Expanding the Empire...

Like any good American, I see opportunity in real estate. Call it Manifest Destiny, or if that's offensive to you, call it something else. When I placed my 36" x 80" N scale model railroad into a rather large basement in Nebraska, it looked really small. I mean tiny. Since I model the mighty Pennsylvania Railraod, the self-proclaimed Standard Railroad of the World, I asked myself, what would the PRR do when confronted with the same situation?

EXPAND.

Of course. It's so simple. But wait...! I'm a military guy, and I move every 2-3 years. How can I expand this thing and still know that it'll fit into some future home I haven't even seen yet? Well, that took a leap of faith. But how to expand? What to add?

The main thing holding me back from experiencing real model railroad operations on my glorified roundy-round was a lack of staging for off-layout trains. I had made a tiny, rickety 3-track yard that wasn't anything to look at and added only marginal play value. But this time I wanted to do it right. Not wired to do anything half-assed, I threw my whole ass into it and added a classification yard with an engine terminal. Because it sits "railroad east" of my fictional depiction of the PRR's famed Middle Division, it became the famous Enola Yard outside of Harrisburg, PA.



So now trains can be made up, broken down, or staged, and locomotives have a place to be serviced.