While waiting to expand the house sometime next year, I am putting the HO Layout on hold. But I want to work on something, and I have been toying with the idea of modeling an actual stretch of a NYC/PC/Conrail Branchline in North Tonawanda, NY, along Erie Avenue.
Why this specific location? Because it is where I grew up when I was a baby and toddler. As the local that served the few industries along the line (which btw still exists, but not as it was back in 1974-1977), my mom tells me I would hop onto the couch as a toddler to watch it from our window as the track was parallel to the street. If I knew how to get a screen shot on one of the satellite web sites I would show you. My home was right on the corner of Erie Avenue and Ellwood avenue. The house is on the south side of Ellwood.
Anyways, I have been toying around with the idea of modeling this branch from the opposite side of Niagara Falls Blvd (during the time I lived there, there was a single track truss bridge that crossed over a creek, now it's just a couple of massive culverts when they did a road realignment so that Shawnee Rd crosses Niagara Falls Blvd at Erie Avenue to make Rt 425 straight. Before you would have to turn right onto Niagara Falls Blvd and left at shawnee abotu 1/2 a mile down the road. It helped reduce traffic congestion. To do that they had to remove the bridge, and realign the track a bit as I recall.
The Branch used to connect a yard along River Road in North Tonawanda to Lockport NY. NYC ran trains along the entire line, as did PC. Conrail took over during the time I lived there, but according to my parents they don't remeber seeing COnrail Blue locomotives when we lived there. So i'm not sure if any repainted units showed up by the time I left there. The 1/2 the line was abandoned by the time CSX took over the line. It now ends about 1 mile from the location I want to model. There is a commercial industry of some kind that has a few box cars delivered every other day I think. There is also a fuel-oil place (Theills) that recieves a tank car that i can see. The track and switch is still there. And I thought I saw a tank care under the "shed"
Here is the problem, very few if ANY of the original industries are there, especially on this end of the branch. Further down there is still the former Durez chemical plant, and I hope to be able to take pictures of it to model the part along the branch accurately. And I plan on including the homes on the south side, including my home. I believe Theilles still has a delivery of fuel-oil (delivered by CSX). I'm going to try to find a Sandborn map that hopefully isn't that old, though for 1974-1978, i'm not sure what other kind of map/track diagram is available to tell me what specifically existed there, and was served by rail. There was some kind of pepsi facility to used to be served by rail (no longer). So how do I find information for the not so distant past, but I seriously doubt there are photos available to give me enough information to model it accurately. Not even in my own photo album are there any pictures as they are of hte house so the track is BEHIND the person who was takign the photos (mostly my mom). I wasn't old enough to tell her, hey turn around a take a bunch of pictures alont the line wil you so I can use them 40+ years later! :-D
I hope to model this in S Scale. Whether this will be an actual model railroad layout I operate on will be a possiblity, but eventually these modules will end up in the Crew Lounge area. If it is operated, I will have two staging tracks at each end to accommodate a local going each way.
So where do I start, to find information on this obscure line?
Ken L
