The Case for Background

As we covered in a previous post, (and, if you’re reading regularly, are probably sick of seeing,) I decided to start with the area of the layout that included the GM assembly plant, Penn Mary Yard, the Canton RR interchange, and the line to Bethlehem Steel.

The photo at the top of this entry generally shows the scene I’m trying to recreate on this first section of the layout. (Click on the photo to be taken to RR Picture Archives and a larger version.) Penn Mary yard—in the photo’s foreground—served the GM plant and also as interchange point with the Canton RR. Behind that, if you squint, you see the auto rack loading area. Since the photo dates to 1980, four years before the period I model, these are open racks, so they’re harder to make out than today’s boxy closed auto racks. But they’re there. (Trust me. Would I lie to you?) This ramp accounts for the many, many pickup trucks parked there. They’re awaiting loading. Behind that, mostly obscured from view, is the actual plant.

“So what?” you might ask. My point is that without some background, I wouldn’t have had the insight to build a reasonable facsimile of the area.

Although proto-freelanced, the MCTD is, at its core, Baltimore. Or at least based on it. Or at the very least influenced by it. I want to be able to replicate certain things as best I can. And I know it will never be perfect; like most layouts, compromises must be made. And certain things I’ll simply make up. But I’m a big believer in knowing your subject(s), in learning as much as you can about what you intend to model. Much like you can’t break the rules until you know them, I also believe that it doesn’t make a ton of sense to just  build something without any knowledge of what was there, assuming you ca get the information. If you have the opportunity to learn about how the prototype works/worked (even a little bit), I think you should take it. Then you can make informed changes later. Or partially informed. (And truth be told, you’ll still probably end up with some uninformed ones, too, because it’s hard to find out/learn everything about a subject.)

This doesn’t appeal to everyone. I get that. Many layout builders are content to assemble a bunch of unrelated “stuff” that pleases them. And that’s fine. Perfectly valid. Because I also believe that it’s your layout, and you should do whatever it is that makes you happy. But it’s not for me. What makes me happy is a layout rooted in reality. Even when I was thinking about a completely freelanced layout, it was still based on the operations of a real railroad (Conrail, at the time). I need it to make sense.

So for me, research and background are big.

As we go along, in addition to talking about my process and actual construction, I’d like to share some of what I learned about the prototypes for this area, as well as where (and why) I diverge from reality. I already talked about some background around GM. The rest will be featured in later posts that I’ll link to as they arrive.