STR RAILROAD STORY (CON'D)

OPERATION:

Operation is run by a 5 minute hour scale clock, with station to station clearance by phone from the Dispatcher who resides in his office along with the Trainmaster. The dispatcher has a phone calling system and 5 online controlled order boards, which along with writing some 19 orders and recording the session on the Dispatcher's work sheet keeps him busy. The Trainmaster looks after all car movements using a computer printed switchlist system for all freight and passenger movement. Operation is run using a 1910 calender and relating to the date, day, and time as much as possible to set the scene. A 5 minute hour provides a 24 hour day session in two actual hours of operation. A 24 hour clock is also used. The STR Railroad has been under operation since 1960. The regular operating night has been Monday since 1969. The sessions pickup each week where they stopped the session before and continue through 1910 until Dec 31 then begin over again. We have gone through one complete year and are part way into our second. The crew who operate are the "STR OPERATORS" and have ranged from 3 or 4 each night to 11 or 12. A dozen people can be kept busy with all the jobs on the railroad which include - Dispatcher, Trainmaster, 3 Yardmasters, 2 Wayfreight Engineer and Conductor crews, 2 Elevated Engineers, Branchline Engineer, Elevated Conductor, 2 Hostlers and as many on call substitue train crews as may be available. The early years of operation developed a card system for car, engine and van control. This system served very well up until the implementation of a computer switchlist system in 1986. Now all trains, freight and passenger as well as local switcher tasks are handled by computer. This system is currently handling 184 cars including freight, vans, and all varieties of first and second section passenger equipment. The freight is servicing 39 industrial or team track locations. Each morning the main Yardmasters receive orders for local work and a wayfreight run. The wayfreights service the online stations in their own sub. Stump-Gulch receives a through freight order and Marysville receives a 1st and 2nd section passenger train order. The through freight services the Junction there by the branchlines as well as transfers freight from sub to sub. Also the Branchline crew receive orders for the Junction and the branches. In the afternoon each main yard receives another set of wayfreight and local spots, and Marysville gets a through freight order. Stump-Gulch will get two passenger train orders and the Junction gets another local and branchline set. Each train's activity is interdependant on the other for car transfer as well as timing for meets. Interchange at Stump-Gulch is handled through the back of the wye which represents the B&W connection to the outside world. Interchange to other railroads is also practiced through this connection.

SCENERY:

Scenery is hard rock terrain of eastern Ontario with plenty of vegitation and rock outcroppings. Using hardshell technique, rock moulding, and zip texturing the scene has been created. There are plenty of scratch built bridges and trestles in wood as well as stone bridges and retaining walls. The mountain effect at Iron Pot Mine rises up behind the valance out of site to give the effect of being in the hills. Various weeds and lichen are used for the foliage providing a wide variety of tress and shrubs. The horizon line is high enough that only one wall has yet to be painted with a background scene. Lighting for the scene is done behind a valance except over the yards and uses white incandescent 25 watt bulbs color toned with amber and red smaller lights. The building lights are controlled by a photo transistor system lighted through a clear or partially masked disk that is run in sync with the clocks. The buildings, platforms and street lights are all sectioned as well as the overhead is sectioned east and west to provide realistic on and off cycling of all lighting. The dimmers for creation of night have yet to be installed. Night overhead will be a general blue lighting.

STRUCTURES:MOTIVEPOWER AND ROLLING STOCK:TRIP

All will be in continuing issues to follow.

OPERATING NIGHT:

The trick or treat job switches seems to have helped in the interest and improved sessions. All crews keep up the good work.

PLACES IN THE DISTRICT:

Where can I get a rest?

That is the all-important query that an increasing number of men and women have to face IN THESE DAYS OF RUSH AND EXCITEMENT AND NERVOUS STRAIN. Business men and professional men and even men of leisure require changes of scene and employment some time in the year, and there is no time like "the good old summer time". We believe there are few places on the continent that can offer to the pleasure seeker, and the man looking for a rest, such delightful attractions as the places we propose calling your attention to in this column. We can suggest places where you can have absolute quiet and rest, and scenes that the poet and artist might revel in. We can suggest fishing grounds that have no equal in any inland waters in America. Lake and park, walk and drive, each vie with one another in wooing the traveller to its patrticular charm; and with all for less cost than can be found at almost any other summer resort. Many people have heard, as in a dream, of the Rideau Lakes. In a short time these waters are bound to become the summer home for Eastern Ontario, and will attract to their shores and islands many from far away.

BROCKVILLE:

Brockville is very closly associated with the Rideau Lakes, for with the majority of travellers it will always be the connecting link between the outside world and the Lakes. The road through these far-famed grounds begins in Brockville. The head offices of the road are at Brockville, and here live the men who operate the road, and make it go. The road gets its name, Brockville, Westport and North-Western, from Brockville. The town itself is of considerable interest, situated as it is on the west bank of the world's greatest river, the St Lawrence, it has come to be a sumnmer resort of much importance. "Beautiful for situation" few towns in Canada can boast of the same varied attractions. It lies just at the foot of the THOUSAND ISLANDS and every day the pleasure seeking travellers can, for a small cost, enjoy an excursion in almost any direction. Then the town is not without its associations of historical interest. It's history reaches back even to the days of French regime and the stirring scenes marking the conquest of Canada. In its immediate vicinity, among a labyrinth of islands, are yet to be seen many relics of the days when soldiers of the French King and their deadly enemies, the savage Iroquois, fought for supremacy; and many are the legends of those days retold to tourists. As the travellers with a taste for archeology glide among the numerous and intricate channels, evidences are to be seen everywhere recalling the aboriginal denizens of what was then the forest primeval. The real settlement of Brockville began much like the settlement of most other places. One day in 1787 Adam Cole happened along, and decided that this was a more likely place to live in than where he had been living, and then and there began to build a town. The next year William Buell came along and took up a piece of land, and he was followed by Charles Jones, who also settled there. These men were all United Empire Loyalists. They knew what they were doing, why they were coming, and they laid the foundations of the town deep and wide. (To be con'd)

Taken from W J Curle 1905

This is the second issue of the STR Railroad Weekly, more will follow.

Prez Bill Ackland