It is finally time to get something built in HO scale. In this entry I am going to describe the layout I am planning with a focus on the 20"x120" section I am going to start with. The larger layout will include Waldoboro on the Maine Central's Rockland branch but my first effort will be focused on the village of Winslow Mills a few miles to the northwest of Waldoboro.
Those of who have followed my efforts know I have been working on a small chainsaw layout in N scale. I plan to continue my work on that. There are things I still want to learn about finishing a scene with a large amount of water. When its done, I will take some pictures, have a drink, and tear it down.
I made a switch in direction to HO scale when I realized I wanted to do an early period model railroad set at the turn of the century. My research has lead me to an interest in the Maine Central Railroad between 1900 and the start of World War I. Over time I came to focus on the Rockland branch.
The Wikipedia shares the following mileposts:
- Milepost 0: Brunswick junction with Maine Central Lower Road and Lewiston Branch
- Milepost 8.7: Bath - Major Shipyard
- ---- Kennebec River crossed by Ferry until 1926
- Milepost 9.5: Woolwich
- Milepost 20: Wiscasset interchange with narrow-gauge Wiscasset, Waterville and Farmington Railway from 1895 to 1933
- Milepost 27.1: Newcastle
- Milepost 28.9: Damariscotta Mills
- Milepost 31.7: Nobleboro
- Milepost 38.5: Waldoboro
- Milepost 45.3: Warren - Interchange with the Georges Valley Railroad. I almost modeled this obscure shortline for my first effort but didnt want to deal with a wye at both ends.
- Milepost 52.4: Thomaston - Brick Yard in my time, huge dragon cement plant now. Served by the Rockland, Thomaston, and Camden Street Railway. Prisoners came in here for the state prison.
- Milepost 56.6: Rockland - Extensive lime works, quarries, and other industries. Railroad docks including ferry connections to Penobscot Bay. Interchange with Limerock industrial railroad. Served by the Rockland, Thomaston, and Camden Street Railway. Steam to electric interchange may have happened. Still researching.
On any given day in my time period as many as 14 trains would be scheduled. Perhaps more if you include undocumented extras or multiple sections. These trains vary from scraggly locals to the Bar Harbor Express, the top train in the MCRR Roster. As a note, I use MCRR because in my time that's what it was. You will know it as MEC until Guilford took over in the modern era.
Ok.. so we have a busy 56.6 mile branch that interchanges with three other railroads including a 2 footer. It has a car ferry on one end and a wharf on the other.The coastal route included a relentless series of bridges and painfully scenic Down East coastal townships. There is heavy industry, wharfs, derelict schooners on sand bars. It doesn't get much better then that. My first attempts at designing a railroad tried to encompass all of that. After filling my basement with three decks I realized that the entirety of the branch would have to wait. I needed to find a small part to focus on for my first effort at period modeling.
I considered just modeling Rockland, but even that proved too ambitious for my current time and budget. I lamented given up on the chance to string catenary, but I had to find some small part of the line I could model quickly and cheaply. I would prefer it didn't include an excessive amount of structures and didn't need to swallow too many cars since at this point in time I own one.
I eventually settled on the small town of Waldoboro and the village of Winslow Mills to the northwest. These were very typical of the time. Rather then numerous spurs found on modern layouts many towns in this time were served by a house track. Only the largest and busiest shippers got their own spur. Industries were either located right on the house track or carried their goods too and from freight cars parked somewhere on the track. Sidings would be included as a third track or found to either side of the location.
Winslow Mills was a small village with a surprising number of industries. The two Sanborn map snippets here are actually adjoining. You can see one house that exists on both pieces.
On the first map there is a small depot, several interesting storage buildings, a small cannery, a granite works, and a building for barrels. Lumber piles suggest the nearby lumber mill and provide another logical destination for freight cars.
The second map shows what would be the signature building in the scene, the Vannah Chute Grist Mill. On the other side of the dam is a saw mill. While it would be a remarkable scene if modeled in it's entirety, I will likely only be including the 
portion of the facility that includes the grist mill. The little wooden bridge would be fun to model too but it will likely also be a fatality of room geometry.
The steel bridge on the map is about 60 feet long. Contemporary maps show a longer 120 foot truss bridge which exists today. I am relieved that in 1912 it appears to be only a smaller plate girder bridge. Likely the shoreline eroded away over time necessitating a longer bridge.
Also note the cooper's shop. Likely the barrel storage on the first map is associated with this shop. With the lime industry so prevalent in the area it is likely they did a brisk business sending barrels to Rockland.
To the left is my adaptation of Winsow Mills designed to fit in a modest part of my basement. The black border shows the module I am planning to build first and how it will integrate into the rest of the layout. While it would be small to the point of uselessness as a siding, this is intended only as a house track. One presumes there was a siding associated with the station either before or after where trains could pass. Operationally, I will consider this to be in staging. This will explain why an east bound train pops in as soon as a west bound train hits staging.
The bottom portion of the layout heads to staging, sure to be cleverly hidden by scenery as it curves away, and the top potion will continue on to Waldoboro on the other side of the layout. A backdrop will physically divide the spaces. As you will see when I present the full plan, a helix will create a time divide between the locations and insure that we don't have any cases where the train in one town backs into the next.
Besides the usual squeeze, the biggest compromise in my plan is direction. Crossing the bridge should be heading west, not east as I have it. However, if I want to preserve the actual track geometry and not have my mainline curving unrealistically into the mill pond this seemed reasonable. A pity since flipping things would put the cannery inside the layout where it could exist as something more then a waybill entry. I may move it to the other side of the tracks anyway but I do need to keep in mind one of my druthers is minimizing build time. Lots of fancy structures won't help me so its probably best to suggest it through freight.
The absence of the coopers storage was pure oversight on my part. I plan to include the shed and the lumber piles at the bottom of the layout. Talk about a cheap industry! The sawmill on the other side of the mill pond can be suggested through sound. I am a big believer that without ambient sounds, locomotive sounds become tiresome. The sound of the sawmill will help provide ambiance, explain the wood piles, and hopefully take less time then building a dam and another mill! Other sounds to include here are water over the dam, wind in the trees, and the occasional sounds of workmen and the granite shed. Ok, I am getting off the subject..
So how does this fit into the big plan? To the right is the current design. 
This plan is adapted from Ian Rice's Siskiyou Short Line found in "Mid-sized and Manageable Track Plans". While the actual subject and track plan is completely different, the general shape of the layout is very similar. Having my staging yard behind Waldoboro and made continuous with a hidden turn back for east bound trains (Winslow Mills is West toward the Woolwich Ferry, Waldoboro is East toward Rockland) was a later addition. My computer will sit under that loop.
I wanted something that was, well, mid-sized and manageable. I wanted a plan that could fit within constraints that don't exist now but may be built in the next year or two. I especially wanted something that could be constructed with major scenes built as sections that could become part of a larger Rockland Branch layout later. I did consider Free-Mo pieces since I have joined a free-mo group but the need to center a track within a two foot wide section was too constraining. Too bad, I had designed a system where 9 foot sections on rollers could house sets of four foot modules so the whole thing could be disassembled and rolled aside when I needed to do big wood working stuff in the basement.
The Staging yard is 3" below the level of Waldoboro making it easy to hide. A step onto a step stool will make it clearly visible and easily accessible. There is some room in the design to fuss about with how things are when I go to fit the final bits in.
I need to move the helix a little to make room for the river under the bridge, but otherwise its pretty tight. I will present details of Waldoboro next time. Suffice it to say it is encrusted with interesting and probably expensive structures. Booth Brothers Granite was an unexpected surprise on the Sanborn maps. I would prefer it was on the other side of the helix since its just down the road from Winslow Mills but it just doesn't want to work that way. Its a double sided track I think, but the single end spur fits and operationally its interesting. Loads for Rockland will get taken to Winslow Mills and picked up by an East bound local. Unless, of course, I can figure a way to have poling work. I figure that cut stone will go West to market, uncut stone will go East to Rockland. I have a fantastic little map of a small cutting facility in Rockland with multiple spurs, a wharf, and a critter shed I will put up here sometime that I think would make a great destination.
I think that's enough for now. I expect to be starting in on the Winslow Mills section in fairly short order. I have wood, I have rail, and the basement is warming up. The next year should be fun! I do love N scale but I get that on several local layouts in my group. Not too many people in my area model pre-USRA.
Future installments will be my design for Waldoboro, operational plans, and of course updates on my actual construction.
Regards,
Chris
Details I omitted:
Min Radius: 24"
Turnouts: #6, curved are 36r/24r
Train length: Max about 12 cars. That length is tested with Bachman 4-4-0 on a similar helix "real world". Siding at Waldoboro should accomodate.
The corner of the layout with the helix will be hidden behind a view block, ala Craig Bisgeier's Bellinadrop. There were no significant grades on this line and its the most obnoxious outside curve.
Depending on the bridge I settle on the curve from Winslow Mills to the Helix may be a longer more gentle curve which will eliminate the only other significant visible outside curve.
The proximity of homebrew to the layout is expected to reduce productivity by 20% but increase satisfaction by 25%. A 5% profit.
