NMRA RH October 2018

Model Railroad Planning in 1995, and
I’ve bought every MRP since; edited
by Tony Koester, it’s full of exactly the
same stuff that fascinated me in Modelling
Historic Railways. I was well
up for a change by the time we visited
California on a family holiday in 2000,
and within days of landing I purchased
a DCC-ready HO scale Bachmann
Spectrum 2-8-0 and some boxcar kits.
I already knew something of the
Southern Pacific Railroad from Model
Railroader, and a drive from Los
Angeles to San Francisco followed
by another down the peninsula to
Monterey alerted me afresh to the
existence of SP’s Coast Line. I loved
the whole notion of this mostly single-track
line that ran between San
Francisco and Los Angeles, with its
scenic locations and the variety of
trains that used to navigate it in the
transition era. The process of learning
about a railroad located a quarter
of the world away from where I live
is a continuing one, and it started
almost as soon as we arrived home
from our Californian holiday. In the
meantime, I quickly dismantled and
sold off my extensive British N Gauge
equipment to fund the purchase of a
decent amount of HO track, and later
a Lenz DCC system.
Look and Learn
I also joined the Western Union
division of the NMRA BR in Plymouth,
where I found a further source
of information about North American
railroading as well as a bunch
of guys who were kindred spirits.
Following a few years of us jointly
running Anson Yard, a portable 12 x
42-ft., DCC-controlled, single-location,
freelance North American layout
built in the shape of a big oval with a
rear hidden storage yard, we became
mutually more interested in “running
trains with a purpose,” and not simply
to watch them go by. We had a lot of
fun attempting to operate more prototypically
with Anson; in the meantime,
I slowly learned more about SP’s
operations along the Coast Line, and
I started to collect and modify locomotives
and rolling stock appropriate
for my favoured transition period.
In 2012-13 at the club, we began
to recognise the prototypical operating
and switching opportunities
offered by HO-modular railroading,
and several members built individual
modules to the agreed NMRA BR
Modular Standard. I later constructed
my own 24-ft. module, Quisling
CA, a fictitious and proto-freelanced
central-Californian small city served
by the SP. I carry it to the club every
month, and to the big Christow Modular
event each May. Quisling allowed
me to hone my modelling skills, and it
served as a test bed to run, film and
video my developing 1950s Coast
Line stock (search for “Quisling CA”
on YouTube).
Brian Moore
. . . to be continued
October 2018 - ROUNDHOUSE 7