On the station track as Shelby there is about 6 inches to the wall.  The backdrop creates depth to the scene and a natural transition from the layout to the horizon.  The station is a walthers kit and there are 32 (little people) LPs from Preiser and Woodland Scenic.  You can see some VIA cars on the storage track.  They are from Rapido.

Built from a Kato SD40.  It was originaly painted for CN.  Added scratch built sunshades and snow shields as well as detail parts such as horns, winterizaton hatch, rerailer, radio antennas, ditch lights.  The decals came from S scale and G scale CDS letters for Central Vermont Box cars.

 It's been a while since I posted any pictures so I thought that I would post a couple of some recent scenery addition. These are a couple of shots of the early scenery progress in the town of Brookside.

Along with trackwork, one of the things to consider early is a choice of power from the many options out there. I'd like to hear from advocates of any system and any "cons" about DCC choices. My concerns are:

Authors edit: One of the nice things about being an admin is that I can change thread titles.... and someone made a good suggestion that I do just that. So I did.

There's another one of the "death of the hobby" discussions going on on another forum that I hang out on, and as it also discussed the dying Hobby/Train shop phenomenon and it's effect on people joining the hobby, it got me thinking a bit.

How does Model Railroading market itself? How should it be marketing itself - or how should we, as model railroaders, be marketing it?

After thinking I was oing to move I began to pack my room and take down my layout. I have since decided to stay put and have taken the opportunity to build a new layout. I will get to save my backdrop and expand it, which I am looking froward to. I have  the basic benchwork up and my next plan of attack is add some supports then hang the hardboard for the backdrop.

Here are some photos of my progress to date:

Since my last blog entry I have tweaked and tuned (and added guard rails to) the double cross-over until it seems to be happy.  I had trouble running steam through it - I think because of too tight flangeways - so I broke my rules and bought a diesel.  It's a sweet-running Atlas MP 15DC (n scale DCC).  I may convert to diesels permanently.  It is a lot more comfortable on my cross-over than the steamers and is very smooth in switching.

I am experimenting with Dick Bronsons DCC uncoupler that he describes on the website at rr-cirkits.com

Its a really good design and I will share my thoughts on it here. First off I made a video of my progress so far.

Ok, an overview is in order. I like the new design as it serves "an end point" for a single track railroad which is 30 inches wide and covers an "S" curved railroad extending to 20 feet to the other end (a port and small yard area). A diesel switch engine serves each end and  2-8-0's with a max of 6 cars or so run from end to end. There are no interchange tracks and the railroad doesn't serve as a feeder to any other road. It's just for me. . .

Ive recently gotten back into the hobby after being away from it for about 25 years. Im currently thinking of putting in a running river, but am stuck on how to go about doing this. Anyone have any ideas?