Great photo!  What building is that in the background?

Jay,

Thank for the nice comment.

The building in the background  is just the simplest mockup you get. I have set up the walls from a DPM "Laubes Linen Mill" package. The walls are actually leaning to the background (blue paint on the basement wall).

But is modeling Arizona/desert normal for Scandinavian modelers? It seems like Pelle Soeberg (sorry, no accent characters on this keyboard) told the world that something wonderful was going on up above the Baltic.  Sounds like it's been going on for several years now!

Do you communicate with Pelle at all, since your prototypes are somewhat similar?

Jeff,

I am sorry for not having answered you before.

Where is "above the Baltic"?

Finland? Or the northernmost parts of Norway? I am not  sure what Pelle meant with that. But there was a nice finnish layout in ModelRailroader last year. And there are built a showlayout down in an old ore mine in Kiruna, Sweden. Roco has put out some of the electric engines that pull the ore-trains from Kiruna to the norwegian harbor Narvik.

I am quite sure this photo shows the remains - a display - of the northernmost railroad in the world in New Aalesund. BTW www.jernbane.net is a great site exploring norwegian railroads. If you have a question, I am sure someone will answer you in english.

No, I have had no contact with Pelle. There is also an other great danish modeller of the modern Santa Fe, Carsten Lundsten. He also has some good pages on signaling.

I don't think there is a trend for Scandivian modelers to find a prototype in the desert. Santa Fe and UP is well known, but others models differnt like the Southen, B&O, CSX etc. But I still think we that focus on US-prototype is the minority as most focus on european models.

If there is a trend it is to model the railroads in the  home country, although some often have german or US models hanging around, as you could see on the layouts of two of the larger clubs, located in Stavanger and Drammen - just scroll down a bit and you find US and european equipment side by side. We have got so many good models of norwegian locos and cars the last years, so it is more feasibel modelling what you see every day or what you saw when you grew up.

The other trend is building FREMO modules and operating on the FREMO-meetings. They operate by timetable and with carcards.

In Norway most of the mainlines is electified with catenary stringed over the tracks. Although you can buy a lot of stuff for that, I find it a bit course and difficult to build more fine catenary, so I never jumped on that. But there are modellers like Jon Einar Vistad who is experts on this. He is also an expert scenery and trackbuilder.

Maybe there is Swedes and Danes here who can tell more about the modelrailroading in their country. Please ask if  you find norwegian modelling and railroading interesting

I grew up 15 miles east of Prescott.

I'll tell you right now you will not need your skies when you visit!!  Arizona is quite too warm half the yar, and far too dry the other half!  We do get snowfall here, and sometimes it's a WHOLE LOT, but those storms are one in twenty or one in fifty year storms.  If there is snowfall, it typically melts off in about 4 hours once the sun comes out!  The snow that does fall occurs once or twice in a in a weird time period- typically February to April or even May!

Flagstaff maintains snow longer, and the north side of the Grand Canyon is also a little more "snowy, but still, this state is in general too warm most of the time, even in winter, to maintain much snow.  Snow needs 32 degrees; its usually between 33 and 50 in the winter here.  Too cold to be comfortable, but too warm for snow!

The Peavine was an incredible route up until they built the Skull Valley to Paulden Prescott Bypass was built. You can still make out the old grade on Google maps, with the ariel photos.  I still very vaguely remember trains IN Prescott, but that was the early Eighties, and not much later the rails were pulled up, the crossing arms taken down, and the railroad slowly erased from the scene.  Prescott would make a lovely shelf module Prototype layout, naturally, because there are roughly five-ten industries total within 500 yards of the depot in either direction.  This includes a lumber yard, a Propane dealership, a Beer distributor, a truss yard, an ?Icehouse? warehouse now converted to a club, and in the area directly across from the depot there used to locomotive facilities.  At one time, there was even a round house and turntable - I think the turntable survived into the diesel days, but the roundhouse did not.  That area turned into the beer distributor and the truss yard.  I don;t know what industries are further east, or west, but there might be no less then three more customers in this area I'm not aware of.

Add in the Lovely Bridge [Pratt Truss, I think] over Willow creek to the west of the depot [separating the warehouse from the depot area] and you have a nice natural scenic area to break up the industrialness of the rest of the layout.  This whole layout could fit in a space of 10'x30" in HO; the first 2 feet, from the left, would contain the icehouse and any services further to the west.  the next 2 feet would contain the Pratt truss scene.  The Depot would fill the next 5 feet, and the beer/lumber/gas would fill the final 3 feet.  A little overlap and a few reversed switches would guarantee the entire thing fits in the space. 

I saw a really cool Link on the Atlas forum to a website I have forgotten but perhaps someone else rememebrs. This link is to a site that has historical maps from years ago, in digital form, and it included a couple historic maps of Prescott including some form 1924.  This website is a subscription site, andsomeone sort of gave this information out on the atlas forum; the username/password might now be defunct.  But the map file might very well be worth the price of a monthly subscription, if you got into Prototype modeling this Line.

KnuT,

I figure that from the way the Baltic curves around, anything on the other side from Germany & Poland is "above the Baltic" - pretty much all of Scandanavia, although I see from a map that Denmark is pretty much the base of the Baltic, and not on both sides like I thought.

I guess I was wondering about Europeans building to American prototype because that's most of what you see (although, as you mentioned, not all) in magazines like MR.

Are you into FREMO as well?

I think it might be interesting to have some sort of ongoing column or article series on modular railroading - between FREMO, Free-Mo, NTrak, Z-Bend, HO-Trak and who knows what else out there, it seems like there would be a decent amount of material to cover - maybe even a "module of the month" thing. 

Personally, when it comes to electrified railways, I respect those who do caternary well - but the idea of doing it myself makes me twitch.

Jeff,

sorry I have been so quiet. My son Eivind reminded me of your question.

No, I am not into FREMO, although I do find that aprroach interesting. I have to concentrate on my own layout right now.

My son attended his first meeting this autumn at the FREMO meeting in the aviation museum at Gardemoen - Oslo Airport. You can see him in the 8th and 9th picture at this webpage of norwegian master modeller and railroad historian Svein Sando.

Benny,

Thank you for your comments and insight on Prescott. Sorry I have failed to answer you before.

One of the guys in the CAMRRC posted on the ATSF-group on Yahoo copies of an article with trackplan and a trackchart of Prescott. I think they are in the files-section

I agree that Prescott could be an interesting LDE - Layout Design Element, and also could be the focal point on a layout.

But I am doing a more proto-freelanced model, not track by track; the Peavine is more the inspiration for my layout.

I hope, however, to incorporate some elements that could place the layout in the Arizona area.

Maybe Walthers Clarkdale depot can be kitbashed to something looking like the old Prescott depot.

I am still looking for plans for the Phoenix Union Station depot.

And I am really interested in names of industries and types of industries along the Peavine in the 1960s.

BTW. Your layoutplans looks intersting.

In my part of Norway the winter now sadly is more rain and ice than snow. Below freezing today, above freezing to morrow...

Knut,

Very nice work. I live in Prescott currently, and used to work for Grand Canyon Railway out of Williams, Arizona. We got a lot of snow over there, also.

Do you know about the Prescott and Eastern which left the Peavine at the Granite Dells and wound its way up into the Bradshaw Mountains southeast of Prescott? This standard gauge line had switchbacks and steep grades.

Best ,

Skip Luke

Skip Luke,

thank you for your nice comment.

Yes,  I know about the Prescott and Eastern. I have bought this books on this area:

John W. Sayre: The Santa Fe, Prescott & Phoenix Railway - The scenic line of Arizona

David F. Myric: Sante Fe to Phoenix - Railroads of Arizona,vol 5

J.R. Knoll's book: Steel Trails - Chasing Arizona Trains in the 1950s

I do have had a little contact with a few members of the CAMRRC, but I still have not been in the USA. My son is on a midwesttour right now and are going to the NMRA convention in Milwaukee. I hope to get chance to go to the SFRH&MS convention in Phoenix next year. Then there would be a chance to visit Prescott.