Atlantic Pacific Railroad: July 2019

Greetings followers of the Atlantic Pacific Railroad and my blog!

We're getting ready to start another series in our Penn Central Car Movements (PCCM). While the other participants model the Penn Central for the most part, I model both modern and the Penn Central. I do mix them on the railroad, especially when I am hosting an operating session.

In order to capture both images and video, moves need to be made in order to make this as realistic as possible (scenery and other room distractions not withstanding).

Last week I had some of the guys over to run some trains and many freight cars, including the ones used in our virtual ops were moved all over the place. I needed to go find them, bring then up from staging or wherever the guys moved them and set them in the yard, for the most part. All of the CSX and Conrail engines needed to be moved, plus any freight cars with markings that could be seen as modern.

First set of moves was to send a train to staging with 10 assorted modern cars. While this was heading down, a PC train with a number of box cars was coming up top. Here we see the meet at the east end of West Harold Interlocking.

A second train that was in staging needed to come up. This train was mostly Penn Central box cars and some Empire Belt box cars.

After all of the cars were moved around, sent down to staging or brought up from staging, we'll be ready to prepare for the upcoming Penn Central Car Movement!

Check back soon for new blog posts! Thanks for reading!

Greetings followers of the Atlantic Pacific Railroad and the Penn Central Car Movements!

P.C.C.M. 62 is wrapping up on Sir John's N.Y.C.T.L. Railroad and PC Ralph's Kings Port & Western Railroad.

The A.P.R.R. is getting the freight delivered around Rock Ridge. We left off with PC Extra 7983 arriving in Rock Ridge with more freight, which included a couple of cars that were inadvertently left in Selkirk.

The rest of the train was cut so they can pick up EB 509823 from Gervais Pipe on the N.Y.C.T.L, headed to Shapeless Steel

AP RS-1 #201 is called on to pull the car, add it to the PC Corrugated cars from KP Steel on the KP&W

Train RS-1 (Ironic, the name of the run matches the type of engine), The Shapeless Steel Turn, departs out of the north end of Rock Ridge Yard

Back at the yard,

Here we see AP Train RE-3 dropping off cars at Ideal Auto Parts

Now that the 3 cars are spotted , they'll pick up the 2 PC cars, add them to the train and head over to C&P Restaurant Supply

PC The two cars are dropped off on the Little Jamaica Secondary and they pull west to get to the Marcal Paper and Freihofers Bakeries

PC cars 360508 from Terminal Warehouse and PC 360557 are dropped off at Marcal

Some of you may or may not have noticed a new Marcal Paper structure. Back in December, I had decided that I wanted Marcal Paper to have a more traditional look. I designed it while in Florida. Then disaster hit the REAL Marcal Paper in Elmwood Park, NJ. The building was destroyed in a spectacular fire. This made my decision to make the building look like the original one a challenge. I added the words 'MARCAL' to the top on some beams to replicate the sign atop the structure.

Here's a link to the video Marcal Paper Building Fire

This is my interpretation of the Marcal Paper building now on the layout. I still need to add the loading dock to the industry.

Back to the move, RS-1 #201 will do a run around with the 2 Penn Central Box Cars and get behind AP box cars #60382 & 60394 from Ralph's Grocery and TPXX Car #5510 from Van Winkle Canning in order to shove the 3 cars into C&P Restaurant Supply

AP Train RE-3 Working C&P Restaurant Supply

The freight cars are in the siding and within the building limits.

The move back to Rock Ridge will be a shove back with the caboose trailing. Some moves from mainline track 1, over to mainline track 2, then over to the east approach track to Rock Ridge takes some planning. While this is a move into the yard, the caboose is protecting the train while on the mainline tracks. The Yardmaster has halted all traffic in and out of Rock Ridge while the trains heads back in.

So what happened to the KP&W Box Car headed to Three Amigos Warehouse with TV's from Zenith TV on the KP&W? AP MP15 #105 will make a run over to Three Amigos and spot the car on siding track 1. Engineer 1/87th Jim is at the throttle.

A quick stop at CP South with train orders and the crew will head out as RT-1 the Three Amigos Warehouse Turn. It's a short run, they'll head out and get crossed over both mainline tracks.

A quick stop at West Harold and Tower Operator 1/87th Steve gives him the overview of the tracks. 1/87th Jim is a relatively new engineer on the APRR and was under the guidance of 1/87th Steve, a veteran of the APRR.

There seems to be an observer on the docks of Three Amigos Warehouse. Looks like some type of supervisor. Must be looking to see if everything goes well.

The car is cut and 1/87th Jim wants to head out before the guy on the dock starts to ask him questions. He looks scary to Jim

Now back in the yard, 1/87th Jim has had it for today. While a short run, between the tower operator and the guy on the dock, he's heading across the yard to everyone's favorite place to chow down, Meet At Ralph's!

Last, but not least, AP Train RS-1 heads out to Shapeless Steel. RS-1 was held on the north end of the yard so the other two trains could get out of his way. With such a heavy load, he needed to have the mainline to himself!

As AP Train RS-1 rounds the turn near Shapeless Steel, the caboose will be cut on the main, then switched on to the West Harold Secondary. Tower Operator 1/87th Steve gives the crew the secondary and will protect the main on the east end of West Harold. No traffic on Mainline Track 1 for a while!