Westbrook

[Brakie]

And a typical manifest has 10% boxcars if you're lucky.
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I guess that will depend on your location..CSX and NS handles thousands of boxcars every week.

NS
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CSX
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While your there on that link check the number of boxcar UP and BNSF handles.

I think you need to research rail served industrial parks and study today's locals..

[radivil]

When I lived in Pittsburgh, boxcars were not very common and the land was ruled over by hoppers, coil cars, and gons of every shape, size, configuration, and road name.

Now I live in Northern Virginia and I'll see whole trains of boxcars. Full of plywood, paper, and bales of scrap fiber, I suspect. If I went off just what I saw out my office window, it would be "what the hell's an autorack? Never seen one of those before."

[Brakie]

Now I live in Northern Virginia and I'll see whole trains of boxcars. Full of plywood, paper, and bales of scrap fiber, I suspect.
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My favorite NS train was P39..It haul auto parts in 60' boxcars bound to and from the now closed GM plant in Ontario (Oh).The normal power was 2 GP38-2s.P39 terminated in Bellevue and dropped and picked up cars and returned to the Harding yard(ex Erie/E-L) that is located by the GM plant.It too is closed and used for storage.

Railroads still hauls a lot of general freight in 50,53' and 60' boxcars.

The NS and CSX explains what is haul in various types of freight cars-look under customers-equipment . Its well worth the few minutes and one will fully understand that the reported death of the boxcar is indeed exaggerated and will learn what can be hauled in various car types.

[alcanman]

Check out the first 2 minutes of this video of thi Pan Am freight in Maine, after a few grain cars there's an endless procession of boxcars!

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I'm certainly not trying to produce a 'unique' layout, simply trying to present a layout which, when completed looks like it could be set in New England.

OK. It could be located in many other states in the US, but with Pan Am/Guilford stock it is New England for me.

With only 9ft x 15ins to work, it's difficult to fit in real prototype industries so I've settled for a Warehouse which distributes paper products and a grain unloading transload facility where the grain is forwarded by truck to a feed mill.

Mal

[Brakie]

Mal,I like those dark blue Pam Am/BM boxcars..

I think the problem is the majority doesn't understand how realistic a ISL is and how like real railroaders you only see the backside of the industry..

All of those industrial parks I named looks the same and they are located in various states-except Slate Creek of course which is a freelance name I made up based on a study of industrial parks on Google and Bing maps which included both rail and nonrail industrial parks..State Creek could be located in anywhere, USA.

The idea of Slate Creek Rail comes from a study of Progressive Rail that serves several industrial parks.

[alcanman]

Thought I'd add a little bit more info regarding Westbrook. Although I took the name from an actual location in Maine, the layout is intended to be freelance.

Westbrook (the layout) is intended to be the terminus of an old branch line, hence the siding and run-around facility for locos. Not shown on my plan will be an old weed covered station platform, now used infrequently as a team track, and a small yard office on the site of the former depot building.

Small branch lines proliferated back in the day, with many being closed by Guilford.

Mal

[jwb]

Brakie, I went to the site that you say supports your view: the NS stats say it moved about 175,000 total cars in the latest week. It moved about 15,000 boxcars. My calculator puts boxcars at less than 9% of the total. I said earlier that you would be lucky to find 10% boxcars in a train. As far as I can see, the stats you point me to prove me correct.

In addition, as a couple of people have pointed out, the number of boxcars in a train varies by region and industries served. So some trains serving the auto industry will be boxcar heavy, while others will as a result wind up with fewer, resulting in trains like the one I observed in another post with more like 5% boxcars. I'm not sure how I'm inaccurate in anything I'm saying here.

You say I should research industrial parks. The city of Vernon, CA, is basically one big industrial park, and it bears out what I'm saying. (I go there frequently and take pictures. It's also worth pointing out that it's nearly the last of many such places in my area -- El Segundo, Wingfoot, The Patch, Downtown, etc, are all gone.) Here is a photo I added in another thread showing part of this area:

   

The tracks along the lower edge here are the alley arrangement I posted in the photo at the bottom of the last page. To repeat, they are empty, and many of the buildings are for rent or sale. Note the massive empty parking lot. There is one industry left in all this trackage, a grain distributor at lower right that receives covered hoppers. I challenge you to find a single boxcar in this whole alley-type area. "Back in the day" they drove Ford Galaxies that got 12 mpg on 25-cent a gallon gas. Things change. Guilford's GP40s came in the 1990s.

Alcanman refers to a video of a train serving a paper mill in Maine, but this bears out what I say as well. The mills are served by heavy bulk operations, not two-car locals. Yes, they ship paper in boxcars. However, this paper does not go to onesie-twosie warehouses -- the same boxcars are running in quantity through places like Virginia. They are not being dropped off by locals in fictitious New England "industrial parks". I repeat, the Guilford main line runs through rural areas almost exclusively and bypasses Boston entirely. Guilford has only a few locals in Massachusetts, and if you find them on Youtube, they do not serve generic warehouses.

People are entitled to build their own layouts, and I suppose if you live thousands of miles away and want to say America is the way you want to see it, you're entitled to do that, too. But again, don't claim you're modeling the prototype.

[jwb]

There's another issue with the use of the Walthers aggregate transfer facility as what Alcanman calls a "grain unloading transload facility where the grain is forwarded by truck to a feed mill." The Walthers rail to road aggregate transfer facility described at <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/933-4036">http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/933-4036</a><!-- m --> is not for grain. Aggregates include crushed rock, sand, or recycled materials that are heavier and dirtier than grain. You would not mix sand or crushed rock with feed grain, and you would not load grain from an aggregate transfer facility, which the Walthers facility clearly is. Also, you wouldn't use covered hoppers used in grain service for sand or crushed rock.

It seems to me that if Brakie thinks I should do research, he should urge Alcanman to do research as well. If you find some products you like, such as a Guilford GP40 and a Walthers aggregate transfer, that's fine, but again, you're in great shape to claim "it's my layout", but not to say "I'm modeling Guilford".

[radivil]

Actually, I do see the locals dropping off ones and twos of boxcars at two local places. We, until the land got too expensive and they sold last year, even had NS running shuttles of one to three boxcars from a pier where barges brought paper to a warehouse and then shuttled it in boxcars five or six miles to the Washington Post plant. Now they're going all rail from Georgia.

[jwb]

But as I pointed out, this is Virginia and the Washington Post, not rural Massachusetts or wherever. Again, Alcanman says he's modeling Guilford and its grain-and-aggregate transfer operation.

[jrossouw79]

Hey Mal!

Love the high hood GP40 and by the way I will always enjoy your work no matter what its called or where its located.

Cheers from a hot and sunny South Africa!
Jacques

[alcanman]

Hey Mal!

Love the high hood GP40 and by the way I will always enjoy your work no matter what its called or where its located.

Cheers from a hot and sunny South Africa!
Jacques

Thanks Jacques, glad someone likes the layout

Mal

[Brakie]

But again, don't claim you're modeling the prototype.
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Trouble is that is a prototypical layout..A ISL is indeed more prototypical then the majority of loop layouts since it serves industries in a city or town.

Of course maybe a ISL doesn't fit your idea of a prototypical layout?

Mal never stated where Westbrook is in the New England States but,it looks the industrial parks and urban industrial branch lines I looked over with Google and Bing maps.

You do need to study more on today's railroads and especially what they haul in boxcars.

[jwb]

OK, I'm not going to disagree that an ISL is prototypical. Lance Mindheim can point to an actual industrial spur in downtown Miami, and he shows that he's modeling it prototypically. However, not all railroads are good prototypes for ISLs. The Rio Grande narrow gauge is not a good prototype for an ISL. Neither is the NYO&W. Neither is its 21st century equivalent, Guilford. Westbrook, ME is largely a bedroom suburb that has a paper mill, but not an ISL style arrangement. I would actually challenge you or Alcanman to show me an "industrial park", defined as an area zoned for multiple industries, with active rail service, anywhere on Guilford.

You keep asking me to do research, but I seem to be the one who posts photos and links. Why not show us your own models, Brakie? How about photos of actual industrial parks you've taken lately? Seems to be a lot of talk but not much else.

[faraway]

.... glad someone likes the layout

Add me to that list too

I share your pain. It is very tough to find a contemporary prototypical spot with multiple rail served small industries extreme close together. The reason why I do not rebuild my ISL inclusive a new track plan is the lack of a prototype that fits my requirements. I do "reverse design" in the meantime by a track plan that meets my operational requirements and the scenery becomes second. That is far from perfection but my "best can do" to stay in the hobby.

ps. That is the reason why I call it "freelance" and the scenery "inspired by".