Greetings All,
One of the benefits of keeping and posting this blog is that it serves as an historic record of what has transpired on the New York Central Layout and all of the other modeling projects I've undertaken over the years. Here's a review of the year 2022.
In my opening blogpost in January 2022 I went into some details about what I wanted to accomplish with the layout, my rolling stock and locomotive fleets in 2022. Rereading it I think I achieved a good number of these modeling goals.
Locomotive Spotlights
Ten Locomotive Spotlights introduced in January 2002 ran the gamut from New York Central FAs to a Southern Pacific E7A. I enjoyed the research and presenting them here on the blog.
It should be no surprise that the New York Central Alco FA-FBs were the first units featured in the Locomotive Spotlight series.
Locomotive Spotlight #8 featured the Rapido Amtrak E8A 4316 which has the distinction of being my first ever preordered locomotive.
Freight Car Spotlights
This series focused on mostly new additions and examined the models while comparing them to the prototypes.
In Freight Car Spotlight #3 I took an in-depth look at model and prototype Trailer on Flatcar /T.O.F.C rolling stock and traffic.
Passenger Train Spotlight
This series kind of wandered away from the New York Central passenger trains and included trains from the Long Island and Lehigh Valley.
Passenger Train Spotlight #1 featured some good research into Lehigh Valley Trains #28 & #29 "The John Wilkes".
Random Running
The random running series featured a few videos of various railroads running thru the layout or being substituted during model railroad operations around the layout. The Lehigh Valley once again enjoyed some layout time in Random Running #1.
A Little More Prototype
This year I paid closer attention to some prototypical railroad practices especially as it pertained to the movement of hazardous materials. Following the guidelines in the Penn Central Hazardous Material Regulations of 1969 that I received from 1:1 PC Ralph. I adopted much of what was in the book within reason to my model railroad operations.
Locomotives no longer couple directly to tanks cars with flammable loads.
A minimum of two cars are used as a buffer to protect the crew whether they are in a locomotive or caboose.
Yard A was established adjacent Pier 16 following the Bush Terminal RR's Yard A that served the sprawling Brooklyn NY waterfront warehouses handling one thousand cars a day at times.
A switch engine is assigned to Yard A to organize and move the freight traffic between the yard, the consignees at Terminal Warehouse & Cold Storage and Terminal Yard itself.
In the Spring I joined the Operations Special Interest Group also known as Opsig. I followed along with their youtube virtual meetups and receive the Dispatcher's Office quarterly. I found it both interesting and very helpful in understanding how freight moves via our rail system. This led to my operational enhancements at Terminal Warehouse & Cold Storage.
In September Terminal Warehouse & Cold Storage added several tenants to its large three building complex to enhance operations.
Historical Pieces
The NYCTL hosted visiting dignitary 1:1 scale Alco Joe in May and he later sent me this brick piece from the Mingo Junction Roundhouse. It is placed in the Terminal Yard engine terminal and we've learned that may be some magic in that rock.
Virtual Model Railroad Operations
Operations continued to be enhanced and refined as noted above and I had the good fortune to participate in a total of eight Penn Central Car Movements with PC Ralph's Kings Port Division and Sir Neal's Atlantic Pacific Railroad. I also ran many solo op sessions using the car card and waybill system I employed starting in 2020.
A Little More Freelance
The seven part Holiday Trackage Rights series offered a large amount of freelance train running and railfanning. New York Central Alcos eye an A-B-B-A set of Santa Fe War Bonnets at Empire City. These war bonnet engines remind me of the Sears Wish Book Christmas catalog from my youth.
The CSX 911"Honoring Our First Responders" locomotive was one of three unique locomotives that rolled out of their Huntington West Virginia shop in 2019. I'm only off by fourteen years.
Locomotive Service Bulletins
The first bulletin of 2022 was for how to repair the couplings that attach the driveshaft to the worm gears on Bachmann locomotives.
This issue has raised its ugly head a few times during the year and this CSX Dash 8 was pulled from the 2022 H.T.R. series for these exact repairs.
Bloopers
Whether running train operations or just railfanning the NYCTL did have its share of derailments of which only one made it to the public eye. That would be the derailment in PCCM 97, The Annual Holiday Coal Op where the Big Hook was called out.
In an unpublished 2022 Conrail Op session this mishegas occurred. This was the first use of some upgraded CR equipment in an op session but it was an EBRR car that caused the pile up.
Layout Improvements
In 2022 I made a couple of layout improvements that included a stone wall backdrop, jersey barriers and the addition of 1:87 Emery.
North Side Yard was greatly improved with the additions of the East Coast Circuits Jersey barriers and the paving of the lot.
1:87 Emery also an East Coast Circuits product took a photographer friendly location at Empire Produce to catch the action around Empire City.
In October I added some retaining wall backdrops around the layout using bulletin board paper. Empire City Station went from this;
To this;
Paint Shop Reports
2022 was a pretty quiet year for the Patti O Paint Shop. A couple of decent paint projects did come out of the shop like this ten car TP&W boxcar paint project with the cars supplied by 1:1 Sir Neal. Five cars went to the APRR and five remained with the NYCTL for the PCCM virtual ops.
Additional Projects
Several other projects were undertaken at the end of the year and will presented in 2023. These include some major improvements to my train layout environment.
Happy New Year
From my layout to yours, from me to you best wishes for a happy and healthy New Year.
Happy New Year from Empire City!!!
Thanks for reading and watching!!!!
Hope you'll come back in 2023!!!
