how did you pick a rail line


budinoh said:
I am curious how you picked the line you chose. ... I know that may have to be my first decision here and I am curious how others made theirs.
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If you figure it out let me know. I've yet to be able to choose.

1. Santa Fe because it was next to my grandparents farm - ooops the streamlined passenger cars are all boring stainless steel.
2. CB&Q because they were the first to dieselize - ooops same issue as Santa Fe stainless steel ...
3. Great Northern because of the big sky blue paint scheme - ooops it was only around for a couple years.
4. Older Great Northern - James Hill was a real hero in RR history. ooops GN steam locos are screwy with their Belpair fire box, the GN only had two Challenger class locos, the GN had zero Alco PAs.....
5. Northern Pacific - cool Lowey two town green passenger scheme - ooops same issue on the lack of Alco PAs as the GN.
6. Missouri Pacific - walked past their head quarters every morning on my way to work. Had some really cool looking Alco rebuilds running all over the branches in Kansas.
7. Minneapolis & St. Louis - interesting smaller class 1 RR that not many people model. Cool paint scheme of the week diesels.
8. Rock Island - love the black winged paint scheme on early diesels.
9. Denver Rio Grande & Western - can't be a Colorado person and not want to model the Grande.
10. Louisville & Wadley - great 10 mile short line that one could model. Petticoat Junction style.
11. Belfast & Moose Lake - another short line with a rich history.
12. Norfolk & Western - the last steam railroad in the U.S. Way cool Abingdon branch.
13. Milwaukee - Electrified branch, Hiawatha's
14. NYC - BIG Eastern Mainline railroading.
15. Hoboken Shore Railroad - Another short line railroad that one could really model in a relatively small space.
16. ...
Need I continue ... 30 years later - 100 railroads later ..... how does one choose?

I can say the ones I will never model - Union Pacific (nasty yellow paint scheme), Southern Pacific (bloody nose paint scheme - cringe).
 
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I'm going to revive this old thread, since I'm new to the board :D

I've had an old Life Like set my dad bought me in the closet for years. I've moved that box everywhere I have gone and not really paid much attention to it.
One day I wanted to put a train under the Christmas tree and pulled that box out.
I have some Sante Fe Tyco stuff and my Life Like set is a Cambell's Soup line.

What really got me into wanting to build a layout and ultimately got me to decide on a rail line was the engine my uncle gave me that he found in a garage sale a year ago.
He found an old AHM/Rivarrosi 2-8-8-2 that is Norfork and Western.
I had never heard of that line, so I did research and discovered what a great steam lineup they had and long history that was quite interesting.
Also picking the late '50s to model gives a great choice of engines to run as they switched to diesels so late
 
For me I didn't grow up next to or even close to a railroad. My dad didn't work on one or did his dad. I had a Sante Fe growing up but I think the "fun" only lasted a year or two....until we moved out on the farm. For me it was my son-in-law who got me going with trains...that and my grandsons.

I was living in Spokane, WA at the time and I did some research into their train history. Spokane was the hub or the gateway to the coast. All of the line, Great Northern, Union Pacific, Northern Pacific, SOO, Spokane, Portland & Seattle, Spokane International and others all traveled through downtown and most of their stations were located there. Spokane hosted the 1974 Worlds Fair and all of the trains donated their land to the city and moved out. The only stipulation was all of the building for the Fair had to be removed and the land turned over to the people as parks. They all agreed and downtown Spokane is beautifull today because of it. Of all the lines the Great Northern had the best color scheme and my nephew and I hiked the old "Iron Goat Trail" over Stephens Pass and walked the length of the old Stephens tunnel. Spookie...:eek: My dream layout would be a HUGE room and model Spokane with all of the ole lines coming in and out.
 
I was born in Chicago and wanted something unique to the area so I chose the Chicago & Eastern Illinois Railway (C&EI) around 1950. It will be in name only as I don't plan on modeling any specific area.
 
My dad is a big santa fe modeler so I grew up with them. But I first got turned onto the BN when I was about 7 because i had a small trainset that had a BN unit. I loved the green and black so I started buying more BN stuff and researching it. Now as I've gotten older I find it amazing all of the neat units the BN had and the interesting operations associated with them.
 
D&RGW modern era. Because I was born and raised here in Denver, and that's what I saw out my door when I was youngin'.

I model BNSF and when UP merged with D&RGW, so I run both RR on my new layout. I already have the MTH BNSF SD70ACe, and waiting for another batch from MTH so I can get the Heratige D&RGW ...ohhh that paint scheme is beautiful.:D

I like modeling what I can see immediately.
 
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Rock Island, any era

As a kid there was a rail line that ran right by the elementary school. A train always came through at recess. It was the Rock Island.
Engineers where freindly and even stopped one day to let us kinds have a closer look.
 
MoPac since my grandfather worked his whole career for them (and I&GN before that, A&NW before that...). However, using UP also allows me to run UP, SP, MKT and just about anything else I decide I like....even a local fictitional bridge line the KL&W (Knippa, Lytle and Western; or Kinda Lost and Wanderin'...)that UP runs older power on sometimes.

OK, on my layout, UP runs on it a lot.

OK....all the time...
 
2 for me

1. the D&H. I was born in Albany NY with a view of the D&H kenwood yard. Always liked them and loved alcos. Modeling wise once I build a better layout the D&H will be set in the rarely modeled time of the late 70s because its cool. Lots of crazy power, cool cars and hacks on every train.

2. my freelanced Great Lakes and New England, a what if EL D&H and NKP line more or less a take off from my love of the D&H with creative license. Modeled time period is from the early 90s-00ish.
 
The NYS&W better known as The Susie-Q. Right by my house where I grew up, easy to get to on bike to watch. Small regional and not a class I. Interesting bunch of power thru the mid 2000's. Nice and simple paint scheme.
 
At first I JUST wanted to have a model RR. Then I started noticing that CSX has a large yard local. So, I decided to go with CSX. I started gathering CSX locos.........THEN.....I saw this!


And I knew I wanted to model Norfolk Southern. Well, I had already decided that I liked the CSX so It is now going to reflect both Lines as we have a CSX and a NS line yard here in Chattanooga.

I also was browsing one day and saw some pictures of the old Santa Fe red and silver paint scheme and have now decided that they, too, must be represented on my railroad as those were the locomotoves I remember having as a child 35 years ago! So, my reasons may be silly but they are mine, none the less!
 
I picked the Boston and Albany Line Berkshire Subdivision because it runs right through my town and I think CSX locos have a nice piant scheme. The BNSF swoosh is pretty nice too though.
 
I choose mine because of scenery and the number of short lines for variety. I have power for a couple of them plus CN and some for my freelanced line set in Eastern Canada.
 
Being a native Baltimorean, I only really had two choices, B&O or WM, so both are on the M&WV, which is a WM subsidiary. The West Virginia Midland is a narrow gauge line which interchanged with the WM at Webster Springs. I got into narrow gauge from East Broad Top trips I used to take in the summer, and I used to try to connect the WM with the EBT via the South Penn RR which was never built. Once I found out about the WVM though, that was all it took. I connected the WVM and the EBT through the Pardees and rebuilt the WVM instead of having her go out of business after the disastrous Webster Springs hotel fire in 1929. The Pickens and Webster Springs was a narrow gauge road which was going to connect with the WVM but never did, but alternate history fan that I am, I worked it in too. :D
 
budinoh said:
I am curious how you picked the line you chose. Was it the color, the scenery it ran through, being familier with it, seeing it everyday or what. I know that may have to be my first decision here and I am curious how others made theirs.


Jeff
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At first, as a kid, it was just about the trains. I thought the paint schemes of the CPR and CNR diesels were cool and modern in the early 70's. My grandfather worked for CN and gave me pictures and posters of CN trains going through the Rockies. As I got older, I made a small 4 X 8 layout so I could run trains, build kits, and make scenery. At this point the diorama aspect and collecting cool looking rolling stock was more interesting to me than running the trains. My first serous layout was when I was in my late twenties. Eventually I focused and decided to model CNR branchlines of the mid 1950's because the scenery and buildings along them remind me of the unchanging economically depressed area in which I grew up in, in the 1960's; and it's those images that stir up mostly fond memories as a kid. I guess it's a comfort thing for me and reminds me of my long gone grandfather and my uncle who introduced me to the hobby though both my grandfather and uncle were not avid train enthusiasts. Today I still enjoy seeing a train moving through the scenes of my layout more so than actually operating the trains.
 
When I was about six, my mother took me on the Santa Fe, out of Dallas to Big Spring, Tx., to visit her parents. We rode in a coach, that converted into upper and lower sleeper berths.....we were in an upper. I remember mamma wanting me to go to sleep.
All I wanted to do was look out the window and watch the world roll by.
The next Christmas, I got a Lionel O27 Santa Fe F7 Warbonnet set.
I love the warbonnet paint scheme, in all it's variations.
Having said that, I also love the paint scheme of the Norfolk Southern. There's nothing so grand as a shiny tuxedo loco.......it even wears a white bow tie.
 
My line

Growing up the SP line ran right behind our back fence, and I watched them go for years. Staying with my grand parents most of the time the SP yard was just across the road, Of course I was told not to cross the road but there I would go. I met several hobo's and I climbed on just about ever car I could. But at night I would wake up and hear the train go by and know it was 2:00 am. I also have a few UK steam loco's such as the Royal Highlander and the Mallard. Being an old street rodder and custom car builder I saw their lines and since I can no longer build cars I added them to my inventory when I went back to my trains. I still have the train set that I got for Christmas in 1955 and it's in the original box with a price tag of $15.00. My friends and I lined the tracks in front of many trains with pennies and ballast rocks just to see the results.
 
Mine is a comprimise to deal with my lack of layout space, my love of the narrow gauge and the avaiablity of models. In my perfect world, someone would produce an affordable ET&WNC 4-6-0, Train and Trooper in Maine did, but at almost $800 an engine, buying a pair isnt in the meager train budget. So I model my second love, the Colorado and Southern in the mid 1920's. Brooks moguls with air tanks on top of the boiler, Cooke moguls with thier butterfly snow plows, and all sporting the signature Ridgeway "Bear Trap" spark arrestors on thier stacks. The little moguls have no problem with my tight radius track I am laying, provided I keep the joints smooth and kink free. Modeling the western narrow gauge keeps the need to produce or purchase lots of trees to a resonable level as I hate scenery work. My layout is just starting to form now, basic track plan is in place, mainly waiting for back ordered flex track to show up. So for now I get my vintage brass engines up to modern standards with coreless motors and beautiful paint jobs. Now if we could just get Blackstone to do up a model of the preserved #9 Cooke mogul in diecast I would be in heaven! Cheers Mike
 
Amtrak

I have chosen Amtrak not because I stay by the mainline or experience riding one it just I really like the EMD F40PH's so I have chosen that one. I do have a fantasy or free-lanced road name that does MOW work and loco maintence called LATX and it useses a lot of former road equipment
 
I was sold on the Norfolk Southern,during my first visit to the Horseshoe Curve in Pennsylvania. Seeing those Dash 9,s and SD70-M2,s in NS black, and close-up was all I needed to want to model them.
Ron
 
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