that it is difficult to even figure out where the rails once went, and I can't remember it being a lot different when I was working there in the 1970's. I think the area may have started into decline in the late 1950's with the advent of the interstate highway system when the trucking industry took away so much of the railroad business. At about that same time, the companies that were still in business started moving out to Ontario, Fontana, and Riverside and San Bernardino Counties where there was a lot of vacant land available to build bigger warehouses.

I'm not really concerned with the level of actual activity in the are during the time period I picked. Its more a time that allows me to use equipment that I like in the modern area as opposed to my turn of the century steam railroad. My roster of freight cars is really what will determine the level of activity in the area. What I really want to do is get in there and model a very gritty urban scene something completely different from my mountainous Colorado based railroad.

[Russ Bellinis]

I'm not really concerned with the level of actual activity in the are during the time period I picked. Its more a time that allows me to use equipment that I like in the modern area as opposed to my turn of the century steam railroad. My roster of freight cars is really what will determine the level of activity in the area. What I really want to do is get in there and model a very gritty urban scene something completely different from my mountainous Colorado based railroad.

Cool! I see nothing wrong with "proto-lancing", I'm going to do it with my version of the LAJ. I just wanted you to know that the "patch" was pretty much gone as a rail served area by the 1970's. I'm looking forward to your progress.

[porthos]

I can always backdate to earlier period too. One of the shots I found from the LA Public library files is an aerial view from about the mid 30s with a plume of smoke from a steam engine coming up from the curved entrance between the two buildings. Even in that shot the main structures are up; Walnut Exchange, Phillips Poultry, Commonwealth Steel the two brick canyon buildings and Nabisco.

[Russ Bellinis]

I would be very surprised if most of the buildings did not predate the railroad. If it was fairly vacant land that was developed at the same time as the railroad, I doubt if it would have been so tight and congested. Also the "Patch" is only a mile or two, at most three from the original Pueblo de Los Angeles at Olivera St. off of Alameda St.

[porthos]

This is the earliest picture I have been able to find of this area. Its an aerial shot taken in 1924 and shows that there is still a lot of area available for building. The Walnut Growers building is in as is Phillips Poultry and the curved alleyway between the buildings. Commonwealth Steel and Supply does not exist yet. It actually shows some detail on the buildings that are actually missing now, the two story ones that were demolished to make way for the massive warehouse that sits there now.
Here is a link to the file in the LA Library photo collection
http://photos.lapl.org/carlweb/jsp/FullR...mber=34850

Okay that link won't work because its defined as a session.
The only real way to see it is to navigate to the picture itself. To do that go here: http://www.lapl.org/
and click on the photo collection on the left hand side. In the keywords enter this number: 00031479
Hit search and it will take you directly to the photograph

[porthos]

This last weekend I found out (through this forum actually) that my trackplan done with anyrail can be exported as a trainplayer file. I spent a couple of hours running it through its paces and I'm pretty happy with how its working. Trainplayer didn't like the peco three way switch so I had to drop that out to make it work. So I couldn't switch the "Nabisco" siding. The only thing I discovered that I might mess around with is the tracks at the far right end could stand to be a bit longer, so I'm thinking of sliding turnouts to the right a bit to get some extra room at that end of the layout.

There are some interesting spots to stash cars around the layout that are readily apparent until you actually begin switching. I started with 7 cars spotted on the layout and brought in 7 more to be spotted. All told it took about an hour to switch things around and pull out 7 empties. I'm thinking that the switching 10 in and 10 out would be about the maximum and that would be overloading the staging tracks on the cassette which can only really handle 6 and 7 cars.

So far so good!

[Dottney]

Kris,
I just found this thread and was wondering whether you built this layout.
Dave

[shortliner]

See MR's "How to build Small Model Railroads (winter 2014)" Page 34