the coordinated movements of the various operators during a ses- sion. I generally play the role of “walk-around superintendent,” where I can enjoy being a railfan seeing several simultaneous train movements at once. It takes an operating crew of 9 to 14 to run the railroad. The average crew size is 12.
I’ve found that prototypical op- erating sessions can really add to the social aspect of the model rail- roading hobby. I’ve made many
friends while operating on other layouts in the area as well as on my layout. I currently host sessions for three different groups of op- erators. Sessions are held on Sat- urday afternoons (since Septem- ber 2004) for my regular monthly crew. I’m also part of a group of retirees from the Cincinnati/ Dayton area who operate every Wednesday morning. The 18 peo- ple in this group operate round- robin style on nine local layouts. This group has existed for many
years — a few of them were part of the regular crew on Allen McClel- land’s Virginian & Ohio Railroad. The third group operates monthly round-robin sessions on five local layouts. Several of the operators in this last group come from out of state. I’ve also hosted sessions during one National and two Re- gional NMRA conventions. It’s re- ally great to have so many people enjoying the Pennsylvania & West- ern, and I’m always motivated to work on scenery, weathering, or other projects to share with them.
Construction
I used more or less standard construction techniques on the layout: open grid 1x4 pine bench- work with 2x4 legs, ½-inch ply- wood roadbed topped with ½-inch Homasote, and cork roadbed un- der the main line. The low point is East/West Valley at 40 inches off the floor, and the high point is on a trestle approaching Summit at 61 inches. The yard at Annville is at 52 inches.
The sides of all rails are hand- painted using a mix of Floquil Rail Brown and Grimy Black. I used light gray ballast for the mainline tracks, dark gray for passing sid- ings and industrial spurs, black for the coal mine and yard, and cinders lightly sprinkled over all areas to reflect heavy steam lo- comotive traffic. Many operat- ing model railroads use different ballast colors for mainline and passing siding tracks, so the train crews can tell at a glance which track is the main.
I painted the sky backdrop by blending blue and white paint us- ing a wide brush as described by Dave Frary in some of his scenery books. I had several really ugly practice (at least I’m calling them practice) attempts at the sky un- til it finally looked right. One sec- tion of the basement wall has six or eight alternating coats of white primer and bad sky paint! Most of my structures were kitbashed from Korber, DPM, Ameritown, and Lionel kits. Sta-
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