My Thoughts

A LOT of modelers struggle with this.  Getting the backstory "right" is a big part of their layout vision.  I can describe how I approached designing my current layout to see if it may provide some ideas.

My layout is a fictitious subdivision of the WP.  The prototype had seven subdivisions in its final years, the last extending from Elko, NV to Salt Lake City.  There are plenty of interesting locations and modelable industries on the parts of the prototype that interest me, but cramming them into my available space in logical fashion, while still making them recognizable and/or in the correct sequence, wasn't practical.  There were other prototypes I explored for this project but ran into the same thing - the ones that interested me operationally or visually weren't going to fit without what I felt to be excessive selective compression.  I thus developed a design around scenes I liked, and operations I liked, while making it logical to a viewer or operator.

In the process, I incorporated scenes and industries that made sense for the area modeled, but weren't necessarily directly from the WP.  Viewers think they recognize these places all the time on layout tours.  The model fits together, and people think they know where they are. "I know that mountain range, so this is X," or "I've been there."  All for fictitious places that are composites of photos and other ideas.

People ask me for the layout's backstory.  I don't have one.  Where is it on the map?  I don't know.  Interchange connections are to known gateways (D&RGW and UP at Ogden, UT, and Elko, NV), but beyond that it's a mystery and I prefer to keep it that way.  Free of restrictions of trying to drop every locale onto an actual map, I can simply create a sequence of scenes that look plausible.  On- and off-stage traffic sources make sense to those familiar with the area, scenery and structures look like they belong, so there's no need to suspend much disbelief.

So my advice is this: figure out what part of your railroad that you want to build, and determine what kinds of scenes you can fit into the available space.  The rest can exist in your imagination for all anyone cares, as the final product will speak to the viewer, not the rationale behind it.  If it looks right, they'll probably think it is.

Lack of focus

I've been modeling my prototype and building my layout based on it for 14 years, and yet, last week, I got distracted for several days when I learned about the Rock Island trustee's proposed (but eventually rejected) plans for the railroad's "core" reorganization.  The line I model was a part of that core, so the idea of backdating the layout to model a downsized RI set in about 1982, casting off its GEs (which I was never a great fan of) and using the funds to buy more new GP38-2s and SD40-2s (my favorites), seemed very attractive.

In the end, though, reality set in, and the thought of hitting the reset button on my car and locomotive rosters just didn't appeal to me.  I have a prototype I'm really enjoying modeling, and that's the course on which I plan to remain.

So yes, I think most people suffer from a lack of focus at times, but once you start down a path, the reality of what it would cost you in terms of both time and resources to change course becomes a very effective deterrent.

Well, we all stray from the prototype.

The only real question is how much. 

With some rare exceptions, your track plan is your first compromise.  No way you can model more than 5-10 scale miles - and that's a large layout usually multi-decked.  And besides who wants to model a couple of scale miles of single track between towns/industries?

Second your "countryside" is about 300 feet deep or less depending on scale - much less for O scale.

So you real choice is whether to limit yourself to one railroad and try to capture the flavor of it, capture the flavor of a type of railroad (Class 1, shortline, ISL, etc.).and/or a particular era and/or a particular part of the country, or just do what appeals to you.

I know the current trend in the hobby press is towards prototype modeling in a set time and place.  But a lot of people over the years have had a lot of fun following their own star.

Enjoy

Paul

Thanks guys, a lot of good

Thanks guys, a lot of good info and examples, that I am not crazy...or at least no more so than anyone else.

Yes, Prototype modelling has been the darling of the MR press for some time. My goal has always been plausibility and flavor.

I've never been a fan of the "pure whimsy layouts" I want it to feel real. I just don't want to have to put this tree here and that mountain there and this specifc bridge in this specific location.

" Why even bother with the

" Why even bother with the place making if I'm not going to follow through?  "

      A place make sit easier to design a layout that looks plausible , it doesn't have to be a specific place or specific location in a city but it does give one a pattern to build to that usually produces a more convincing picture than a non defined place.   

Have to answer the rhetorical question...

"And besides who wants to model a couple of scale miles of single track between towns/industries?"

I DO! I would LOVE to have that long distance between towns.  This would allow the Operators time to do their jobs instead of having to OS trains every few seconds as trains proceed from each town to town!

Ken L.

I can't ever imagine doing anything but pure freelance

Everybody is different and to each their own but I don't think I'll ever understand why anyone would box themselves in by strictly modeling a prototype. Proto freelance is better but still to me it puts limits what you can do. When you do pure freelance losing focus is just not that much of an issue, at least not to me, because your focus can shift around to different things and it's up to you how much " depth of field" you want.  Please excuse the lame photography puns!! 

Michael

Focus through multiple combined lenses

Those watching my glacier speed progress on my layout must at times think I have lost interest or focus but such is not the case. I did similar to Rob, select areas on a prototype (actually 3 in my case) and combine them in the space I have available in a logical manner. As a whole it does not represent any prototype even though each LDE is in fact on a prototype somewhere. A viewer will be able to recognize each individual location in isolation but of course the whole of the railroad is not placeable.

The key for me to maintain focus and long term interest was to select LDEs that had significance in my life. Places that I have fond memories of. Places that I have an emotional attachment to. Freelancing them together opened up freedom to be creative so I was not locked into prototype fidelity. While I greatly admire the folks that have the constitution to accurately model a specific prototype, the constraint on creative freedom would be a fun killer for me. Bolting together prototype pieces into a freelance layout is the best of both worlds in my train room and the root reason why I do not suffer from lack of focus. 

Proto

Because condensing something 70 miles long into a basement and retaining the characteristics takes at least as much creativity as freelancing.

Fri, 2014-06-27 16:19 —

Those watching my glacier speed progress on my layout must at times think I have lost interest or focus but such is not the case. I did similar to Rob, select areas on a prototype (actually 3 in my case) and combine them in the space I have available in a logical manner. As a whole it does not represent any prototype even though each LDE is in fact on a prototype somewhere. A viewer will be able to recognize each individual location in isolation but of course the whole of the railroad is not placeable.

The key for me to maintain focus and long term interest was to select LDEs that had significance in my life. Places that I have fond memories of. Places that I have an emotional attachment to. Freelancing them together opened up freedom to be creative so I was not locked into prototype fidelity. While I greatly admire the folks that have the constitution to accurately model a specific prototype, the constraint on creative freedom would be a fun killer for me. Bolting together prototype pieces into a freelance layout is the best of both worlds in my train room and the root reason why I do not suffer from lack of focus. 

Alan

http://www.LKOrailroad.com

Excellent points Alan, my plan is similar and is continually being refined. The plan calls for modeling and compressing about seven to ten miles of railroad and doing representations of the industries that were actually there although not all were in operation at the same time. The layout will depict some what ifs and some fortunate events that saved the area from the rust belt. Time table and train order ops will take place in one town controlled by several towers (All the same guy) and will not need a fast clock. ops will be in real time. Events will be spaced out as far as through trains and mainline trains go so they can get past the locals.

The ops segments are in the intellectual planning stage as i want to work out the various ways trains can go from staging to the yard and then on to staging after traveling over the layout. Every one else I have heard about has been compressing time and distance for operations and I thought it would be interesting to go in the other direction and see how that works.

Rob in Texas

A Time Machine?

"I don't think I'll ever understand why anyone would box themselves in by strictly modeling a prototype."

Just a theory (OK more of a hypothesis really) but I think a good portion of prototype modellers are choosing so to create a time machine of-sorts to return to some idyllic railfanning experience. That certainly could explain Tony Koester, who switched from proto-freelancing to modelling the very thing that introduced him to liking trains from his childhood; the NKP Clover Leaf Division of the 1950's.

As for myself, I got my first train set as a kid in the 1970's, and my modelling interests seem to have been stuck in this decade ever since.

As for modern-era prototype modellers, their idyllic railfanning period is the present day. So I guess it is not so much a time machine for them, as it is to miniaturize a sunny day at their favorite railfan location.

As for the question of prototype, freelance, or whatever combination between these, I see the merit in all of these approaches. To answer which is right for you, one needs to look into their heart to discover what it is about the hobby that most fascinates you, and would hold your interest in the long run.

For what it's worth, I like these fallen-flag "what-if" scenarios and the model railways they inspire. I often wonder what the proposed Rock Island + UP merger would have looked like had the ICC granted it back in the 1960's. Or Alfred Perlman's NYC + C&O proposal.

"As for modern-era prototype

"As for modern-era prototype modelers, their idyllic railfanning period is the present day. So I guess it is not so much a time machine for them, as it is to miniaturize a sunny day at their favorite railfan location'

    It might not start out as a time machine but by the time it's done it will be :> ) When I was a kid I started out modeling what I was seeing in 1957 but by the time I moved ahead in era 1957 was 25 years old.  Now I'm still modeling about 20 years ago which is kinda interesting as I consider it "modern"  .DaveB

In the same boat

I hear you Dave.

I'm one of the very few original members left in the Sudbury Div Modellers when it first formed in 1989. The club voted to model the 1970's back then because it was a bridge to those who wished to model CP in the 50's/60's (it was the maroon/grey to action red transition era), and yet was recent enough that research was easy and everyone remembered it well. Incidentally, no one wanted to model 'present day' CP Rail as they dropped the Multimark logo years earlier, and we all agreed the dip-red paint scheme of the time was boring.

Well flash-forward to 2014, and aren't we the fossils now for modelling something from 40 years ago.

Same thing here ...

Proto

Some but certainly not all.  I model 100+ years ago.  One fellow is modeling 1870.  Many of my friends model the mid 1950's which puts the layout about the time they were born (or slightly before) certainly not at time they could remember.  Many are modeling an area in which they have never lived. If a modeler wants to model steam then they pretty much have to go before 1955.  To remember that you would probably have to be near 70 years old.  I rather doubt all the steam era modelers are in the 65-70 year old range.

I think modelers might start with an era they are familiar with and then as their interests mature and change, they pick an era that interests or challenges them

Guess I'm just weird.....

...but right now I'm more influenced by my love of The Gorre and Daphetid and John Allen than I am by any real life prototype.

For years when I was in N scale I modeled diesels because they were what was around in the 70's and 80's when I grew up from a teenager to a young adult and reliable ones in N scale were easier to come by than anything else.  Even though the Norfolk Southern runs all over where I live, I've never been interested in it and I've always found it visually and scenically boring.  For the longest time the diesels I modeled were of the Santa Fe and the Southern Pacific and the D&RGW because I found the color schemes interesting and appealing.  Most of all I loved the Kodachromes from the failed SP and SF merger. They still hold a special place in my heart and if I had to pick a prototype to model  strictly or to proto freelance, it would be something involving those lines  and that era. Most likely Tennessee Pass or Donner.

Thing is though, at some point I realized that my modeling was missing the air of romanticism that drew me to the G&D. I would try to build and emulate the scenery and atmosphere of the G&D the best I could and plop diesels and more modern looking trains in the middle of it and it just never seemed "right".  It wasn't until I started buying steam engines and  single and double sheathed wooden boxcars, first in N and now in HO, that I got the atmosphere and look I was after. These days, I try to follow some rules of the prototype and make things reasonably plausible but I rarely look to prototype photos for inspiration.  I tend to look more at the work of guys like John Allen, Jack Work, Malcolm Furlow and George Sellios or even our very own Verne Niner for inspiration more than anything else.

I haven't given up my love for the "Kodachromes" or for "Warbonnets" and "Bloody noses" though.  I often think about that if I ever get my dream layout space that I may totally switch gears and go in that direction with some type of proto freelance effort but it will be hard decision to make between that and a room filled with standard and narrow gauge steamers negotiating a myriad variety of bridges and canyons ala John Allen.  How's that for lack of focus?? Maybe I'll build two layouts!

Michael

"if I had to pick a prototype

"if I had to pick a prototype to model  strictly or to proto freelance, it would be something involving those lines  and that era. Most likely Tennessee Pass or Donner"

 another sweet place to model would be Tehachapi in that era since it was joint SP /ATSF operations. I spent many happy hours up there watching the Kodachromes, dirty SP bloody noses, and Santa Fe super fleet warbonnets grinding up the hill...DaveB

If a modeler wants to model

I'm in my late 20s, modeling narrow gauge in the American southwest circa 1907.  Though, to be fair, I fall into the "protolance" camp rather than the strictly prototype. 

In answer to the original questions in the thread, I suppose it was my inability to focus on one point that led me to the protolance side.  Initially, I wanted to model the Silverton Railroad.  That interest spread to its neighbors, the Silverton Northern and Silverton Gladstone & Northerly.  Even at that point, it didn't seem feasible to model all three in the way I wanted, but then I developed a strong interest in the D&RG's Chili Line, and any chance of combining those influences realistically in a manageable layout was gone.  Then in college I discovered the book "Utah Ghost Rails" and had my eyes opened to the vast number of narrow gauge shortlines that dotted the West around the turn of the century and have been all but forgotten since they vanished.  That made me realize that I could plausibly sneak a couple fictional railways into that pantheon and in them, combine all the influences I found appealing about a wide range of prototypes.

Well...actually, not ALL of the influences...still no plausible way to get a narrow gauge seaport scene into southern Utah, unfortunately.

"Well...actually, not ALL of

"Well...actually, not ALL of the influences...still no plausible way to get a narrow gauge seaport scene into southern Utah, unfortunately."

    Nothing's impossible, The SP narrow gauge had a lake with freighter sailing near it's south end down in the desert. 

Hypothesis = Best Guess

OK, so I'm wrong there (nothing new) just wanted to throw out my best guess. Actually after posting that I remembered the good number of people I know how are in their 20's-30's who model steam-diesel transition era, or earlier. Though the steam-era is long gone, modelling it isn't going to die off any time soon.

In that vein, I'll modify my hypothesis to "...create a time machine (ranging from yesterday to 150+ years ago) to recreate some idyllic railfanning experience, either directly experienced or indirectly through research."

Wow, sounds like the beginning of a research paper.

In that vein, I'll modify my

I think that's right on.  In fact, it might be one of the best single-sentence descriptions of the purpose of model railroading I've ever read.

Coincidence?

No narrow gauge on my present layout but I have been trying to convince myself of the plausibility of a "lake harbor"  with a car barge at the foot of the mountains on one end of it.

Michael

Railfan

Can you even say its a "... railfanning experience..."?  Railfanning is being an observer, it is a passive role.  I don't know that my (or many of my friends) layouts have a purpose of creating the experience of watching the trains roll by.  Most of the people I know are interested in a more interactive experience that is more oriented towards actually operating the trains and the experience of operating a train (in whatever degree of detail is entailed in "operation").  The farther end of "non-railfan" spectrum would be Lance Mindhiem who is trying to replicate the details of the switching down to unlocking gates and walking around.