Oahu Railway & Land Co.

[joshmeister]

Thank you. Also Ken, I sent you a PM with something that I think might help out.

 

[joshmeister]

Thanks to Ken for creating a DEM file of Oahu for me (Thank you VERY VERY MUCH Ken) I have now started work once again on the Oahu Railway & Land Co. as it would have looked in the late 30's through WWII. I have started around mid point on the route which is Ka'ena Point at the sand siding working my way towards Honolulu Depot. First shot is of the Sand siding at the point. Speeds on most of the main line were 40 MPH on 70 pound rail but will be reduced likely to around 20-25 in game to give the line a more layed back feel to it. I am also working with togog to create engines and cars with the help of friends at the Hawaiian Railway and cant thank these guys enough for helping make this possible.





Second shot is of the Yokohama Bay garbage dump, the dump is still here but tracks are long gone




The third shot is of one of the many sidings built for the USN Railway guns. These were mostly temp sidings with snap track being used so that the sidings and the railway guns could easily be moved to different locations.





Last shot is as far as Ive layed track which is just outside the town of Makaha.

 

[KenRuof]

Sweet, looking good so far Josh. Glad I could help and nice that you have Togog making equipment, they are beautifully painted!

 

[cascaderailroad]

Is your DEM covering the entire island ? The mountains on the east coast are spectacularly rugged !

You could make aerial flyways, using BNSF50 Invisatrack, and fly planes all around the island

 

[joshmeister]

Im pretty sure Ken did the whole island. If Any one could show me how to overlay google earth images of the island onto the map that would also be very helpful.

 

[martinvk]

Looking forward to following this development. I was fortunate to visit Oahu last February and visited the Hawaiian Railway Society yard. Lots of interesting bits and pieces to see. Even took a ride on their Sunday excursion. After a hike to Ka'ena Point, it was only after studying the railway map that I realized the curved cutting that is part of the current trail was the old ROW.

Good luck with your route.

 

[joshmeister]

Martin, glad you enjoyed your stay Island side Heres a shot of the wye at Waianea along with the passing/depot siding in the middle as well as a connecting track to one of the many Sugar cane operations the OR&L interchanged with.

 

[KenRuof]

Coming along nicely Josh and yes the DEM is the whole island.

 

[cascaderailroad]

Like I said I have all the 15 maps for the entire island, if anyone can georeference them, and place them on your DEM

 

[joshmeister]

Progress is continuing towards Ewa at this point, will post photos soon but for now heres my heavy test train running along what I have worked on so far to test grades and curves.

 

[cascaderailroad]

I would imagine that being that the line was slightly above sea level, and on the western side of the island that gradients would be no more than 0.10 %

 

[joshmeister]

If you look at the older ROW maps the tracks in most places only ran about 5-10 feet above the water line, and in alot of places even ran right on the beach's just feet from the water. Up towards the point like say around the Blow Hole the tracks did sit alittle higher but again were right around the waters edge for the most part. Still a work in progress so alot of things will be changed once im ready to get deeper into it.

 

[martinvk]

Thought I would share a few of the things I saw while there in February.

 

[joshmeister]

Very nice Martin More updates to come soon.

 

[joshmeister]

Havent really worked on the route today but I DID take time to work on 1 of the 2 OR&L C class shays that the railroad ordered new. 44 and 45 were ordered and ran trains up the steep 3-4% grades going from Waipahu up to Wahiawa and Schofield Barracks. Here is a shot of 44, Since there are extremely few to almost no photos of the shays, we dont really know what they looked like as far as any modifications that might have been done to them .

 

[sawyer811]

certainly captures the flavor of a 3ft NG shay though I'd say that's good enough. Really is a Pity Lindsey Ashby didn't pull IRCA No. 36 out of El Salvador, seeing as she was one of the ex-OR&L 2-8-0s sold to them after the line went bust...

Keep up the good work!

 

[joshmeister]

Ya, A number of the 2-8-0's ran in El Salvador until the mid 1970's before finally being scraped. Alot of boxcars went as well and met the same fate after the engines were cut up. There is a man in 1 of the southern states that has an OR&L boxcar that he is using to house chickens but will not speak to us about letting us by the car from him . The OR&L kept #60 till the very end (The first Mike) and stored her serviceable in the shops encase someone wanted her for a display but over time she was vandalized and became a major pain for the then terminal railway and was finally cut up and sold off to a scrapper just a few years before the Hawaiian Railway was formed.

 

[joshmeister]

Hi guys, just as an update I have been in the process of moving which is why I sorta vanished for a while. I am still working on the route and have made it almost to where the Waipahu depot and Shay building will be placed. I dont have many new photos but I do have a shot of where the Ewa sugar mill will be placed later on.

 

[KenRuof]

Cool, glad to see you still at it!

 

[joshmeister]

Thanks Ken, its a very slow process, free handing track can be a pain so some stuff might be off a little bit untill I can figure out how to either add google earth textures to the route or add my PDF file track map. -Shrugs- Either way its looken good so far.