Here's the easy part, as I'm a lot handier with a credit card than I am with a soldering iron. This is most of the rolling stock needed for Torrington (plus a few indulgences) on my test track.
AnyRail is a great way to plan a layout but it gives you little idea of how the finished article will operate.
So I've built a mock-up of the Torrington layout in Train Simulator 2017 (TS2017) and I'm using it to rehearse the Summer WTT I discussed in earlier posts.
It's quickly apparent that it poses a major shunting puzzle with the demands of holiday traffic stretching the station's sidings capacity to the limit.
The test is also shedding light on likely fiddle yard requirements -
My trainsim days have given me a taste for authentic modelling of railway operations. Fortunately BR(S) modellers are well blessed with the necessary material, starting with the Southern Email Group's timetable archives at https://uk.groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/SEmG/files/MartinWhiteCollection/ (you may need to join the group to access these).
I also have the Xpress publication "District Controllers View No. 14: North Devon" - this wonderful series really brings the dusty world of WTTs, CWNs
My layout project had to be modest in scope and size and interesting to operate. I have history with BR (S) steam-era routes in trainsims, together with a lot of reference material on Devon and Dorset railways. So I looked at a lot of possibilities in that area.
Despite its modest size, Torrington in the 1950s boasted through coach services to London, considerable milk and china clay traffic, and also terminated services from Halwill Jct. Almost everything needed to operate the line authenti
As a teenager I started a 32ft long N Gauge layout of Weymouth station - a laughable youthful folly given my lack of skills and resources at the time. The baseboards live on as a workbench in my parent's garage. A few grains of ballast live on.
Now I'm returning to N Gauge modelling with greater resources on hand and a grim determination to actually get something built.
Thankfully in the intervening decades the internet has arrived to provide both tuition and access to UK model shops.
