An American Short Line

This a railroad just crying out for some enterprising model railroader to emmulate in miniature: The Effingham Railroad Company in Effingham, Illinois.

Pictured above is the railroad's sole engine, and old EMD SW-1200 switcher painted in a scheme reminiscent of the long-gone Chicago Great Western Railroad.

Though the little Effingham R.R. is only 1.7 miles long, it has high class connections with two of the "Big Four" American railroads: CSX and Canadian National/Illinois Central.

But my favorite aspect of the Effingham R.R. is one of its customers: a Krispy Kreme donut factory! (YES!) In the above picture, the SW-1200 wears a banner celebrating the opening of the rail served donut factory.

Railroads and donuts, what more could one want?

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Inglenook Sidings Shunting Puzzle

Model railroads are not just for the endless running of trains, the very best train layouts incorporate the realistic operation of the railroads they mimic.

Of course it's very difficult to downsize the operations of an American Class I railroad into a small space, but the fun of operation can incorporate elements other than mainline freigt and passenger operation.

Consider, for instance, the "Inglenook Sidings" shunting layout. Originally measuring only 1 x 4 feet, it has a mere two switches! (points!) But despite it's small size, it provides a tremendous amount of operating fun.

For an explanation on how the Inglenook Sidings puzzle works, I highly recommend the the article on the Model Railways Shunting Puzzles website.

Please check out this page, which feature both "Box Street Yard" and Inglenook type layouts from Europe.

Sometimes a very small layout, with a fun operation scheme, can be far more pleasurable than a large layout with little or no operating puzzles to solve.

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Micro Layouts

For the model railroader who has no space for a massive layout featuring the New York Central mainline from Albany to Chicago, there is hope: micro layouts.

Personally, I LOVE the idea of small, simple layouts that attempt to capture the flavor of a particular time or place, rather than an attempt to recreate mainline railroading.



For those of you who are interested in finding out what can be done in a REALLY small space (four square feet or less!) I highly recommend Carl Arendt's Small Layout Scrapbook web-zine and his Micro Layout Design Gallery. An interesting article by Carl about American micro layouts can be found here.

There is a complete index for all the issues of Small Layout Scrapbook. Well worth taking the time to go through!

I'm seriously considering my own micro layout, to be about 9" wide by about 8' long...a bit bigger than most micro layouts, but offering a little more operation than usual.

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