Illinois Trains 2015 Part One

At the end of June, we traveled to Illinois to visit family and disassemble my original train layout in my folks' basement. There were also lots of other train-related adventures along the way. Our first encounter was south of Owatonna, MN, where a huge crew is rebuilding the Canadian Pacific tracks. The operation was several miles long, and used a conglomeration of complex and wacky looking machinery to perform most of the tasks.

The next day, we traveled to Kenosha, WI with relatives and rode on their electric streetcar loop. The PCC trolley we rode on, #4610, was decorated in Toronto colors, and was operated with foot pedals. Growing up I rode on the Illinois Railway Museum's CTA PCC car (the "Green Hornet"), which is operated with hand controls. Apparently, the CTA was the only system that used hand controls on these cars, but I didn't know there was another option until I visited Kenosha. Kenosha has several PCC cars in their fleet, each decorated for a different city's electric railroad.

http://www.visitkenosha.com/attractions/top-attractions/electric-streetcar-circulator

Train adventures continued the following day, as we visited Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, IL. They have a narrow gauge railroad that circles much of the park, headed by a blue "steam" locomotive. The open cars provide for easy loading and unloading, and thankfully the weather was beautiful, although rather humid. Locomotive 22 has a #4 builder's plate. At each station, the engineer and fireman would trade off with personnel from the next station. We also rode on several roller coasters which have "trains" and run on track as well.

More on this trip later! Keep your rails shiny ~

Toronto PCC Car 4610 in Kenosha, near Lake Michigan

Interior of the 4610

Great America locomotive #22 taking riders on a scenic tour of the amusement park

Narrow gauge "steam" engine puts on a nice show

Signage and Lighting and Puzzles

This week I placed some signs in the Train Room, and set up the Switch Lantern. The bi-fold doors on the Train Room closet were looking rather bare, and I now have a variety of train-related signs displayed on them. My Switch Lantern had already been altered to run on household electricity, so it is now plugged in and hanging out on top of the DVD player. Amber and I also tackled a neato railroad puzzle in one evening. We purchased it at Wall Drug on our way back from Illinois.

In the coming weeks I'll be prepping some items to sell at our garage sale. These will mostly consist of O-27 rolling stock and track. The goal is to get all of the boxes/tubs stowed under the layout and get some trains rolling again!

Til next time - keep your rails shiny ~

East closet doors decorated

West doors decorated too

New sign welcoming visitors to the Train Room

The switch lantern on display

The completed puzzle - lots of fun to work on with my bride!

Boxes...Again!

The remainder of my train collection has been brought from Illinois to Montana, and is now sitting on and around the layout. Now to find a new home for everything!

It was a big job to disassemble a fully scenic'd train set, and I will show the process in a few blog installments. I was also able to ride on several real trains while in Illinois, so we'll check those out too!

Keep your rails shiny!