Freelance 2015-3

[faraway]

I am so sorry but the urgent calls for green force me to start the transition into a contemporary layout. A very old industrial area is today a perfect weed plantation.....
I am afraid I will have to stretch freelance somewhat into fantasy creating dense still rail served old fashioned brick industry. Let's see how far I can go until you start yelling on me

9/9/2015 is day zero of my contemporary switching layout.

[Canadian Atlantic Railway]

Hahahaha I was just thinking last night a change in era couldn't be far away.

[Catt]

Reinhard,I am 70 years old and while memories of trains and industry go back to around 1955 there was a lot of green even then. I can not see the call for greenery as a call to era change.I for one think I just gave you an excuse to redo the layout again. :mrgreen:

[faraway]

Reinhard,I am 70 years old and while memories of trains and industry go back to around 1955 there was a lot of green even then. I can not see the call for greenery as a call to era change.I for one think I just gave you an excuse to redo the layout again. :mrgreen:

Yes, of course I (mis)used your last append to cover my latest change.

But seriously I was very much surprised not to find any vegetation on the photos shot around the terminal railroads in NYC older then 1940. There is a Yahoo newsgroup covering the same subject and they discussed the missing vegetation too.
There have been two important statements
a. The impression from old photos is true. There was virtually no vegetation at all.
b. The ground was made of cinder and periodically soaked with old oil.
That created an environment not very healthy for vegetation (and anything else).
They explained that vegetation/weed started to grow up after 1940.

Anyhow, I am always astound how much the overall impression changes by just swapping rail and street cars.

[Catt]

There are a lot of older industrial buildings still in daily use here in the West Michigan area.Many of them have had new modern windows and people doors added and more that a few are now apartment buildings.I seriously doubt these older buildings will be leaving the landscape anytime soon.

[Tyson Rayles]

That last picture is killer!

[faraway]

Replacing the backdrop with the most modern building available and replacing a warehouse and Horowitz Garment with low profile building make a difference too. Both buildings are not rail served. That makes it easy to replace them.
But a contemporary street without todays decoration of "no parking" signs, yellow safety paint, road marks etc. looks strange. That is a good example how important details are on a layout.




ps. I am glad I saved the valuable Downtown Deco structures.

[Twist]

Hi,

Looking good with the new old building in place. Will you add another backround flat behind that structure or leave it as is and let the sky through that hole?

It´s always good to save older structures.

Regards,Chris

[Mike Kieran]

Reinhard, why not make the buildings interchangeable/modular so that you can switch eras as you desire?

[faraway]

Chris, behind the background is the glass of a balcony door. I do not want to block the light anymore and stay with the low profile building.

Mike, I tried that but it looks not right. Street marks, traffic signs and a lot of more details are very much time dependent. A change of area requires at lest a full rework of the details. The ground cover is also effected. Concrete vs. cobblestone etc.

[Catt]

Reinhard, here in Grand Rapids,MI. where I live we still have some cobblestone streets.We also have brick streets ,in fact there is az 3 mile stretch of one street that had all the brick replaced with new about 10 years ago.Some of our older industrial areas still have the original brick streets.

One thing I have noticed over the last several years are model companies selling sheets of street brick and calling the cobblestone. I do not understand how they can confuse a rectangular brick with a round stone.

[faraway]

Reinhard, here in Grand Rapids,MI. where I live we still have some cobblestone streets.We also have brick streets ,in fact there is az 3 mile stretch of one street that had all the brick replaced with new about 10 years ago.Some of our older industrial areas still have the original brick streets.

One thing I have noticed over the last several years are model companies selling sheets of street brick and calling the cobblestone. I do not understand how they can confuse a rectangular brick with a round stone.

Catt, I do not intend to remove all cobblestone it is just the mix needs to be readjusted. The same happens with the buildings. I love to keep brick buildings but they will mix with other buildings. That is all fine and I like the artifacts of the past on a contemporary layout.
The problem is the probability to find still rail served business in brick buildings at cobblestone streets close together to fill a small layout. Business needs to be quite successful to receive and ship it's goods via rail. Less successful business usually declines and get a truck load only. But a successful business usually moved into a more modern building in an industry park long time ago. The West Bottoms in KC,MO are a very good example of that development. Still some old buildings but no more rail served industry. It becomes an shopping and entertainment district.
That is the point where I move intentionally from freelance into phantasy when I use a time past 2005 for my layout. Everything would be easy if I would like the transition area. That was a great time where old and new intermixed everywhere. I think that is one of the reason why the transition area is a favorite of many modelers.

NYNJ RR uses a leased GP38-2 in Brooklyn. A perfect prototype for me.

[faraway]

I have quite large areas paved with cobblestones. I like them also on a contemporary layout but they got covered by a layer of asphalt applied many years ago. The prototype is very friendly and the asphalt looks today like patchwork.
This is a test with plain white printer paper painted with my standard street color on the top side and white glue on the back and than applied on cobblestone.

[modelsof1900]

Looks very good - and it is very close to some of our streets here in Dresden.

[lajry]

Reinhard
Can you put a drape or curtain in front of the balcony door? Just close them whenever you are running trains. Open whenever you want to "let the light in.
As for having the "right" pavement for any given era, don't worry about it. Many US cities have a variety of pavement types.