It’s probably obvious to regular readers, but over the past few months I haven’t had any enthusiasm to do any railway modelling. (Or, to be honest, engage with any of my other hobbies.) There are several reasons for this.
One big factor is, I’m self-employed and been busy doing things for clients. At the end of the day, I’m just too tired to tackle anything that requires concentration.
But also, everything I’ve attempted of late has turned into a much bigger project than I want, with too many problems to solve and not enough perceived reward to make the effort worthwhile.
My foray into modelling the Southern Pacific in Proto:48 has been a worthwhile exercise – but mostly to identify a number of aspects of the hobby that don’t appeal to me (or aren’t as important to me as I thought), while highlighting the things I do enjoy that are more worthy of my focus.
I find I’m spending a lot of time installing tie plates and spiking rails to each tie. The effort looks good through the magnifiers I wear while building it (well, reasonably good: I’m not a great track-builder). But from normal viewing distances, my eyesight is no longer sharp enough to appreciate the details. Since I have no plans to wear an optivisor while operating, the effort seems wasted – and it is a considerable effort.
Would I miss prototypical track? Honestly, I don’t think so: I built the track for my last layout – Port Rowan in S scale – in the traditional way (no tie plates, rails spiked every 5-6 ties) and the non-prototypical shortcomings never bothered me.
Beyond track, I’ve also encountered numerous problems with regauging and/or remotoring and/or installing DCC into locomotives. Everything has become more of a project than I wanted.
It’s important to note that I’m not suggesting that Proto:48 or the SP are “bad choices”. They work very well for others in the hobby. I’m just not sure this layout project is what I should be doing with my hobby time.
At this point I’m calling the SP project “stalled” and not “abandoned” because I’m too busy to tear it out and I haven’t yet developed any plans worthy of replacing it. There’s always a chance I’ll find some enthusiasm for it once I’ve recharged. However, if the SP layout is doomed – what next?
The most likely replacement is the Niagara St. Catharines and Toronto Railway. I’ve made a good start on modelling that line with my model of the Welland Avenue car barn and storage yard. The NS&T speaks to me strongly as a railway I learned about as a teenager. And I have a large stash of S scale equipment (including models for the NS&T’s parent, the CNR), structures, details, people, vehicles, and other essentials that give me a jump-start on getting it built.
The stumbling block has been the need to pick a portion of the railway – nobody can do it all – and then condense it to fit my generous but still too small space. I’ve found the more familiar I am with a prototype, the harder this is to achieve – and I’m very familiar with the NS&T. I know many modellers who follow a specific prototype struggle with this, too.
I plan to give this more thought once my workload lightens.
Then there’s my interest in UK railways – specifically, the Great Western Railway in the Edwardian Era. This also speaks strongly to me because when I was a child, UK modelling magazines and models played a larger role than North American influences in shaping my hobby.
I know I will do something to exercise this interest. How much I commit to it will depend on whether I keep working on the SP and how much of my layout space I want to devote to the NS&T. Again, I’ll think on this once I’m not so busy with work.
I’m not looking for advice here: I need to figure it out myself. And I’ll do that – but not right now, because I have other things to write.
The Model Railway Show 