You described the line, but I'm not sure what you are modeling.

Are you going to model the line into Pittsburgh?  If so, I would think you would need at least one power plant to receive coal.  There were steel mills around Buffalo, N.Y., but I don't know if they extended into Western Pa.  There are also a lot of Chemical companies in Western N.Y. and Southern Ontario.  Again, I don't know if the Chemical companies built into Western Pa.  If you are modeling a rail line out in the country, and not modeling any part of the cities, I'm not sure what industries you would have besides coal, and perhaps some oil wells.  I'm not sure where the Pa oil wells were.

Looking for Customers out in the Country....

I plan on modeling several industries in the downtown Pittsburgh area to keep local yard crews busy.  I'm even considering modeling a part of Erie, PA, so i can have other heavy industries and big businesses to model and serve.  It's more along the mainline, especially along the Allegheny River that i'm trying to come up ideas for.  I just was hoping to add a little variety, since it will get a bit boring if the only thing the local is switiching is a Team Track and Freight House, and the occasional woodchip/pulpwood loading spur. 

Ken L.

Define your ROW and link towns

Ken,

Have you defined what towns your railroad will pass through? If so, why not cherry-pick the industries that were there. For instance, Meadville, PA was a big tool & die center in the 1950s. Many companies shipped out specialty equipment and refurbished equipment to the big steel mills in Youngstown, Pittsburgh and Cleveland. Warren and Corry had several interesting industries, as did the Oil City & Titusville areas. Greenville, PA was home to a small steel company that also built freight cars. Sharon and Mercer, PA also had steel-based industries. Note these towns are almost all north of present-day Interstate 80.

Define your route town by town and pick up the local industries. Yes, nearly all decent towns had a freight house, team track, and such, but by your time period these services were not what they used to be.

I recommend you consider one major idea in your planning as it can be a blueprint that you could pick and choose details from. Look closely at the Bessemer & Lake Erie line that connected PGH with Erie, PA and Conneaut, OH. Consider repurposing the B&LE as your freelanced P&A. You have the route, the towns, the industries, and lots of background material available in a few books. Rather than stitching together a new fabric from raw data, reuse and repurpose a prototype line to fit your desires. Sure, make a connection over to the coal fields of Somerset and on to Harrisburg. Why not? I'm sure Andrew Carnegie could have had similar thoughts when he first plotted the original railroads that became the B&LE.

Eric

Any recommendations?

I've gone through books that cover most of the actual ROW that i'm using.  From Franklin, PA to Pittsburgh I'm using the old Allegheny Valley Rwy ROW (which becomes a part of the PRR mainline that runs along the east bank of the Allegheny River) From Franklin, PA to Erie, PA,  So far, all I can find is interchanges with other railroads and pictures passing by stations and freight houses, no other businesses. Though I'm sure there are other books, I don't have the resources to buy every book on the PRR in the region.  My internet searches have failed as well because I dont' seem to be able to use the correct terms to find what I need.  Once I know what links to go to, I am all set, but it's finding those links that is a severe challenge for me.  I either come up with "no results" or so many thousands or results, with most of them irrelevant to my search! :-\

For the other parts of the P&A mainline, I "beat" the Erie RR for it's mainline from Franklin, PA to Meadville, PA (thanks for the basic infor on Meadville) - I have yet to find a book that focuses on that specific part of the Erie RR mainline for the time period i am modeling).  From that point north, i have recently began to debate what I am going to do.  I originally had the P&A have it's own new Right of Way that parrallels the B&LE and PRR running along a creek/river that I have as of yet been unable to identify but it runs almost due north from Meadville.  But I am reconsidering having the P&A investors able to acquire the Right of Way that the PRR uses from Union City PA to Dock Jct, PA. I need to do more study of that specific line.  The reason is though I am proto-freelancing, which allows me some artistic license, if I am using an existing ROW, I want to keep true as much as possible to the profile of that ROW.  In other words, if I want a helper grade, with tall viaducts crossing wide valley's, I'm hesitant to use an existing ROW that never had those features.  If I create my own ROW for a part of the P&A mainline, I can choose more "challenging" terrain for the ROW, and include those features.

For the section of mainline from the WYE to the Sommerset, PA area, i'm following, in part the north bank of the Kissimiski (sp?) River (part of the PRR Conemaugh Division).  That's only a part of it though, the other parts has to be totally fabricated to reach the South Pennsylvania RR ROW. 

So that gives a bit more background.  Thanks for the info you have provided already! 

Ken L.