Earlier this year I decided to participate in the local open house schedule for Maryland and Delaware (modelrailroadopenhouse.com). Once the schedule was finalized and published, I realized that I was the only N-scale layout on the schedule, and was not sure how that would effect my turnout. Before the big day arrived, there were several projects I wanted to complete on the layout before opening to visitors. This included finishing up some electrical work, replacing some sections of facia, and most importantly installing some skirting that my wife and daughter made to hide some of the storage under the layout. The day before the open house, my daughter even baked some cookies for the event. With my RR Crossing sign out front, it was time to open up to the public. A friend and fellow model railroader came over to help me run the layout while I talked to guests. Just about from the start, there was a steady stream of guests from the Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey areas coming through the house to observe and ask questions. Many were interested in the historical background of my railroad, how I played track, electrical work, structures on my layout, and operations. I received a lot of compliments on how well the trains ran and the over all concept of the layout. I even let a couple of the kids that visited run a train for a while (that is how we grow the hobby). Most indicated they would like to come back next year to see what updates have been made, which at this point should be mostly scenery. Overall, this was a positive experience and one I would recommend to others. This is a nice hobby, but is even better when you have the opportunity to share it with others.
First Operating Session
On April 1, 2014 the Deer Creek and Susquehanna Railroad hosted its first operation session with HARM (Harford Associates for Railroad Modeling). About a dozen members came to see what I had been working on and several were quickly put to work operating some local trains using some orders that I had created using the program Switchlist for the Mac. The railroad itself operated quite nicely with only a couple of derailments or other user errors were reported. However, the train orders did take about twice as long to complete than what I expected. This is not completely a surprise, since the operators were not as familiar with everything as I am. All in all it was a good evening and gave me some insight into how others may run my railroad in the future. I will continue to update my switchlists and work on scenery and structures in the meantime until the next formal operating session.
