Empire City Station Part 1

Greetings All,

Several weeks ago I visited my LHS to check on their annual winter sale. I came across a used Walthers Bailey Savings & Loan building kit still unbuilt in the box with a very decent price tag plus an additional 20% off. I thought this would be a good candidate for my Empire City Station which lacked such a building so I made the purchase.

Once home I taped the building together and placed it on a piece of plywood that spanned the tracks. The steel columns holding the plywood up are intended for a wedding cake. I bought them about 25 years and three layouts ago. 

I tried the plywood at a height even with the upper level. The whole thing at that height just didn't look right so I continued with the scene at this lower height.

The plywood is about 24'' long from left to right with just enough coverage that doesn't totally hide the trains.

A pair of tunnels give vehicular access to the station.

With vehicular access comes vehicle parking so I'm thinking a small parking lot where we see the cars turning in.

After disassembling the building I washed all parts in warm soapy water, rinsed them well and let them air dry. I then put the building together using Bondene from Plastruct. The building was painted with a rattle can gray. 

My next step was to apply a mortar wash of one part dark gray, one part alcohol and two parts water. It's subtle and gives the block some depth. The door and widows were sprayed with rattle can gold. I scraped the gold off the frames where it contacts the building walls and again used Bondene to attach the window frames to the walls and window 'glass' to the frames.

I placed some of my more eye catching figures and vehicles in the scene and continued to evaluate it.

One thing that bothered me was the center of the roof has this circle from the manufacturing process that needed to be addressed. BTW the roof is painted a rattle can dark gray with lines from a #2 pencil and straight edge. 

Enter this little structure leftover from a Walthers Bralick Building kit that I built and painted to match the station. That looks better!

I continued adding rooftop building details like the chimney and water tank from unneeded parts from the Bralick Building kit that I used as a building flat as seen in my Condos for Sale post. I also lettered the station with some stick on vinyl letters.  

I thought the water tower was a little big so I swapped it for this one from a Bachmann Spectrum City Series Building kit.

The large water tank at its new home on top of the Algonquin Hotel

The station is now open for business. The yellow and black cars are stand ins for taxis. Pedestrians and vehicles go about their business including the well known blue & white VW belonging to the Kings Port Railfan Society.

I'm happy with how the structure turned out and its overall size looks proportionate to the scene. The white wedding cake towers have been painted rattle can black and I like the way they look.

Next up is to work on the foam board foundation over the tracks.

The current height of the foam board base will allow loaded tri level auto racks and double stack container cars to pass under it with no issues. The pedestrian bridge in the foreground however limits the double stacks to the rear two tracks. 

Thanks for reading!!!

See Ya Soon!!!