Port Able Railway 2021

[Mike Kieran]

PORT ABLE RAILWAY

 

Reporting Marks: PA

The railroad is about a mile long and handles approximately 650 cars per year.

 

Customers       Maximum Weekly Carloads In/Out

 

Wattsup Dock & Transloading                          4/4

Ed Ibble Foods Inc.                                          4/1

Hertz Uranus Chair Corp.                                 2/0

Total                                                                10/5

 

Back in 1970, with the collapse of the Paddle Creek Bridge due to fire and thus severing the branch to the Port Able Navy Yard, The Atlantic Lines decided to abandon the Navy Yard Branch. The last 3 customers on the line, Wattsup Dock & Transloading, Ed Ibble Foods, and the Hertz Uranus Chair Company did not wish to end rail service. Enter recently retired Port Able Division Supervisor, Artie Fischel, who decided to supplement his retirement income as well as relieve his boredom by purchasing the 1 mile industrial track and creating the Port Able Railway. He started operations at the Port Able headquarters at 22 Twain Street with a GE 45 tonner purchased from government surplus and an old caboose.

 

Since there were no longer any runarounds, the train would travel up the branch line caboose first. In it's first year of operations, the railroad handled a modest 250 cars. by the end of his tenure at the helm, it increased to 650 cars per year.In 1979, Artie decided that he no longer had the energy to run the railroad.  It was time for his full retirement and he wished to sell the short line for a modest profit while doubling the traffic that he started with. Two of his railroad employees, Andy Scores along with Pat Onnabach, purchase the railroad and resumed operations.

 

While I've been off the grid for a little while, a new abode will allow me to pursue my model railroading endeavors. I still don't have access to permanent wall space, but I will still make use of my dining table which measures out to a standard 5 feet by 3 feet (por table). The layout will measure 60x40 inches and fold in half. As many of you know, I love short lines, switchers, no runaround caboose shoves, industries that receive AND ship freight, and portability (portable) It will fit in the tailgate of most cars in case I want to transport it and it will have storage for the locomotives, cars, and DC/DCC power pack (in case I run older engines). 

 

The track is Atlas Code 83 with an 18 inch minimum radius and 4 Snap Track 18 inch radius turnouts. I know that this roundy round layout isn't everybody's cup of tea, but I hope to share that there are possible options out there. As usual, I put out a car loadings chart. The purpose of this is so that I can plan out the traffic with car cards and to decide on the inventory that I wish to have with regards to rolling stock purchases. I will use a variety of rolling stock. With the transload/team track, I can literally have any freight car on the Port Able Railway's tracks.

 

The operation is simple. I will shuffle my car cards (each piece of rolling stock will have it's own card), then roll a dice. if it rolls an even number, there are 2 cars at the interchange. When cars are ready go back to the interchange, the same will happen in reverse. I downloaded a dice rolling app to my phone and I will use 2 colored 6 sided die, green for incoming and red for outgoing traffic. I figure that setup, operation, and putting away the layout will take approximately 1 hour. I will use a 4:1 fast clock (1 hour is 15 minutes) and only operate 2-3 hours of a crew's work day.

 

A friend on my Tonawanda Island Railroad page in Facebook was the railroad's General Manager. From discussions with him, I learned that he had many varied daily duties. He would run the train; handle billing & paperwork; the railroad's own bills; make phone calls to Conrail the Delaware & Hudson regarding routing and charges; talk to customers and local politicians; maintenance; fueling; filing and typing; and cleaning the toilet (his words). I then came to the realization that the train operations didn't happen for 8 hours each day.

 

My apologies for the terrible puns. Incidentally, the names of the railroad workers are puns as well as the railroad's address, 22 Twain Street. Reading the names with nausea medicine is advised.

 

[F-UnitMad]

1 hour ago, Mike Kieran said:

22 Twain Street. Reading the names with nausea medicine is advised.

Must admit it took a few minutes for that one to register.

Yes your puns are awful but as I'm not above copying & using subtle puns myself I guess I can't complain.

Medecine taken.

 

[Mike Kieran]

[Regularity]

3 hours ago, Mike Kieran said:

the railroad's address, 22 Twain Street

Managed by a Mr. Desmond, no doubt...

[Mike Kieran]

11 hours ago, Regularity said:

Managed by a Mr. Desmond, no doubt...

Not many people get the reference. One of my favorite of Peter Sellers movies.