Hockey fan, too?

You've certainly got a good team there in the Bay Area.  We'll see if this is their year.

As for your scale selection, N scale is vastly superior to what it was 25 years ago.  You can get a lot more railroad in a small space, as long as you can deal with the smaller parts which hasn't hampered me too much with my sausage fingers.  I'm assuming you've read Bernie Kempinski's column in MRH as well. 

Good luck, and keep us posted on what you're up to.

Reference article

Sharksfan,

I too have been facing some of the same dilemmas.  Though, some years back I sold all my N scale eq. , so I'm back in HO.   Here's some ideas.

Of my old HO equipment, I have some HO Atlas locos that run well, and some old blue box Athearns also.  The others are gutted and configured as dummy lead units with lights, cleaning pads, crews cab details, etc.

Rolling stock is gradually being upgraded with new trucks and couplers.  And I have been known to glue cars to the ends of sidings as "bumpers".

N scale, now, has great possibilities.  The newer equipment runs about as well as HO, detail is good, and N-trak has great standards to guide you for modular building.

Also, April 2005 Trains magazine had an article by Linda Niemann about working the Lawrence switcher in amongst the array of Bay area commutes.  It could give you some operations ideas.

Good luck, and welcome back.

Try making a small layout to see if you like the scale

I would recommend making a small layout or module, perhaps in your caltrain theme, to see if you like working in N. N is pretty cool, but there are definitely some issues working with such a small size. Putting something limited in scope together will help you get a feel for how you will like working with N.

Chris

Thanks for the input

I've seen that you all are very active on the site and I appreciate you taking the time to comment. I did read the MRH "Comm-N-tary" column. It went a long well to quelling some of the fears I had with the quality of the products. You figure my knowledge base is 20 years old or more. Back then I wasn't impressed at all with N scale products. Tjis past Sunday I went over to The Train Shop in Santa Clara and drooled my way through the store. I was really impressed with the detail of N scale now.

Even better bay area hobby shops for N

As you have time and/or are in the neighborhood, you should also have a look at Tom's Trackside Trains in Bulingame and Feather River Train Shop in San Rafael. (Yeah, it's a schlep from the South Bay. Call first to be sure of the hours before you go.) Feather River has online ordering as well.

These are smaller shops, but much more focused on N scale and can give you advice and ideas. The Train Shop is OK, but they sometimes treat N scale as the ugly stepchild. It's nice to support people who support N scale.

Chan's Trains

I was just in San Francisco at a conference, and popped down to Chans' Trains

Chan's Trains & Kits
2450 Van Ness
@union Street
San Francisco CA

I found them to be very nice and helpful, and they had a fair amount of N scale, and a decent set of published reference material if I remember correctly. As they're right in town, they may be a good place to browse for starters.