Traffic

Mr. Thompson touched on this and I would second it, considering both ends of a shipment as industries.

Many modelers want to run coal cars so they immediately think they need to have a coal mine.  I suggest thinking more about the consignee (receiver) than the shipper.  For every coal mine there may be hundreds, if not thousands, of customers that receive that coal, especially in eras prior to the 1960's.  Before WW2 the vast majority of industries were coal fired and many medium to larger industries had their own coal dumps.  Plus  heating was coal fired.  The public elementary school I went to in the early 1960's had a coal fired heating system into the 1960's.  So retail coal was a big thing

Same with a brewery.  For every brewery there are hundreds of beer/beverage distributors that receive reefers and boxcars. 

On the flip side, just because an industry uses a commodity, it doesn't mean that it receives it by rail.  Especially in more modern times.  A coal mine uses dynamite or other explosives, but that doesn't mean its going to receive it in boxcars.  Normally rail shipments are in the 10 to 50 or 100 ton range.  Is a coal mine really going to use 10-50 tons of explosives on a regular basis?  Are they going to want to store that much explosives on site?  Probably not.  But if you model coal mines there might be an explosives distributor who receives explosives in bulk and then sells smaller amounts to several mines in the area.

Like Mr. Thompson, I looked at the seasonality of shipments (I was fortunately able to find a monthly breakdown of commodities handled on my prototype) and rather than model an entire year, I picked the month that had the most shipments (also driven by wanting fall scenery).  On my layout its always October, 1903.

Great article

Thank you for the article the information is great. Also the Bibliography is a wealth of information. And just a side note the length was great.

           Doug

Team Tracks

Tony Thompson's colorful descriptions make modeling operations fun.  Simple details like crates on the dock are a useful part of the modeling scene, and team tracks are easy to do.  Today we won't see lumber being unloaded from a box car as seen in picture 19, but team tracks will always be used .  A big load for today's team track would be wind turbine blades.  

Recievers vs shippers

I try telling people this often.  A beverage distributor would have a variety of cars sent to it, while a brewery would have just their own. Being in the MIlwaukee (the city that made beer famous) area, beer reefers are a popular choice for modelers...

A coal dealer might get in a variety of cars from different regions, depending on what grade and type of coal is needed.

On my home table, I'm planning to have a foundry sand transload, to allow for a variety of short PS-2 covered hoppers.  Important to have shorter cars when constrained to 18 inch radius turns.