Overview
Our version of the Tallulah Falls Railroad begins inside an enclosed screen porch and laundry area that overlooks the backyard., with a pair of miniature doors that allow access to the great outdoors beyond. The track will head east out of the doors, then immediately turn north to run alongside the fence toward the back of the lot. The track will make a huge "U" shape as it turns to follow the back fence, then turns again to run alongside the opposite fence back toward the house. The track will then continue along that fence down the driveway, terminating directly across from the front porch. In model railroading terms this is described as a "point to point" layout - certainly the typical situation with real railroads, but a distinction from the variations on the continuous running loop layouts that date to the toy train era. Continuous running is nice, though, so a pair of return loops at Cornelia and Rabun Gap will allow trains to run unattended.
Track Plan
Depicted below is Version 1.0 of this plan, the railroad superimposed atop a landscaping plan that was prepared for us by a friend who was in a landscape architecture program a few years ago. Unfortunately, only a tiny fraction of this plan has actually been implemented, so this plan is most useful for showing the overall orientation of the house, the porch, the back deck, as well as the general layout of the rest of the lot.
Not yet shown are the sidings that will serve depots and industries. Also missing from the drawing is a short spur line that will originate at Tugalo Junction and proceed toward the house a little ways, depicting the spurs that were built to facilitate construction of a series of Georgia Power dams between 1913 and the early 1920's.
Planning any model railroad is always a tug-of-war between the number, size and complexity of the communities and industries we'd like to model, as well the amount of space to be left over for picturesque, open-countryside running. Even with the seemingly enormous amount of space available with an entire backyard and the small size of the TFRR, the size of these models require that a variety of choices and compromises must still be made to ensure that we don't end up with towns so close together that a train's locomotive will pull into a town while the caboose is still in the last.
For this reason, a few of the towns and all of the whistle-stop communities indicated on the TFRR timetable must regrettably be cut, with the possibility of at least one more being left out. Complicating matters further is a couple of non-town "must have" scenes of personal interest, such as the big trestle at Wiley, the dam in Tallulah Gorge and the Stuckey's at Tallulah Point. Whenever possible, photographs, postcards, maps and track diagrams will inform the selection of the specific rail-side businesses to be modeled from the few that still exist and the many that have vanished beneath the sands of time.
Through an amazing coincidence, the natural desirable spacing of the towns along the line and the slope of the land are such that the changing elevation for the garden railroad will generally mirror the change in elevation for the real TFRR. Specifically, there will be a slight drop in elevation between Cornelia and Demorest, then the road will climb all the way to Mountain City, where the real-world Continental Divide is found. From there the line will lose elevation heading down the driveway toward Franklin.
Operations
For me the primary goal of the railroad will be operations, which is the model railroading term for the game of actually running your railroad - moving freight cars between on-line customers and the connection points with other railroads in a way that makes some kind of economic sense. For a more complete discussion on this topic please see the Operations Plan.
In the meantime, suffice to say that the businesses I plan to model will be selected to depict a cross section of the actual traffic that was being moved on the TFRR at its heyday, which was between its completion at the turn of the century and the arrival of the Great Depression. At that time EVERYTHING that came into those three counties traveled by rail - passengers, mail, packages and crates, and also the carload bulk shipments that is more typical of today's railroading. Flowing out of the counties was the output of a few manufacturers, but mostly it was forest resources and agricultural products: apples, cattle, cabbage lumber and plenty of King Cotton. Of course, it is completely inaccurate to depict the TFRR in the mid-1950's and have this level of robust activity, but that's one of my artistic licenses for the entire project; I will freely cherry-pick history to show my favorite aspects of the TFRR.
Scale
The actual track is 1.77" (45mm) between the railheads, commonly referred to as "G Scale", though "G Gauge" would be more accurate. This track size is also referred to as "#1". Structures will be constructed at 1:24, where the simplicity of "half inch to the foot" scale conversions easily trumps for me any complaints about this scale's position out in the middle of actual scale narrow gauge (1:20) and mainline (1:32) railroading. Likewise rolling stock is mostly either 1:22.5 or 1:24.
Anyone who is wondering about this mish-mash of scale sizes should take a look at this essay at George Schreyer's site for an introduction to this topic. I was astonished to learn that this end of model railroading has products in a variety of scales. All run on the same 45mm track, but some will look grossly out of proportion with others. For example, careful selection must be made when buying figures lest you end up with either giants or a bunch of midgets.
Motive Power
All locos will be outfitted with lithium-ion batteries and a Quantum Magnum + G-Wire, a combination loco controller/sound card and matching radio receiver. This means NO electrified track to deal with on the entire railroad! The track will be track only, thus sidestepping the endless conductivity and wiring hassles associated with virtually all model railroads in smaller scales. Instead, the hand-held transmitting controller will allow the operator to walk along with the train through the garden changing speeds, direction, blowing the whistle, ringing the bell and everything else as if he or she were right in the cab.
Here are the essential TFRR locos to be modeled:
* TF #77: 1909 Baldwin 4-6-0 "Ten Wheeler"
Pulled passenger and mail trains pre-1946.
This is an easy one to model, as Bachmann Trains produces an inexpensive and decent looking replica of the Baldwin Ten Wheeler in 1:22.5. We found a great deal on this one on ebay and put it on the mantle until more track is laid.
* TF #78: 1899 Baldwin 2-8-0 "Consolidation"
Pulled freight trains pre-1948.
Aristocraft makes a great looking 2-8-0 as part of their "Classics" line, the old Delton 1:24 line of models. This is a more expensive loco, so this one will be a while in coming.
* TF #501: 1948 General Electric 70-Ton Switch Engine
With its twin #502, pulled all trains from 1948-1961.
No one makes this loco in G gauge, so I'm actually planning to make this little 500 hp diesel switcher from scratch using a pair of powered trucks from a USA Trains NW-2 for the power. Its basically two rectangles on a flat platform, so how hard can it be, right? Famous last words, I know...
* Georgia Power #? : 0-4-0 steam switch engine
Moved men and materials through all phases of dam construction
This was another easy one to model thanks to Aristocraft's 0-4-0 switcher. Supposedly this model is 1:29 scale, but it looks completely reasonable to me when placed side-by-side with the 1:22.5 Bachmann Ten Wheeler. Strictly speaking Bachmann's 0-4-0 "Docksider" tank engine would have been more accurate for modeling the fleet of "dinkys" that roamed the Georgia Power spur lines, but the tender will add a huge amount of space when I'll be making the conversion to batteries and radio control. In terms of operations, this unit will be assigned to move seasonal and other specials trains, such as movement of fill dirt for the dam site, log loads to the sawmill, or short open hoppers of apples or cabbage. For this expanded role on the mainline, a tender is thus justified.
The longer wish list would include:
* Aristocraft's Alco RS-3
The RS-3 is my favorite diesel road engine. Painted in the lovely Southern Railway green paint scheme, its justification for service on the TFRR that it would be run as a loaner from the parent company while #501 was getting tune ups. This model is actually scaled to 1:29, so it would be a little undersized against my 1:22.5 and 1:24 rolling stock, but not enough so to make me ditch the idea.
* TF #201: self-propelled gas-electric railcar
Towards the end the TFRR had a "doodlebug" that was used to deliver the mail less expensively than running the whole train. The shell of this car still exists today! Hartland Locomotive Works makes a reasonable 1:24 scale copy of this car:
...but the truth is I much prefer the old-timey look of the version they make representing gas-electric service from 40 years earlier, so artistic license may lead to yet another temporal incongruity on this point.
* TFRR Executive Car #97
Need I say a word? How can you not want to model this awesome railcar?
Town by Town
Cornelia
Cornelia was the southern terminus of the TFRR, where the railroad interchanged with parent company Southern Railway.
The indoor elements model a small section near the throat of the Cornelia Yard, including the two-stall TF engine shop/barn, as well as a machine shop and 10,000 gallon water tank shown on the 1922 Sanborn Fire Insurance map. The entire yard is removable to allow access to our clothes washer and dryer below.
Here's the Sanborn map showing the same ladder track, though I had to flip the orientation to get to the door to the outside. The rectangular building in the lower right corner of the red box is the TFRR's two stall engine house/barn.
Here's the pair of tracks that I've reproduced in the far left corner of the little yard, which capture the machine shop and the water tank. In fact, these were behind the shop rather than in front of it, but that's another adjustment made to try to squeeze as much of the reality into the model as possible.
Eventually overhead cabinets will be mounted over the entire scene, creating more of a shadowbox effect. More detail will be added to the entire scene, including sky blue for the backdrop, a "flat" (1" deep) version of the machine shop, and models of the water tank and the engine shop.
