The Cleveland-Chicago freight waits in Cleveland yard for an engine to be assigned so it can get underway.
The philosophy of my railroad is pretty simple: Operate!
I love the challenge of operations, switching and making deliveries. My trackplan is what most people would call a spaghetti bowl -- there are track running everywhere, though this is somewhat disguised by the big buildings and heavy industry which helps divide up the layout.
The other issue I had to plan for was I like too many railroads. I grew up in old PRR territory and it's what my dad and I modeled, so I've always loved the Pennsy. I lived in Chicago at one point and saw the Chicago & Northwestern in operation and loved the green and gold. While researching Chicago railroads, I learned about the Chicago Burlington & Quincy and the Chicago Great Western. I had to have those railroads as well! The solution: Model portions of the entire Eastern United States.
The Cleveland to Chicago freight is all empty today with the expception of the last PRR box (it's just out of this picture next to the cabin car) which has paper bound for the Collin & Brown Printing facility in Chicago. The Chicago yardmaster will be very happy to see all those empty boxes roll back home as there is currently a waiting list for boxcars.
Each railroad has its own base of operations. My layout is like a giant letter E. On top of the E is a folded dogbone. Beneath the E on the lower level is a point-to-point with a ramp up to the upper level. Cleveland and Kansas City are on the lower level on each end of the E. Chicago is on the upper level of the middle peninsula. The PRR operates out of Cleveland, while the CB&Q operates out of Chicago and the CNW and CGW share Kansas City. Most CGW operations are just coming on and off the layout; it has no onboard switching duties. This setup is stretching the limits of believability, but hey, if you don't like it, don't ride my rails.
It's a tight squeeze when operating in The Flats of Cleveland. Most of my city and industry is based on the John Pryke book Building City Scenery -- it's an excellent reference.
I think too many people are frozen by inaction. They read the pages of Model Railroader every month and see the museum-style layouts that are carefully detailed down to the length of the fingernails on the engineers. Most people look at those layouts and get intimidated and keep putting off work on their own layout. They always need just one more piece of information to make their layout "perfect." My advice: Just get started. You'll learn far more by doing and half the stuff you plan will never pan out anyway. I'd rather have an operational layout that has flaws I can fix as I learn more than an empty basement.
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