Model Railroading > Maintenance of Way Operations, at an Operating Session

At the most recent operating session on my HO scale Conrail Onondaga Cutoff, we modeled a typical summer scene on mainline railroads - the surfacing gang out doing its thing. One of the benefits of double-track, main line railroading - on the prototype and in model form - is that revenue trains can move on the open track while necessary maintenance occurs on an adjacent track. We model that situation from time to time on the 'OC' and I thought this time I'd take a few images and a video and share here.

1. Boom trucks work to gather used ties up for disposal while ML-403, a westbound Autorack train from Newark, NJ to Toledo, OH, brings his racks west up Track 1. Iroquois Paperboard is to the left with I-481 in the distant background.

2. TV-99, a westbound high-priority UPS piggyback train, comes up to the westbound home signals at CP277. Track work was east of CP277 on Track 2 this day.

3. Earlier that day, with the low morning light shining, Foreman Jacob in a hi-rail truck with the ballast tamper/aligner behind has copied his Form-D and is proceeding into the interlocking at CP280 for the run east to the work site.

There's more!

~RGDave
http://onondagacutoff.blogspot.com/



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/15/17 05:40 by RGDave.

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4. After the work was finished, evening finds the whole fleet of maintenance vehicles assembled at Onondaga Yard to offload ties from the day's work. Time for a few beers after this!

5. Trains come and go after dark, making use of the newly-refurbished track. Even with the outage, the Mohawk Dispatcher was able to move all trains with no delays to Amtrak or to the intermodal trains.

6. A video of TV-9, a Boston to Chicago UPS piggyback train, coming upgrade past the work zone. Radio chatter in the background is typical of an operating session on the Onondaga Cutoff. In this case, the Mohawk Dispatcher was offsite at a remote location, and was using the radio and software via the internet to control switches and signals.

Enjoy!
~RGDave
http://onondagacutoff.blogspot.com/



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/15/17 05:40 by RGDave.

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super love that layout

Great video!  I really like how the curve and structure hides access to the entrance (from staging or helix?).  Thanks for posting....

John Parker
Longmont, CO
BNSF Fall River Division

Very authentic looking, including the NY State Police car.

Top notch stuff, Dave. The RR looks great. --Sully

Dave has nailed the south side of Syracuse area very well, so much so it's uncanny. No matter how hard I try to leave that part of the country behind, it keeps coming back to haunt me in Dave's layout photo's! =P

Love it! MOW is something that's overlooked all too often in the operations world, so it's nice to see someone incorporating it. In addition, I love the idea of the DS being in a remote location. That's something that IMRL and I have discussed as well to increase realism.

- Jeff Carlson

That is really awesome! Job well done!
Cooper

Nice! Once your crew seasoned, and operations begin to go a little too smoothly, this sort of thing can spice up a session. Others: speed restrictions due to track conditions; delays due to officers conducting efficiency tests (this can be quite funny); and if your trackwork is flawless, treating the very occasional derailment as the prototype would have. I'm told that John Allen used to clandestinely place autos on the tracks at grade crossings when crews weren't looking during op sessions.

EO

That's an impressive collection of authentic MOW vehicles!

Ted Curphey
Ontario, OR

Thanks all!

Yes, Ted, my buddy Mark loves scratch-bashing the MOW stuff, as well as all sorts of classic trucks. Several of his creations are mine in trade for DCC and weathering services I provided him, and for this session he also brought his 4-5 trucks that were built in conjunction with mine so that no two are exactly alike. Lots of fun!

~RGDave
http://onondagacutoff.blogspot.com/