Date
1 - 18 of 18
A Purpose For Frt Car Distribution Studies.
With respect to the 'purpose' ...
I think it has been left unsaid that it is very common to go to an NP
layout and see far too many NP cars - or to a B&O layout and see almost
nothing but B&O cars. And when you look at a picture of a freight yard
or freight train "it just isn't so". The point is that some (many?) of
us get too wrapped up in our favorite railroad and tend to have way too
many freight cars for "our" railroad on our layouts. There are hundreds
of reasons why we do this - a new model comes out and it is killer so we
buy 10 of them instead of 1, a model of a very unique car for out RR is
sitting on the shelf and we just have to have one (or more), we just
love the look of lots of our favorite RR, etc., etc., etc. And let's not
forget that many of us have a 'second favorite' or even a 3rd - that is
also going to encourage us to over-populate. The layouts I'm talking
about are the ones that it takes a great deal of imagination to stretch
the skew enough to justify the number of 'favorite road' cars ... far
more than just the 'need' to represent that one lumber train over Sherman
Hill.
Those layouts that are seriously over-represented with cars from a
small set of RRs just "feel wrong" when you op there. I've op'ed on a
couple where it was so over done that you stopped paying any attention
to the road name part of the car number when trying to locate or spot
a particular car ... because they all seemed to be from the "home road".
We've all op'ed or visited layouts like this.
Having said that - I personally do not think it makes a big difference
whether you take the national percentages and try to match them for your
layout. I -do- think it is important to have enough 'foreign road' cars
that things "feel right" ... but I think that taking it to the nth degree
with respect to the research is ... well to put it bluntly ... totally
nutso and missint the point. That approach is not for me. But that's me.
And that's my opinion.
What I do is this - I try to have a "fair number" of freight cars in
my fleet that are from 'foreign roads' ... but I have to admit that I
have too many from my favorite, 2nd favorite, and 3rd favorite ...
when compared to any national average. But I also think that you should
have some cars that are from RRs that had relatively small percentages
of the national fleet - because even the RRs with the largest percentages
didn't dominate and the actual 'rule' was that there were lots of smaller
RRs that added up to the majority of the freight car pool.
But I also have an advantage over most of you in that my layout is a
club layout and we don't have permanent freight cars on our layout. We
bring the cars we select and set them up before each op session (usually
freight car forwarding with car cards and way bills). We also have op
themes which means that this month the theme might be "Santa Fe in the 50's"
and next month it might be "SP in the 60's" and the month after that it
might be "The SP&S in any year" ... and each member selects freight cars
for that run using a rule of "50% for the home road and the rest from other
roads - if you have them" and so our runs have a different mix and even
different cars from op session to op session - based not only on the
changing themes but also on which members show up for that particular
run and what they chose to put in the case this time.
As had been said on many lists and many times - your methods may vary.
- Jim (Betz) in San Jose
I think it has been left unsaid that it is very common to go to an NP
layout and see far too many NP cars - or to a B&O layout and see almost
nothing but B&O cars. And when you look at a picture of a freight yard
or freight train "it just isn't so". The point is that some (many?) of
us get too wrapped up in our favorite railroad and tend to have way too
many freight cars for "our" railroad on our layouts. There are hundreds
of reasons why we do this - a new model comes out and it is killer so we
buy 10 of them instead of 1, a model of a very unique car for out RR is
sitting on the shelf and we just have to have one (or more), we just
love the look of lots of our favorite RR, etc., etc., etc. And let's not
forget that many of us have a 'second favorite' or even a 3rd - that is
also going to encourage us to over-populate. The layouts I'm talking
about are the ones that it takes a great deal of imagination to stretch
the skew enough to justify the number of 'favorite road' cars ... far
more than just the 'need' to represent that one lumber train over Sherman
Hill.
Those layouts that are seriously over-represented with cars from a
small set of RRs just "feel wrong" when you op there. I've op'ed on a
couple where it was so over done that you stopped paying any attention
to the road name part of the car number when trying to locate or spot
a particular car ... because they all seemed to be from the "home road".
We've all op'ed or visited layouts like this.
Having said that - I personally do not think it makes a big difference
whether you take the national percentages and try to match them for your
layout. I -do- think it is important to have enough 'foreign road' cars
that things "feel right" ... but I think that taking it to the nth degree
with respect to the research is ... well to put it bluntly ... totally
nutso and missint the point. That approach is not for me. But that's me.
And that's my opinion.
What I do is this - I try to have a "fair number" of freight cars in
my fleet that are from 'foreign roads' ... but I have to admit that I
have too many from my favorite, 2nd favorite, and 3rd favorite ...
when compared to any national average. But I also think that you should
have some cars that are from RRs that had relatively small percentages
of the national fleet - because even the RRs with the largest percentages
didn't dominate and the actual 'rule' was that there were lots of smaller
RRs that added up to the majority of the freight car pool.
But I also have an advantage over most of you in that my layout is a
club layout and we don't have permanent freight cars on our layout. We
bring the cars we select and set them up before each op session (usually
freight car forwarding with car cards and way bills). We also have op
themes which means that this month the theme might be "Santa Fe in the 50's"
and next month it might be "SP in the 60's" and the month after that it
might be "The SP&S in any year" ... and each member selects freight cars
for that run using a rule of "50% for the home road and the rest from other
roads - if you have them" and so our runs have a different mix and even
different cars from op session to op session - based not only on the
changing themes but also on which members show up for that particular
run and what they chose to put in the case this time.
As had been said on many lists and many times - your methods may vary.
- Jim (Betz) in San Jose
Mike Brock <brockm@...>
Jim Betz says:
"Having said that - I personally do not think it makes a big difference
whether you take the national percentages and try to match them for your
layout. I -do- think it is important to have enough 'foreign road' cars
that things "feel right" ... but I think that taking it to the nth degree
with respect to the research is ... well to put it bluntly ... totally
nutso and missint the point. That approach is not for me. But that's me.
And that's my opinion."
Which is as good as anyone's. The real value...to me...in the hypothesis put forth by Dave Nelson and Tim Gilbert is that it has driven us away from over populating our layouts with home road cars...as Jim says. I will admit, however, that I get a bit of interest when I see something unusual...like the 8 at least Mopac hoppers laden with coal sitting on Santa Fe tracks in San Bernadino in around 1950 as shown in the Warbonnet, First Quarter 2008. Richard has explained this...the Kaiser plant received such coal. Still...unexpected at first glance. Hmmm. Wonder what they would do to the hypothesis...let alone the pool of cars being used by a modeler of Cahon Pass. Yahoo...Andy Sperandeo, Ted York?
Mike Brock
"Having said that - I personally do not think it makes a big difference
whether you take the national percentages and try to match them for your
layout. I -do- think it is important to have enough 'foreign road' cars
that things "feel right" ... but I think that taking it to the nth degree
with respect to the research is ... well to put it bluntly ... totally
nutso and missint the point. That approach is not for me. But that's me.
And that's my opinion."
Which is as good as anyone's. The real value...to me...in the hypothesis put forth by Dave Nelson and Tim Gilbert is that it has driven us away from over populating our layouts with home road cars...as Jim says. I will admit, however, that I get a bit of interest when I see something unusual...like the 8 at least Mopac hoppers laden with coal sitting on Santa Fe tracks in San Bernadino in around 1950 as shown in the Warbonnet, First Quarter 2008. Richard has explained this...the Kaiser plant received such coal. Still...unexpected at first glance. Hmmm. Wonder what they would do to the hypothesis...let alone the pool of cars being used by a modeler of Cahon Pass. Yahoo...Andy Sperandeo, Ted York?
Mike Brock
Charlie Vlk
It would be nice if this topic would get integrated into the mainstream Model Railroad Hobby.....
Having been in both the manufacturing and distribution end of the Industry, there is WAY too much sales regionalism in
roadnames.... (and I'm not even going to broach the tendency for people to buy the colorful and unusual over what
they really "need" to represent the prototype on their railroads!!).
While we might overbuy our favorite prototype road, those of us that have fictional home roads probably underpopulate
our railroads with cars for it due to the task of decaling or having custom runs done.
It is interesting to think about the distribution of roadnames and car types on a particular stretch of modeled railroad....
and to figure out how that should impact how the cars are waybilled. I don't think schemes that purely randomize the
car assignment by type without regard to owner duplicate the prototype. The car accounting rules and interchange
conventions between roads forced patterns that flavored the consists of individual trains.
Maybe Ted could think about this as a sidebar to his "Essential Freight Cars" series to provide the answer to the unwashed
as to WHY a Soo Line or Pennsy car is essential, even though a person models ATSF or B&M, etc..... I think MR had a
piece that opened the subject of car interchange rules and the accounting that was supposed to drive utilization of the fleet...
but perhaps more needs to be said on the subject, both for the general modeling public and as a handy authoritative reference for
more sophisticated students of freight cars....
Charlie Vlk
It
Having been in both the manufacturing and distribution end of the Industry, there is WAY too much sales regionalism in
roadnames.... (and I'm not even going to broach the tendency for people to buy the colorful and unusual over what
they really "need" to represent the prototype on their railroads!!).
While we might overbuy our favorite prototype road, those of us that have fictional home roads probably underpopulate
our railroads with cars for it due to the task of decaling or having custom runs done.
It is interesting to think about the distribution of roadnames and car types on a particular stretch of modeled railroad....
and to figure out how that should impact how the cars are waybilled. I don't think schemes that purely randomize the
car assignment by type without regard to owner duplicate the prototype. The car accounting rules and interchange
conventions between roads forced patterns that flavored the consists of individual trains.
Maybe Ted could think about this as a sidebar to his "Essential Freight Cars" series to provide the answer to the unwashed
as to WHY a Soo Line or Pennsy car is essential, even though a person models ATSF or B&M, etc..... I think MR had a
piece that opened the subject of car interchange rules and the accounting that was supposed to drive utilization of the fleet...
but perhaps more needs to be said on the subject, both for the general modeling public and as a handy authoritative reference for
more sophisticated students of freight cars....
Charlie Vlk
It
water.kresse@...
Folks,
Even though this discussion "appears" to go on fo ever, Dick Argo did a good presentation on what was freight car distribution in the C&O Parsons Yard, Columbus, Ohio, in the 1950s. A lot of lines run east-west through or just north of Columbus . . . including a PRR yard just north the C&O yard. I don't believe his study would meet the statistical standards needed by this group . . . . just notes over time taken while working as an "on call" diesel switch engine fireman or a rail-fan.
I've found some great C&O related FC images taken out in St. Louis, MO (boxes), Los Angeles, CA (scrap aluminum and steel gons), and up in Minnesota (coal gons). These freight cars sure do get around.
Al Kresse
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
Even though this discussion "appears" to go on fo ever, Dick Argo did a good presentation on what was freight car distribution in the C&O Parsons Yard, Columbus, Ohio, in the 1950s. A lot of lines run east-west through or just north of Columbus . . . including a PRR yard just north the C&O yard. I don't believe his study would meet the statistical standards needed by this group . . . . just notes over time taken while working as an "on call" diesel switch engine fireman or a rail-fan.
I've found some great C&O related FC images taken out in St. Louis, MO (boxes), Los Angeles, CA (scrap aluminum and steel gons), and up in Minnesota (coal gons). These freight cars sure do get around.
Al Kresse
-------------- Original message --------------
From: "Charlie Vlk" <cvlk@...>
It would be nice if this topic would get integrated into the mainstream Model Railroad Hobby.....
Having been in both the manufacturing and distribution end of the Industry, there is WAY too much sales regionalism in
roadnames.... (and I'm not even going to broach the tendency for people to buy the colorful and unusual over what
they really "need" to represent the prototype on their railroads!!).
While we might overbuy our favorite prototype road, those of us that have fictional home roads probably underpopulate
our railroads with cars for it due to the task of decaling or having custom runs done.
It is interesting to think about the distribution of roadnames and car types on a particular stretch of modeled railroad....
and to figure out how that should impact how the cars are waybilled. I don't think schemes that purely randomize the
car assignment by type without regard to owner duplicate the prototype. The car accounting rules and interchange
conventions between roads forced patterns that flavored the consists of individual trains.
Maybe Ted could think about this as a sidebar to his "Essential Freight Cars" series to provide the answer to the unwashed
as to WHY a Soo Line or Pennsy car is essential, even though a person models ATSF or B&M, etc..... I think MR had a
piece that opened the subject of car interchange rules and the accounting that was supposed to drive utilization of the fleet...
but perhaps more needs to be said on the subject, both for the general modeling public and as a handy authoritative reference for
more sophisticated students of freight cars....
Charlie Vlk
It
From: "Charlie Vlk" <cvlk@...>
It would be nice if this topic would get integrated into the mainstream Model Railroad Hobby.....
Having been in both the manufacturing and distribution end of the Industry, there is WAY too much sales regionalism in
roadnames.... (and I'm not even going to broach the tendency for people to buy the colorful and unusual over what
they really "need" to represent the prototype on their railroads!!).
While we might overbuy our favorite prototype road, those of us that have fictional home roads probably underpopulate
our railroads with cars for it due to the task of decaling or having custom runs done.
It is interesting to think about the distribution of roadnames and car types on a particular stretch of modeled railroad....
and to figure out how that should impact how the cars are waybilled. I don't think schemes that purely randomize the
car assignment by type without regard to owner duplicate the prototype. The car accounting rules and interchange
conventions between roads forced patterns that flavored the consists of individual trains.
Maybe Ted could think about this as a sidebar to his "Essential Freight Cars" series to provide the answer to the unwashed
as to WHY a Soo Line or Pennsy car is essential, even though a person models ATSF or B&M, etc..... I think MR had a
piece that opened the subject of car interchange rules and the accounting that was supposed to drive utilization of the fleet...
but perhaps more needs to be said on the subject, both for the general modeling public and as a handy authoritative reference for
more sophisticated students of freight cars....
Charlie Vlk
It
With respect to the 'purpose' ...
I think it has been left unsaid that it is very common to go to an NP
layout and see far too many NP cars - or to a B&O layout and see almost
nothing but B&O cars.
My impression of most club layouts is that anachronism is a far
worse distraction than reporting marks. At least with good staging
the percent of reporting marks can be corrected, while the anachronisms
are impossible to fix. (They can only be surgically removed.) I've only
seen a few home layouts in my region, and when it comes to freight cars
well... the word "irremediable" comes to mind.
Tim O'Connor
Anthony Thompson <thompson@...>
Al Brown wrote:
Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@...
Publishers of books on railroad history
What?!? You mean that Coast Guard guided-missile car shouldn't have arch-bar trucks??!? Say it ain't so!Well, at least the missile, its markings, and the launcher are accurate <g>.
Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@...
Publishers of books on railroad history
Dang, there goes my searchlight car...
Prototype N Scale Models (TM)
by George Hollwedel
310 Loma Verde St
Buda, TX 78610-9785
512-796-6883
www.micro-trains.com/sr-0806-hollwedelATSF.php
www.micro-trains.com/hollwedel.php
www.imrcmodels.com/n/sr/html/GHollATSFExpressN.htm
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
Prototype N Scale Models (TM)
by George Hollwedel
310 Loma Verde St
Buda, TX 78610-9785
512-796-6883
www.micro-trains.com/sr-0806-hollwedelATSF.php
www.micro-trains.com/hollwedel.php
www.imrcmodels.com/n/sr/html/GHollATSFExpressN.htm
--- On Fri, 8/15/08, al_brown03 <abrown@...> wrote:
From: al_brown03 <abrown@...>
Subject: [STMFC] Re: A Purpose For Frt Car Distribution Studies.
To: STMFC@...
Date: Friday, August 15, 2008, 3:18 PM
--- In STMFC@..., Tim O'Connor
<timboconnor@...> wrote:is a far
My impression of most club layouts is that anachronismworse distraction than reporting marks.What?!? You mean that Coast Guard guided-missile car
shouldn't have
arch-bar trucks??!? Say it ain't so!
Al Brown, Melbourne, Fla.
------------------------------------
Yahoo! Groups Links
Malcolm Laughlin <mlaughlinnyc@...>
Posted by: "Anthony Thompson" Al Brown wrote:
accurate <g>.
===========
I've solved the era problem for missle cars. My 70's missles are on a car with K type brake cylinder and verticval brakes staff ane wheel. With the early brake system and the more up to date missles, on average it's aperfect fit for 50's in the STMFC era ;-)
Malcolm Laughlin, Editor 617-489-4383
New England Rail Shipper Directories
19 Holden Road, Belmont, MA 02478
What?!? You mean that Coast Guard guided-missile car shouldn't haveWell, at least the missile, its markings, and the launcher are
arch-bar trucks??!? Say it ain't so!
accurate <g>.
===========
I've solved the era problem for missle cars. My 70's missles are on a car with K type brake cylinder and verticval brakes staff ane wheel. With the early brake system and the more up to date missles, on average it's aperfect fit for 50's in the STMFC era ;-)
Malcolm Laughlin, Editor 617-489-4383
New England Rail Shipper Directories
19 Holden Road, Belmont, MA 02478
Dave Nelson
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
-----Original Message-----
From: STMFC@... [mailto:STMFC@...] On Behalf Of Jim
Betz
I think it has been left unsaid that it is very common to go to an NP
layout and see far too many NP cars - or to a B&O layout and see almost
nothing but B&O cars. And when you look at a picture of a freight yard or
freight train "it just isn't so". The point is that some (many?) of us get
too wrapped up in our favorite railroad and tend to have way too many
freight cars for "our" railroad on our layouts.
------------------------------------
To be clear for everyone... The Distribution Hypothesis under discussion is
all about Foreign Road boxcars.
Home Road Boxcars is very different: One can find ICC data in the annual
Blue Books that cite, nationwide, the typical ratio of Home Road boxcars to
Foreign Road boxcars for the preceeding 10 years. Tim Gilbert took those
numbers and dug up when the recessions were and found there was a geneneral
trend that in recessions there were more Home Road boxcars on Home Rails
than there were in times of plenty.
I don't have the data right here in front of me... But IIRC in WWII Home
Road Boxcars on Home Rails were about 21-24% of all boxcars... The rest of
course were Foreign Road cars. In bad years the numbers might climb by
10-15 points.
In the absence of having the data at my fingertips, I would hazzard a guess
that 25-30% of your boxcars should be home road cars. If you want something
more precise, get a Blue Book and look it up.
Now I happened to do a lot of computer modeling of the Western Pacific
traffic... I won't bore you with the details and assumptions as there are
plenty of both to go with a handful of facts but from that modeling I
realized that it was quite likely the WP terminal in Oakland / San Francisco
area received about twice as many carloads as were shipped. Doesn't really
matter if that's really true... Just take it for now as a talking point.
So, if a particular area on a railroad had a much higher ratio of boxcar
receipts than boxcar shipments, it would stand to reason that the local
yardmaster (a) probably had little need for home road boxcars held in
protective service and (b) had to deal with getting a lot of empties out of
his yard. IOW, very few Home Road boxcars there. Conversly, if any area
has very few recipients relative to shippers, the local yardmaster (or
agent) probably had a considerable need to home road cars held in protective
service and so their numbers might well be higher than whatever road-wide
average might suggest.
So going back to the rough figure I cited above of 25-30% of your boxcars
should be home road. That really should be adjusted by your best estimate
of what the shipper / recipient boxcar ratio is -- both on the layout and
what would be adjacent areas. All the rest of the boxcars you own then get
addressed via the distribution idea under discussion here.
And again, I'm talking about plain Jane XM boxcars.
Dave Nelson
From: STMFC@... [mailto:STMFC@...] On Behalf Of Jim
Betz
I think it has been left unsaid that it is very common to go to an NP
layout and see far too many NP cars - or to a B&O layout and see almost
nothing but B&O cars. And when you look at a picture of a freight yard or
freight train "it just isn't so". The point is that some (many?) of us get
too wrapped up in our favorite railroad and tend to have way too many
freight cars for "our" railroad on our layouts.
------------------------------------
To be clear for everyone... The Distribution Hypothesis under discussion is
all about Foreign Road boxcars.
Home Road Boxcars is very different: One can find ICC data in the annual
Blue Books that cite, nationwide, the typical ratio of Home Road boxcars to
Foreign Road boxcars for the preceeding 10 years. Tim Gilbert took those
numbers and dug up when the recessions were and found there was a geneneral
trend that in recessions there were more Home Road boxcars on Home Rails
than there were in times of plenty.
I don't have the data right here in front of me... But IIRC in WWII Home
Road Boxcars on Home Rails were about 21-24% of all boxcars... The rest of
course were Foreign Road cars. In bad years the numbers might climb by
10-15 points.
In the absence of having the data at my fingertips, I would hazzard a guess
that 25-30% of your boxcars should be home road cars. If you want something
more precise, get a Blue Book and look it up.
Now I happened to do a lot of computer modeling of the Western Pacific
traffic... I won't bore you with the details and assumptions as there are
plenty of both to go with a handful of facts but from that modeling I
realized that it was quite likely the WP terminal in Oakland / San Francisco
area received about twice as many carloads as were shipped. Doesn't really
matter if that's really true... Just take it for now as a talking point.
So, if a particular area on a railroad had a much higher ratio of boxcar
receipts than boxcar shipments, it would stand to reason that the local
yardmaster (a) probably had little need for home road boxcars held in
protective service and (b) had to deal with getting a lot of empties out of
his yard. IOW, very few Home Road boxcars there. Conversly, if any area
has very few recipients relative to shippers, the local yardmaster (or
agent) probably had a considerable need to home road cars held in protective
service and so their numbers might well be higher than whatever road-wide
average might suggest.
So going back to the rough figure I cited above of 25-30% of your boxcars
should be home road. That really should be adjusted by your best estimate
of what the shipper / recipient boxcar ratio is -- both on the layout and
what would be adjacent areas. All the rest of the boxcars you own then get
addressed via the distribution idea under discussion here.
And again, I'm talking about plain Jane XM boxcars.
Dave Nelson
Guys,
The amount of heat in some of these posts is making my screen glow
brighter than usual ...
I might be wrong but it seems to me that the essence of the 'conflict'
is not as much about whether or not Tim's work was 'correct', nor even
about whether or not it is 'interesting/useful'.
It seems to me that what gets people emotionally involved and displaying
either aggressive or defensive behaviors (on either side) is the idea that
Tim's analysis should be applied to the freight car fleets on our layouts.
Especially on "my" layout or when considering the content of "my" personal
collection of freight cars ("my" is meant to refer to "whoever is talking
at the time" - even when the "my" is actually a group of guys such as at a
club).
The other thing that seems to be a source of the heat is when someone
says something like "Tim's analysis is nice - but it doesn't apply to
model railroading". And then a bunch feel they have to get in there and
'defend' Tim. Personally, I don't think he needs defending and I doubt he
would have wanted it. I've read Tim's own words and he always seemed to
be talking about 'trends' and 'imbalances' in our model freight car
fleets and not about "right and wrong".
Perhaps we need to re-visit the concept of "It's my railroad and I
get to do it my way." I don't think anyone needs to defend the choices
they make (or don't even think about it as a choice) - or have made.
On either side of this topic. And I certainly don't think that anyone
should be making statements such as "the freight cars on this layout
are all wrong because they don't represent Tim's analysis". And I
don't think that many of the posts have reflected such attitudes. But
here we are with a lot of "he said/they said/I said" quotes that pick
at details in any one opinion.
Having said that - I'll restate that when I ... and many others on this
list ... go to operate on a layout and the skew is -soooo- heavily shifted
in any one direction that it is "immediately noticeable" that we tend to
feel that maybe the owner has a bit too much affection for his particular
RR. Heck, I've even known guys who are put off because there weren't any
cars from his particular favorite RR running on someone else's layout!
- Jim (Betz) in San Jose
The amount of heat in some of these posts is making my screen glow
brighter than usual ...
I might be wrong but it seems to me that the essence of the 'conflict'
is not as much about whether or not Tim's work was 'correct', nor even
about whether or not it is 'interesting/useful'.
It seems to me that what gets people emotionally involved and displaying
either aggressive or defensive behaviors (on either side) is the idea that
Tim's analysis should be applied to the freight car fleets on our layouts.
Especially on "my" layout or when considering the content of "my" personal
collection of freight cars ("my" is meant to refer to "whoever is talking
at the time" - even when the "my" is actually a group of guys such as at a
club).
The other thing that seems to be a source of the heat is when someone
says something like "Tim's analysis is nice - but it doesn't apply to
model railroading". And then a bunch feel they have to get in there and
'defend' Tim. Personally, I don't think he needs defending and I doubt he
would have wanted it. I've read Tim's own words and he always seemed to
be talking about 'trends' and 'imbalances' in our model freight car
fleets and not about "right and wrong".
Perhaps we need to re-visit the concept of "It's my railroad and I
get to do it my way." I don't think anyone needs to defend the choices
they make (or don't even think about it as a choice) - or have made.
On either side of this topic. And I certainly don't think that anyone
should be making statements such as "the freight cars on this layout
are all wrong because they don't represent Tim's analysis". And I
don't think that many of the posts have reflected such attitudes. But
here we are with a lot of "he said/they said/I said" quotes that pick
at details in any one opinion.
Having said that - I'll restate that when I ... and many others on this
list ... go to operate on a layout and the skew is -soooo- heavily shifted
in any one direction that it is "immediately noticeable" that we tend to
feel that maybe the owner has a bit too much affection for his particular
RR. Heck, I've even known guys who are put off because there weren't any
cars from his particular favorite RR running on someone else's layout!
- Jim (Betz) in San Jose
Norman+Laraine Larkin <lono@...>
Sounds like you hit the nail on the head, Jim.
Regards,
Norm Larkin
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
Regards,
Norm Larkin
----- Original Message -----
From: Jim Betz
To: STMFC@...
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 3:21 PM
Subject: [STMFC] Re: A Purpose For Frt Car Distribution Studies.
Guys,
The amount of heat in some of these posts is making my screen glow
brighter than usual ...
I might be wrong but it seems to me that the essence of the 'conflict'
is not as much about whether or not Tim's work was 'correct', nor even
about whether or not it is 'interesting/useful'.
It seems to me that what gets people emotionally involved and displaying
either aggressive or defensive behaviors (on either side) is the idea that
Tim's analysis should be applied to the freight car fleets on our layouts.
Especially on "my" layout or when considering the content of "my" personal
collection of freight cars ("my" is meant to refer to "whoever is talking
at the time" - even when the "my" is actually a group of guys such as at a
club).
The other thing that seems to be a source of the heat is when someone
says something like "Tim's analysis is nice - but it doesn't apply to
model railroading". And then a bunch feel they have to get in there and
'defend' Tim. Personally, I don't think he needs defending and I doubt he
would have wanted it. I've read Tim's own words and he always seemed to
be talking about 'trends' and 'imbalances' in our model freight car
fleets and not about "right and wrong".
Perhaps we need to re-visit the concept of "It's my railroad and I
get to do it my way." I don't think anyone needs to defend the choices
they make (or don't even think about it as a choice) - or have made.
On either side of this topic. And I certainly don't think that anyone
should be making statements such as "the freight cars on this layout
are all wrong because they don't represent Tim's analysis". And I
don't think that many of the posts have reflected such attitudes. But
here we are with a lot of "he said/they said/I said" quotes that pick
at details in any one opinion.
Having said that - I'll restate that when I ... and many others on this
list ... go to operate on a layout and the skew is -soooo- heavily shifted
in any one direction that it is "immediately noticeable" that we tend to
feel that maybe the owner has a bit too much affection for his particular
RR. Heck, I've even known guys who are put off because there weren't any
cars from his particular favorite RR running on someone else's layout!
- Jim (Betz) in San Jose
From: Jim Betz
To: STMFC@...
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 3:21 PM
Subject: [STMFC] Re: A Purpose For Frt Car Distribution Studies.
Guys,
The amount of heat in some of these posts is making my screen glow
brighter than usual ...
I might be wrong but it seems to me that the essence of the 'conflict'
is not as much about whether or not Tim's work was 'correct', nor even
about whether or not it is 'interesting/useful'.
It seems to me that what gets people emotionally involved and displaying
either aggressive or defensive behaviors (on either side) is the idea that
Tim's analysis should be applied to the freight car fleets on our layouts.
Especially on "my" layout or when considering the content of "my" personal
collection of freight cars ("my" is meant to refer to "whoever is talking
at the time" - even when the "my" is actually a group of guys such as at a
club).
The other thing that seems to be a source of the heat is when someone
says something like "Tim's analysis is nice - but it doesn't apply to
model railroading". And then a bunch feel they have to get in there and
'defend' Tim. Personally, I don't think he needs defending and I doubt he
would have wanted it. I've read Tim's own words and he always seemed to
be talking about 'trends' and 'imbalances' in our model freight car
fleets and not about "right and wrong".
Perhaps we need to re-visit the concept of "It's my railroad and I
get to do it my way." I don't think anyone needs to defend the choices
they make (or don't even think about it as a choice) - or have made.
On either side of this topic. And I certainly don't think that anyone
should be making statements such as "the freight cars on this layout
are all wrong because they don't represent Tim's analysis". And I
don't think that many of the posts have reflected such attitudes. But
here we are with a lot of "he said/they said/I said" quotes that pick
at details in any one opinion.
Having said that - I'll restate that when I ... and many others on this
list ... go to operate on a layout and the skew is -soooo- heavily shifted
in any one direction that it is "immediately noticeable" that we tend to
feel that maybe the owner has a bit too much affection for his particular
RR. Heck, I've even known guys who are put off because there weren't any
cars from his particular favorite RR running on someone else's layout!
- Jim (Betz) in San Jose
Where else would you hit a nail?
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-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: "Norman+Laraine Larkin" <lono@...>
From: "Norman+Laraine Larkin" <lono@...>
Sounds like you hit the nail on the head, Jim.
Regards,
Norm Larkin
Norman+Laraine Larkin <lono@...>
There are many fingers out there that have witnessed where else. 8>)
Norm Larkin
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Norm Larkin
----- Original Message -----
From: timboconnor@...
To: STMFC@...
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 4:21 PM
Subject: Re: [STMFC] Re: A Purpose For Frt Car Distribution Studies.
Where else would you hit a nail?
-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: "Norman+Laraine Larkin" <lono@...>
> Sounds like you hit the nail on the head, Jim.
> Regards,
> Norm Larkin
From: timboconnor@...
To: STMFC@...
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 4:21 PM
Subject: Re: [STMFC] Re: A Purpose For Frt Car Distribution Studies.
Where else would you hit a nail?
-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: "Norman+Laraine Larkin" <lono@...>
> Sounds like you hit the nail on the head, Jim.
> Regards,
> Norm Larkin
My point exactly. If you miss the nail, then you're not hitting it.
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: "Norman+Laraine Larkin" <lono@...>
From: "Norman+Laraine Larkin" <lono@...>
There are many fingers out there that have witnessed where else. 8>)
Norm Larkin
----- Original Message -----
From: timboconnor@...
To: STMFC@...
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 4:21 PM
Subject: Re: [STMFC] Re: A Purpose For Frt Car Distribution Studies.
Where else would you hit a nail?
-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: "Norman+Laraine Larkin" <lono@...>
> Sounds like you hit the nail on the head, Jim.
> Regards,
> Norm Larkin
Anthony Thompson <thompson@...>
My point exactly. If you miss the nail, then you're not hitting it.Well, that's not what my thumb thought. <g>
Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA
2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com
(510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@...
Publishers of books on railroad history