Need a name for my Railroad.

[tredfern83]

If this was an attempt a humor is isn't funny. The OP said they are a newbie and probably don't even know what the NMRA is. So any humor here is totally lost, and might scare them away.

If you aren't trying to be funny, the real rule is that you can't have a railroad name registered at NMRA if you don't have a railroad. That is to just keep everyone from taking up admin cost having NMRA register a bunch of things that aren't.

---- back to the topic ---

All real railroads begin with a name long before any track is laid. My named railroad existed as planning on paper at least two years before the first track was laid. It took me that long to think it through and come up with a track plan to match the "fake" real railroad.

As our friend Heath Ledger would say "why so serious?" Humor is in every way welcome in the class of learning. In many ways and for a lot of people, humor is a more effective learning tool than any other. I surely do know what the NMRA is, and I have been studying the standards they have been setting. I do not expect that anybody would know that information, but had I not known about the NMRA, D&J would most definitely have brought them to my attention in a way that would create the curiosity needed to seek them out and learn.

As far as the NMRA name registration is concerned, we are far from that point and I think D&J is just making light of a rule that, while it makes sense, it could be construed as a little over the top, or overly regulatory. But the basic idea is fare.

Otherwise, please, feel free to goof about and pull chains. We will all be better off to go into old age laughing, rather than strictly disciplined and cantankerous.

 

[tredfern83]

What sort of railroad is it? A little private industrial, mining, or logging railroad. A short line that serves a few local towns. A regional that serves an entire area, and possibly the Pacific Coast. Or is it a great big transcon that connects the NW with Chicago? Deciding that will help in the name selection.

The railroad will be a short line. There will be three staging yards (east, west, and upper) that will act as distant locations for local traffic to originate from. The largest industry on the upper level is a coal mine, while the largest industry on the lower level is a harbor/ wharf with a large grain elevator. There are two small towns on the layout and other various small industries designed to work together as a supply/ demand scenario. I speak as though there is a layout because I have spent considerable time in design with two major iterations completed. I have just now gotten the final design set, and will be moving forward with it soon.

Wherefore art thou?

A little place known as Portland, in the rainy state of Oregon.

....and now, something completely different!

View attachment 54631

I'm hungry.

 

[new guy]

As our friend Heath Ledger would say "why so serious?" Humor is in every way welcome in the class of learning. In many ways and for a lot of people, humor is a more effective learning tool than any other. I surely do know what the NMRA is, and I have been studying the standards they have been setting. I do not expect that anybody would know that information, but had I not known about the NMRA, D&J would most definitely have brought them to my attention in a way that would create the curiosity needed to seek them out and learn.

As far as the NMRA name registration is concerned, we are far from that point and I think D&J is just making light of a rule that, while it makes sense, it could be construed as a little over the top, or overly regulatory. But the basic idea is fare.

Otherwise, please, feel free to goof about and pull chains. We will all be better off to go into old age laughing, rather than strictly disciplined and cantankerous.

I figured you 'got it' so I did not feel bad about chiming in with the 'spell' to cast to keep the 'hitman' away! LOL!

 

[Charles Smiley]

Why not pick a road you admire and try to actually model it as correctly as you can manage. Then it will be the Great Northern or Northern Pacific or smaller SP&S as examples - or some other name that stands for something tangible?

 

[tredfern83]

Well I feel like I may have come to a final idea for a name. This layout will be very freelanced and not geographically accurate at all, so I felt that using the name of a real existing or past line would be misleading. I was considering the SP&S because it has a few elements that do resemble the way that my layout will operate. The only one true problem is that the SP&S runs on the South bank of the Columbia river, making it so that in the layout, if you are standing in the river/ isle, you will be facing South. Because of the somewhat standard always North facing East is to your right model orientation, I felt that I would almost be forced into modeling the layout in reverse in order to get any real geological landmarks set in the order they appear in life. This sets my OCD off in a fury and I have essentially mentally forced myself to crap that Idea.

So The next best thing would be to go in a completely imaginary direction and name the layout The Redfern Road.

The Ironic part about that is that there really is a road in the city I live with my last name on it, named after my grandfather who was the first paid city official/ building inspector in the city.

Thoughts? I feel like the name has a good sound to it, but I'm not a vain person, so I feel a little like I shouldn't use my own last name.

 

[wombat457]

I don't think using your own name in the name of YOUR railroad is being vain, it merely identifies your railroad as yours.

 

[santafewillie]

I like the 'ring' of "The Redfern Road". It just rolls off your tongue.
Willie

 

[Beady]

I don't think using your own name in the name of YOUR railroad is being vain, it merely identifies your railroad as yours.

Vanity, shmanity. The Beady, Bordello and Northern it is. Running between Beadyville and Beadytown.

Why all the angst? Do it your way and have fun.

Oh crap!

 

[Milwaukee Road 113]

I like the name as well...The Redfern Road, The Route of The.....and so on..

 

[D&J RailRoad]

When I re-entered the hobby in the early 1980s, my son was about 5 or 6 years old. We worked on a name for the railroad and after a few weeks of tossing names around, we came up with D&J Railroad, representing Dad and Jon Railroad.

 

[new guy]

Redfern Road, I LIKEE!! S'good, really good!

Man, I think you got a winner!

 

[new guy]

Keep it personal! LOL! and in the family, I'm going to name the "house of working girls" in one of my towns "Mabel's" in honor of my Grandmother who was a bra model in the 40's!