Model Railroading > Bridges & Time on the Onondaga Cutoff

One of the big initiatives lately on the Onondaga Cutoff is to finalize the scenes along one of the large peninsulas, and that includes an overhead bridge for a roadway to pass over the main line and East Lead of Onondaga Yard. It was surprising to see how few kits are available for highway-design through-truss structures. I decided to kitbash my own out of the Walthers Double-Track truss kit.

Highway bridges vary quite a bit but are usually a lighter design than railroad structures, due to the smaller live loads they are designed to carry. I took some liberty with that and kitbashed several Micro Engineering City Viaduct parts into the Walthers trusses, resulting in a bridge that looks different the stock model and also appears to be closer to several truss structures I have seen around Syracuse.

However - This is always a tough time of year to make layout progress. Summer and fall are busy and spent mostly outdoors. Add to that three kids under 6, the oldest starting kindergarten, and the youngest at 6 months, and time gets considerably less available!

So, to continue the little-by-little approach on the Onondaga Cutoff, I decided to bring some of the modeling up into the house so that I could work on it here and there while spending some time with the 'clams' (one of my nicknames for the crowd).

1. Progress on the kitbash at the living room table, with Pete (6 months) happily watching from his bouncer.

2. Progress continues at the kitchen table, this time with Susie (5) and Teddy (2-1/2) enjoying their breakfast.

3. The completed truss, before bearings, sidewalk supports, road details, and paint.

There's more! :-)

~RGDave

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...continued:

4. An overview of the area at the east end of Onondaga Yard and Engine Terminal, showing a now-painted bridge atop abutments to the right. You can see how this construction will do a nice job to eliminate a visual 'horseshoe curve' that has no place on a layout set in Central New York!

5. The installation will include a big embankment for the approaches to the bridge, and I like to have the fascia match elevation changes when possible. So, I fabricated and installed new fascia for this area ahead of the embankment construction to match the dimensions of the embankment cross section.

6. The fascia in place, now I can start the installation of the cardboard webbing I will use here to support the terrain and base scenery.

This progress is leading up to another scenic improvement, coming this fall! It's a great hobby that allows this kind of progress while being available for my wife and our young children. Well, somewhat available. :-)

Thanks for looking!
~RGDave
http://onondagacutoff.blogspot.com/

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Very nice and it appears that you have a couple of budding railfan/modelers too.

Bob Krieger
Cheyenne, WY

Really looks good. Would you mind writing a bit about that Berlin Mills boxcar?

Jim

How do you do it? I an empty-nest retiree and get little accomplished.

TJY

RGDave Wrote:
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>
> However - This is always a tough time of year to
> make layout progress. Summer and fall are busy
> and spent mostly outdoors. Add to that three kids
> under 6, the oldest starting kindergarten, and the
> youngest at 6 months, and time gets considerably
> less available!
>

Amen, brother! I'm glad there are others out there who know the struggle. Really enjoying watching your layout take shape.

-Ryan

What about Mom? She should be part of this.

Nudge

Photo #1: my reaction as well when I see a new thread about the Onondaga Cutoff. Thanks Pete, a snapshot is easier than words!

Posted from Android

What a great thing that you make time for your kids....as you age you will find that being able to look back and be able to say you were a good parent is a truly great thing.

Wishing you had none more/better is an awful thing to live with every day.....nothing you can do or accomplish in life is worth depriving your children of an everyday Dad..you have a great layout and a great life. My compliments.

Bob

Hookdragkick Wrote:
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> Photo #1: my reaction as well when I see a new
> thread about the Onondaga Cutoff. Thanks Pete, a
> snapshot is easier than words!
>
> Posted from Android

One of the best replies I've read on TO! Mainly because it is my reaction too!

Cute thread all the way around. Bridge looks like something that would cross a yard.

Jim

Thanks all for the support and thoughtful commentary!

Nudge, no worries - Mom is a critical, and irreplaceable part of the scene here. She was out when I was taking the photos, but here's a pic of the whole family over Labor Day, with all 5 of us. Kristen is a major reason things work as well as they do around my world, she's one of those rare people that makes everything in my life better when she's a part of it.

Bob, your thoughts are spot on. Thank you! I'm dammmmmm lucky and I appreciate it all, having come from a family that dealt with a lot of loss over the years. We have our ups and downs like everyone does but that's small potatoes ('salt' potatoes in Central New York, lol).

It's a privilege to be able to spend time with the family almost every day. I miss them in the morning with early starts, but see them almost every evening. TJY, another privilege is to be able to make time most nights to spend some minutes on the layout. Each little bit counts!

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

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Also, Jimmies,

Sorry to miss your question in my first reply.

The Berlin Mills boxcar is part of my paperboard plant fleet, and is one of the old 'Bev-Bel Athearn' kits made in the late 1980's and early 1990's. Bev-Bel was a company that took blue box kits and painted them up in otherwise unavailable paint jobs, including a variety from the Northeast.

These cars were common in paper service all over the Northeast and I found one at a local hobby shop in the late 1990's in a consignment box. $5! I equipped it with Atlas 33" metal wheels and my standard 3.6k Ohm resistor for block detection, and it's a staple in and out of Iroquois Paperboard through the years.

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

RGDave,

I'm remarried to a Brit who is train friendly but I still can't get done what you do. She'd take one look at those bairn's (Scottish/northern England for little children) and the first word out of her mouth would be "trouble"!!!

Actually she loves children and is a professional nanny for a couple of PhD phychologists who work for the US State Department. The youngest is 5 and just started kindergarten and their are 4 boys between 9 and 12, and a 3 of them are ADHD. Fun fun fun.

Keep up the good work up there in Onondaga County, go Orangemen and all that rot! Even though I hated Lake Effect snow, Wayne Mahar and the weather cat kept us informed and train watching was better there believe it or not.

Cheers, from an ex Sorryexcuse (Syracusian)
Jim Fitch



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/21/17 12:53 by SPDRGWfan.