I’ve started this “blog” website over 2 years ago. It was meant to be a place to journal my progress on building my layout and share my journey with building my model railroad. The Chicago & Northwestern Marshline Subdivision. I’ve had some wavering moments, where I’ve wanted to call it quits on the Marshline – Go back to the Mascoutin Valley or model another part of the Chicago Northwestern system. The pictures below show my modeling progress of the last two years. Planning, work, rework, money and time spent on what? 60% of 8 feet of module? Hmmm.
Biting off more than you can chew?
So to recap the Marshline subdivision in the 1970’s was a 25 station stop branchline that traveled from Fond du Lac to Marshfield. That’s alot to model. I felt modeling all of the towns on the line would take years, and space and resources that I didn’t have. Not to mention the money! I would have needed about 50 engines and 500 pieces of rolling stock to make this dream work! That being said, I’ve recently scaled back the layout plan to the early 1980’s where much of the line had been abandoned and it was only a 3 station branch.
Looking back on my progress, have I bitten off more than I can chew? Right now I’m struggling to complete one module, one section of my layout! I really want to keep going, but I just feel like I can’t make any real progress to the end goal of recreating the Marshline! Recreating the memories of a railroad I watched when I was a kid. I’m starting to think that building one module to completion and then building another module to completion may not have been the best method to build this layout. At least not for me. I think I have to have the distraction to be able to mindlessly run trains around the track for an hour or two to keep me engaged in the project. I think by not having that ability to operate in between work sessions has really limited my engagement and progress.
So now what?
I think its back to the drawing board for the Chicago & Northwestern Marshline Subdivision. I’m not going to totally ditch the project. I’m going to retool it. Again…
I’m going to take a look at the space that I have and couple that with a simple design that can get me running trains quickly. Because I feel like If I can’t run trains soon, I may lose sight of building this layout altogether. The one module approach was not for me. Tried it, got the T-Shirt, now its its time to move on…ONWARD!
I’ll add little video series showing some of my moments planning and building the Chicago & Northwestern Marshline. Thanks for reading along with me and remember to Keep ‘er in Notch 8!
Second Section Podcast 