Vibes and Audacity I

 

Test Fitting a curved wood crossing.

    I joke that most of my layout work is "Vibes and Audacity" and it's actually quite true. While I'm a decent planner of things railroad I'm not great at planning when the work on the railroad happens. Generally it's a whim that gets me up for twenty minutes and after throwing caution to the wind and with only a hint of an idea what I'm doing some new part of the layout comes to be. So far that's covered laying track and wiring. Today was no different. Once I got Marvin's Curve in I knew I could finish out to the Produce Spur in short order. And that's just what I did. It took twenty minutes and of all the track I've laid it may well be the easiest. 

    Once wiring is complete I'll be able to run refers and LCL freight to this spur from the yard. Granted we're missing about a third of the layout but The Clearwater Pacific will become a functioning railroad. What with two industries to serve and a yard. One thing that I'm keeping in mind is to ensure the track and wiring is as  bulletproof as it can be before we begin on major scenic work. This is an layout for operations and poor operating hurts no matter how pretty it is.  

Produce Spur

 What's cool about the above photo is that Daylight baggage car is signed by Doyle McCormick and the 50' boxcar is much like a car I had back in the Salmon Bay Terminal days. Seems the more things change the more they stay the same.