VanRail 2025 and Beyond

VanRail, that biannual international operating extravaganza, took place on September 12-14. This year, I opened Pembroke as a “Preview layout.” It is still premature to say Pembroke is ready to host operating sessions, especially the freshly-ballasted bits. I felt I could be ready by 2027, and so I thought I would offer it for preview. […]

Sticky, Silly Short

Of course it happened when I had a visitor. The train had set off from Golden Lake, and was triumphantly passing the Pembroke freight shed, having stayed obediently on the track for the whole run. But when it stopped short, no amount of cajoling would move it. I finally looked at the command station, and […]

Extra 10 North Holds the Main

I’ve been making steady progress toward eliminating derailments on the main track. However, the passing siding has seen wheels only a couple of times in all these years because, frankly, there hasn’t been a need to use it! So, to create a reason to use the passing siding, and also to get the equipment off […]

Realistic Layout Operation

My old friend Tony Thompson has started a mini series of blog posts on Realistic Layout Operation. As always, Tony is a thoughtful person, who probably has more model railroad operating experience than anyone I know. The first post in the series surprised me, but I’m not going to precis it; you should read it […]

Register Refinements

It’s hard to believe that almost two years have passed since I introduced train registers at Golden Lake and Pembroke. In reality, there would be two registers at each station – one for each direction. However, in the interest of reducing the amount of stuff, I decided to make only one book that serves both […]

Annulling 51 and 52

As I only have one passenger car, one engine and a few freight cars, I’ve only been running the branch line trains. The through trains to and from Ottawa, 51 and 52, are going to need a lot more stock than I have today, and I’ve been eliding them as a result. This is okay […]

Updated Register Pages

After filling in the register every time a train traversed the line for almost a year, it was time to add some more pages. With all that experience came some improvements. First, I did away with the Tonnage column. In terms of model operations, it’s as useful as a spoon in a sword fight. Indeed, […]

Amuse bouche of operations

My sister and her family came to visit this week. Between sandcastling, fireworks and eating together, we found time to check out the progress on Pembroke. Now, when you have a rabid foamer like me in your family, you’re likely to find a more productive way to spend your energy than building trains too. However, […]

Running Around

I’ve not seen one in ages, but model railroad magazines used to publish switching puzzles. They would present a situation where a train arrived on a scene and had to deliver some cars and pick up others. The game was to complete the job in as few moves as possible. Over the years, these switching […]

Daily except Sunday

There were no trains on the Pembroke branch on Sundays. According to the schedule, even the first class to Ottawa ran daily except on Sundays, and freight trains were outlawed by the Lord’s Day Act, of course. So, on Sundays the branch slumbered. Starting on August 1st, 1905 and running one or two trains almost […]