As I think back to what has been accomplished on the Deer Creek and Susquehanna Railroad during the past year, I realize that the layout has not progressed as far as I thought it would have by now. However, many lessons have been learned and significant changes have been made during that time. Early in the year, the first operating session with HARM took place. One of the valuable things learned from this is that a conversion from a two-throttle DC system to DCC was inevitable. This did mean putting some of my older DC only locomotives on the display shelf for now, but that can be a project for another day. On the other hand, I was able to purchase a few newer DCC locomotives as well as install decoders in some other locomotives that had previously been in storage. So far, the conversion to DCC has been well worth the expense and work. The other major lesson learned has been the need for a defined operating system for the railroad. I have begun to use a program called Switchlist to keep track of rolling stock, cargos, and trains. It is also used to generate train orders for our operating sessions. This, coupled with a timetable and assigned jobs has made operations much more enjoyable. I even print orders for myself to use between official sessions. It is still a work in progress to balance cargos and train sizes, but it is much better than not using a system or generating all of that information by hand.
As I look toward 2015 and think of all the tasks that need to be completed on the railroad, a few immediately come to mind. First of all, more scenery needs to be completed. I am getting tired of much of the railroad having benchwork and plywood showing. However, some of this can only happen after the second item is completed; the last few major structures for railroad industries. I don't want to create too much scenery and then have to tear some of it out to place a structure properly. Lastly, there are some electronics projects that I would like to complete soon. This includes wiring all of the turnout frogs and installing some short circuit protection and auto-reversing modules for the various sections of the layout. I would also like to setup JMRI for my layout, but that is much further down the priority list. Overall, 2015 should be a busy and productive year on the Deer Creek and Susquehanna Railroad.