Model Railroading > Guessing dimensions

As a person of limited intelligence, I am wondering what clues in this picture would reveal the length, depth and height of this structure. Is this a standard SP design?
 

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A couple of things stood out for me.
The loading dock height is about 4 feet.
The doors on the motor car shed about 6'8'' to 7'!

Mike

Dimensions of the windows and the doors are often the same as in similar district buildings. Try finding a dimension for the siding boards, probably from other similar buildings.

Track gauge, of course, is 4 ft 8 1/2 inches, you could measure that parallel to the ties and use it to scale off the end wall facing the camera.

The Calif. State RR Museum Library may have plans for this building:

Southern Pacific. MWD 9039 / 1 Dec. 10, 1930 / Mar. 19, 1931. Port Costa: Combination station, plans, section. 24 x 36 Pencil on paper. Filing location:+ D ID 53810

The building's siding is called "V rustic."  On the SP, boards of V rustic siding were usually either 7 inches wide or 8 inches wide.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/10/18 13:47 by johnsweetser.

Railroad Model Craftsman, July and August 2000, had aricles about modeling Port Costa.

The Port Costa freight station, seen in the posted photo, was once the Port Costa passenger depot and used to be closer to the water.  Photobob took the two photos of the shore side of the freight station seen in the RMC article, plus an obscured view of the land side of the building. You could probably order copies from him.

Update to my prior post: It's possible the plans labeled "Combination station" at the Calif. State RR Musuem Library may not be for the Port Costa freight station since that building is not really a "combination station" (i.e., freight and passenger).  



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/10/18 13:46 by johnsweetser.

Thank you much...an awsome bunch. PhotoBob, if you read this, I bought your book...hint-hint.

Based on the door height and the dock the windows are about 36" wide, or 18" squares..give or take.  If you find plans please post some actual demensions.
RB

SP and UP used "Common Standards" for their structures. I live in a neighborhood of CS homes, including ours. Most, like ours, have been modified.
Very well built!

Bill Deaver
Tehachapi, CA

johnsweetser Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Railroad Model Craftsman, July and August 2000,
> had aricles about modeling Port Costa.
>
> The Port Costa freight station, seen in the posted
> photo, was once the Port Costa passenger depot and
> used to be closer to the water.  Photobob took
> the two photos of the shore side of the freight
> station seen in the RMC article, plus an obscured
> view of the land side of the building. You could
> probably order copies from him.
>
> Update to my prior post: It's possible the plans
> labeled "Combination station" at the Calif. State
> RR Musuem Library may not be for the Port Costa
> freight station since that building is not really
> a "combination station" (i.e., freight and
> passenger).  

If that's the series I'm thinking of, it was very well done.  Love Port Costa, especially photos of what it used to look like.

Nathan

I have much more info about the Port Costa freight house (the darker yellow building) and the freight office (the lighter yellow building) that I will post on Monday.
 
As for the question were these standard designs, the answer is no.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/11/18 16:46 by johnsweetser.

Looking forward to that...thanks.

I came up with around 14' x 52' by around 11' sidewall. upkpfan

I think you are real close...thanks

I previously stated that the Port Costa passenger depot became the freight station.  To be more accurate, the passenger depot became the freight office (the lighter yellow building in the posted photo).  Besides a passenger depot, Port Costa had a freight house at the same time (which is the darker yellow building on the left in the photo, shorter than its original size).

Valuation records indicate that the freight house originally was 17 feet wide and 72 feet long. It's original location can be seen in the top photo on pg. 117 of John Signor's Western Division book.  At some point, probably when the passenger depot was moved to become the freight office, the freight house was reduced in size and relocated to the curve seen just below the building in the photo on pg. 117.

Because of its new location on the curve, the freight house was not parallel to the freight office.  Note that in a photo overlooking Port Costa on pg. 74 of the July 2000 Railroad Model Craftsman, the roof lines of the two buildings are not parallel.  This aspect can also be seen in a color photo Port Costa on pg. 174 of "Northern California Railroads, The silver Age" by Matthews.

I don't know what length the freight house was reduced to but it appears that the building was chopped off about where the east edge of the western-most freight door was (originally, the building had two freight door along the track side).

Valuation records indicate that the passenger depot was 15 feet wide and 110 feet long.  It can be seen in the bottom photo on pg. 117 of the Western Division book.  I don't know if there was any reduction in its size when it was relocated to become the freight office.

As can be seen in the posted photo, the siding on the west end of the freight office was narrower than the siding along the track side.  Probably 7-inch rustic siding on the end and 8-inch rustic siding along the track side.  A Photobob photo on pg. 80 of the RMC article shows that the east end of the freight office also got the narrower siding as well as the short section on the track side of the freight office that received a freight door.  

It appears, based on two partial views on pg. 80 of the RMC article, that the freight house had the wider siding (i.e., 8-inch rustic).

The freight house had two short vertical board on its wall, which probably originally were part of a support for a ladder (a ladder can apparently be seen on the freight house in the top photo on pg. 117 of the Western Division book.  The middle photo on pg. 80 of the RMC article shows a closer view of one of the vertical boards). 

Regarding the plans for a combination depot at Port Costa that the Calif. State Railroad Museum Library has that I previously mentioned, it would be best to see them in person.  If not possible, it would be an expensive waste to go ahead and order a copy and they turn out to not be for the correct building.  My suggestion in this situation is to send the people at the library a copy of the posted photo and ask if it matches the one in the plans. 

The Calif. State RR Museum Library doesn't list any station plan for Port Costa, which would show dimensions of all the railroad buildings there.  They do have right of way maps for the Port Costa area but I don't know if they include buildings.  A possible source for a station plan would be the Contra Costa County surveyor's office (your first question to them would be "Do you have copies of railroad company maps?")

Photocopies or scans of the book photos and the RMC article can probably be obtained from the Calif. State RR Museum Library or the Kalmbach Memorial Library (article was on pages 74-80). 

P.S.  "Rustic" here refers to a specific style of interlocking siding.  How it got that name, I don't know.  It's not rough sawed boards or something 



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/13/18 16:50 by johnsweetser.

The reason the section on the east end of the freight office had narrower siding as I previously pointed out is because it was originally an open-air section that was boarded up at a later time, probably when the passenger depot was was moved and converted to a freight office.  Valuation records indicate the open-air section was 12 feet long. 

It was the west end of the passenger depot that was shortened when the building was converted to a freight office.  In the photo showing the passenger depot on pg. 117 of the Western Division book, finials can be seen on both ends of the building but only the finial on the east end remained after the building was converted.  Another indication that the west end was shortened are missing metal chimneys.  The passenger depot had three metal chimneys west of the brick chimney but the only one to survive the conversion was the chimney closest to the brick chimney.  Judging from the location of that metal chimney in the photos on pg. 80 of the July 2000 RMC article, I would say that the west end of the passenger depot was truncated around where the western-most door was on the south side.

The roof of the freight office appears to have been covered with diamond-shaped asphalt or abestos shingles.  In the photos on pg. 80 of the RMC article, it is hard to tell what the roof of the freight house is composed of but it does not look similar to the freight office's roof so it may have had wood shingles.  The color photo of Port Costa on pg. 174 of "Northern California Railroads, The Silver Age" shows a slight green tint to the the freight house roof.

One other thing, I think the freight office was longer than the 52 feet that upkpfan came up with.

 



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/14/18 13:41 by johnsweetser.

If the freight office was 52 feet long as upkpfan contended, that means the passenger depot was reduced in size by almost one-half.  In this scenario,  the metal chimney nearest the brick chimney (see the photo showing the passenger depot on pg. 117 of the Western Division book) would have been eliminated but obviously, it's still there in the photo posted here as well as in the photos on pg. 80 of the RMC article.  Therefore, the 52-feet figure for the length is way off.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 08/15/18 14:00 by johnsweetser.