I’ve been doing taxidermy on the side for about a decade now and really enjoy. I took a break over the weekend from layout construction to finish an antelope mount for my sister. It was her first antelope and she took it back in October of 2019. I mounted it back in late September, but the head has just been sitting in my shop since, waiting to be finished.
After several months of designing different layouts in AnyRail, I finally settled on a plan and prototype that should keep me busy for a while. My final choice is the Central Montana Railroad, which is a Class III shortline based out of Denton, MT. The CMR's tracks start at the BNSF interchange in Moccasin, MT and then proceed to the NW going through Denton and ending in Geraldine. The railroad used to move a large amount of grain, until their operations were brought to a standstill when the massive trestle over the Judith River was damaged in the 2012 spring floods. The trestle has been repaired but most of the grain traffic has disappeared. Currently, the CMR's operation's center around storing cars. I spend alot of time in that part of the state and there is a large number of tank cars currently waiting for a rise in oil prices before returning to service. Because of the a washout in Arrow Creek Gorge in 2006, the line has effectively ended at Coffee Creek, MT, with trains no longer serving Geraldine.
I plan to stick fairly close to the prototype when building and operating the railroad, and it will be set in present day (2021). However, I will deviate from prototype practices in several ways. First, even though it's 2021, the elevators in Denton are still going to ship grain. Second, I'm pretending that the tracks are still in service to Geraldine (represented in Staging), and the CMR will service a mythical unit grain elevator there. Third, the gravel shipper near Ware, MT is still served by rail.
My last and furthest stretch of the imagination is that the CMR's trackage (which is former Milw. Road) extends past Geraldine and continues into Great Falls (the tracks were pulled up in the 80's). This will allow me to use my large collection of BNSF engines from time to time. The line would serve as a backup to the BNSF Laurel Subdivision.
The main operations of the CMR will center around Denton, MT. I figure I will use two crews to work the railroad. The first crew will take loaded/empty cars back to Moccasin for interchange with the BNSF and switch the Montana Gravel Spur. The second crew will be responsible for switching out the industries in Denton. I will run an extra for the unit train service to Geraldine.
With the arrival of our newborn, my time in the layout room has been fairly limited. However, I have been able to weather some cars that I ...
