Pennsylvania Railroad?

[Alex99al]

I am a big Pennsylvania Railroad buff and I have the GG1, M1, K4s, E6s, RS3, RS11, F7 (EF15), FA (AF15), E8, GP9 and MP54. I was wondering why aren't there any PRR routes or more PRR power like the freight electrics like the E44? As big as the Pennsylvania Railroad was in it's heyday you'd think users would focus on the largest railroad in the United States. But, I guess there aren't many Pennsy fans. I wish there were PRR routes as adequant as they make for CSX and Norfolk Southern or international routes. One route I would like to see would be the main line from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to Crestline, Ohio or the NEC from New York's Penn Station (including Sunnyside Yard) and Washington D.C.'s Union Station. One question, is why do so many people treat the Pennsylvania Railroad like a bunch of dirt? I mean, Pennsy had some of the best locomotives in the world and you're going to make only a few examples of PRR motive power, coaches, freight cars, maintenance of way equipment, etc.

 

[gfisher]

why do so many people treat the Pennsylvania Railroad like a bunch of dirt?

That's utter rubbish. As a creator I have done quite a bit of PRR content, and I am working on the NY Phily mainline, but it is a huge project requiring large amounts of custom content and will take years to finish. For one thing, I have to build the catenary systems (since the builtin ones are not very accurate) but of course before doing that I have to get the technical drawings. Perhaps you could lend me your copy for a bit since you are such a great fan and must of course have them. As for the electric motors you mention, sure I'd like to have them too. Perhaps you can build some.

 

[Milaga]

One question, is why do so many people treat the Pennsylvania Railroad like a bunch of dirt? I mean, Pennsy had some of the best locomotives in the world and you're going to make only a few examples of PRR motive power, coaches, freight cars, maintenance of way equipment, etc.

The PRR also had a very eclectic taste in locomotives. The reason there are F7s, RS3s, GP9s, etc. for the PRR is that many railroads had them. People are less likely to spend time modelling something that was only used by a small number of roads, irregardless of how cool they were.

Or perhaps they treat the PRR like dirt because they are NYC fans.

 

[Alex99al]

That's utter rubbish. As a creator I have done quite a bit of PRR content, and I am working on the NY Phily mainline, but it is a huge project requiring large amounts of custom content and will take years to finish. For one thing, I have to build the catenary systems (since the builtin ones are not very accurate) but of course before doing that I have to get the technical drawings. Perhaps you could lend me your copy for a bit since you are such a great fan and must of course have them. As for the electric motors you mention, sure I'd like to have them too. Perhaps you can build some.

I like your stuff, I just mean many Trainz users don't take the time to make our railroad shine.

 

[jadebullet]

One question, is why do so many people treat the Pennsylvania Railroad like a bunch of dirt?

Because it was.


Anyway, it is the same reason why there isn't alot of Reading stuff. Noone has really made it yet, and alot of people focus on the newer stuff rather than the old stuff.

I am working on some Reading stuff though, so maybe, there will be someone out there who wants to create things for that OTHER Pennsylvanian railroad. (Besides George of course.)


PS, I am saying this as I am watching an AI driven PRR steamer huff and puff around George's Cape May County Route.

 

[Alex99al]

The PRR also had a very eclectic taste in locomotives. The reason there are F7s, RS3s, GP9s, etc. for the PRR is that many railroads had them. People are less likely to spend time modelling something that was only used by a small number of roads, irregardless of how cool they were.

Or perhaps they treat the PRR like dirt because they are NYC fans.

Pennsy owned the New York Central and railfans like you and me know it. I wish other railfans knew it also.

 

[Alex99al]

Because it was.


Anyway, it is the same reason why there isn't alot of Reading stuff. Noone has really made it yet, and alot of people focus on the newer stuff rather than the old stuff.

I am working on some Reading stuff though, so maybe, there will be someone out there who wants to create things for that OTHER Pennsylvanian railroad. (Besides George of course.)


PS, I am saying this as I am watching an AI driven PRR steamer huff and puff around George's Cape May County Route.

Treating Pennsy and Reading like dirt sucks. They were two great railroads and deserve a big spot in Trainz.

 

[Alex99al]

That's utter rubbish. As a creator I have done quite a bit of PRR content, and I am working on the NY Phily mainline, but it is a huge project requiring large amounts of custom content and will take years to finish. For one thing, I have to build the catenary systems (since the builtin ones are not very accurate) but of course before doing that I have to get the technical drawings. Perhaps you could lend me your copy for a bit since you are such a great fan and must of course have them. As for the electric motors you mention, sure I'd like to have them too. Perhaps you can build some.

I may be a big PRR buff, but I am trying to find those to make a Philadelphia to Baltimore section of the NEC.

 

[jadebullet]

Pennsy owned the New York Central and railfans like you and me know it. I wish other railfans knew it also.

HAH! Hahahahaha. The Pennsy merged with the NYC in what has been known as the biggest epic failure in railroading history. They didn't own the NYC, they just ruined it. Now the N&W, LIRR, LVRR and a few other railroads that the PRR corrupted, yeah, but not really the NYC.

Now, if only the Pennsy hadn't merged with NYC and started whining about a bailout, Conrail wouldn't have happened, and the Reading would have recovered, or become part of Chessie, rather than being forced to join CR, the EL and LHRR would have recovered from Agnas damage(probably), the LVRR would have gone under or merged with the Reading, and maintainance companies wouldn't have had to put up with the nightmare that was the condition of PC locomotives.


Don't get me wrong, the Pennsy was pretty cool in some regards, they just were kinda dicks in other regards. The PC was the biggest failure though. What were they thinking.

Treating Pennsy and Reading like dirt sucks. They were two great railroads and deserve a big spot in Trainz.

Agreed. Like I said, I am trying to give the Reading the glory it deserves as one of the greatest northeastern railroads of all time.


By the way, just be happy that you have that when it comes to PRR stuff. The Reading has a GP40 at USLW, a GP35 that is the wrong color at RRmods, SW1500s(by me and Kree8tiviT) on USLW and the DLS, and F7A by me, an FP7 by SRR88(sp?), and a bunch of stuff by CincySouthernRwy, which unfortunately, is really off color wise. Oh, and two trainmasters.

 

[Alex99al]

HAH! Hahahahaha. The Pennsy merged with the NYC in what has been known as the biggest epic failure in railroading history. They didn't own the NYC, they just ruined it. Now the N&W, LIRR, LVRR and a few other railroads that the PRR corrupted, yeah, but not really the NYC.

Now, if only the Pennsy hadn't merged with NYC and started whining about a bailout, Conrail wouldn't have happened, and the Reading would have recovered, or become part of Chessie, rather than being forced to join CR, the EL and LHRR would have recovered from Agnas damage(probably), the LVRR would have gone under or merged with the Reading, and maintainance companies wouldn't have had to put up with the nightmare that was the condition of PC locomotives.


Don't get me wrong, the Pennsy was pretty cool in some regards, they just were kinda dicks in other regards. The PC was the biggest failure though. What were they thinking.




Agreed. Like I said, I am trying to give the Reading the glory it deserves as one of the greatest northeastern railroads of all time.

You're right on Penn Central. PRR and RDG had their differences, but they were two great railroads here, in Pennsylvania that should still be here.

 

[jadebullet]

Agreed. It would be interesting to see what the railroading world would look like now if PC never happened.

 

[Alex99al]

Agreed. It would be interesting to see what the railroading world would look like now if PC never happened.

Probably better and no Amtrak. The GG1 would still be operational and all the Pennsy power would be.

 

[UP5521]

And since we are talking about the PRR,you can't forget the steam power they had ranging from the A5 class 0-4-0 switchers to the massive, M1 class mountain locomotives and so on!

 

[Milaga]

Maybe I'm alone in this, but I always thought that both Conrail and Amtrak had a certain sense of style. The big blue was nice, and the way they gradually absorbed other equipment was a modellers dream. Perhaps it's also because the first caboose I ever rode in was Conrail. Perhaps it's because these two roads are some of the more positive steps the US government has taken to improve the state of rails.

But I think they each have a style that fits along side the likes of the lightning striped NYC Alcos, the white, black and green Burlington Northern, the silver and red of the AT&SF passenger trains, the Captain America shield at the front of a horsepower-incalculable Union Pacific lashup consisting of of impeccably clean engines that exist no where else on the planet. And yeah, I guess the PRR GG1 can join the group.

I'm sorry, what color is PRR? Boxcar brown? How classy.

<kuid:138423:112020> is my absolute favorite engine in the DLS. An SD45 painted as a late PRR, quickly repainted as a PC, quickly repainted as Conrail. Yeah... with all the dependencies the asset clocks over 100MB. So it will take more than a day to get it without a first class ticket. But still, that's a fine looking engine. I wish there were more models that used 2048x2048 textures.

 

[Alex99al]

PRR Colors

Maybe I'm alone in this, but I always thought that both Conrail and Amtrak had a certain sense of style. The big blue was nice, and the way they gradually absorbed other equipment was a modellers dream. Perhaps it's also because the first caboose I ever rode in was Conrail. Perhaps it's because these two roads are some of the more positive steps the US government has taken to improve the state of rails.

But I think they each have a style that fits along side the likes of the lightning striped NYC Alcos, the white, black and green Burlington Northern, the silver and red of the AT&SF passenger trains, the Captain America shield at the front of a horsepower-incalculable Union Pacific lashup consisting of of impeccably clean engines that exist no where else on the planet. And yeah, I guess the PRR GG1 can join the group.

I'm sorry, what color is PRR? Boxcar brown? How classy.

<kuid:138423:112020> is my absolute favorite engine in the DLS. An SD45 painted as a late PRR, quickly repainted as a PC, quickly repainted as Conrail. Yeah... with all the dependencies the asset clocks over 100MB. So it will take more than a day to get it without a first class ticket. But still, that's a fine looking engine. I wish there were more models that used 2048x2048 textures.

The Pennsylvania Railroad had four colors that they used. Their steam locomotives wore Dark Brunswick Green (A shade of green so dark it looks black), the freight diesels and the bulk of the GG1 fleet wore this and tuscan red (passenger diesels, few GG1s, MP54 MU cars), freight car color (iron oxide) used on the freight cars, cabin cars and yellow on the MOW. Also different colors for the cupola to indicate different Pennsy divisions. I like Conrail and Amtrak. But I wish Amtrak would do a heritage series, all their locomotives and coaches honoring different railroads. Like a GE P42DC in Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad colors.

 

[HSSRAIL]

It is interesting to read the response to the above query in fact such query’s are quite common on the forum neither the query or response is really adequate in addressing the issue.

The issue being why is there not more ________ fill in with favorite railroad routes or content?

The answer lies in how Trainz differs from model railroading. Model railroaders are much more numerous and can usually find members who share the same interests living close together. It is rare on these forums for me to identify two people who live in the same state or province. Model Railroading has obtained its level of perfection because model railroaders can get together and work on common projects. While I have seen evidence of this team approach in the Trainz community many of these groups are exclusive. The Trainz software like most railroad simulators to date is an individual play experience which leads to an individual approach to making routes and content for it. It is inherent in the structure. To really progress in the content creation and route creation arena it will be necessary to revise this thinking. I submit that the ship simulator and flight simulator communities are tighter because those games have multi-play capability.

Route Creation:
If you could find 20 or 30 people who would be interested in creating say the Pennsylvania Railroads line from say Harrisburg to Pittsburgh and you were to segment that route into 10 mile pieces that were readily identifiable and if you loaded those segments onto an FTP server whereas each segment could be checked out and worked on by different people you would have that route easily within 1 year. The tool to do this exists in TRANSDEM. This scenario is lacking insofar as more than one person can not work on the same segment at the same time. Until you have actually seen a model railroad club working together on the same segment it is hard to imagine how important a group effort is and how useful it is to critique a work in progress. The way things are right now a given piece of work can only be analyzed after the fact. This is a big problem that may be hard for a lot of people to visualize it must be seen to be understood. Most model railroad clubs are not exclusive but are open to all members who have various skill levels. The more advanced modelers mentor and help the novices who eventually become advanced modelers themselves. This process is lacking in the Trainz community largely because of the current structure of one individual one content item.

Content Creation:
Our dear forum is littered with the graves of unfinished projects that remained unfinished because they were too much for one person to do. The Trainz community is littered with projects that bogged down and never made it to the download station. For some reason steam locomotives keep coming to mind. While structurally multi-person route building has built in limitations these walls do not exist on content creation we have placed them there ourselves. Programs like go to meeting could allow one person to work with a 3D modeling program while a more experienced person watches and offers suggestions. While the tutorials are a life savor they can never take the place of hands on mentoring. Most 3d Modeling programs have Object Libraries. Thru these an item made by one person can be shared with another and used in a project. Thru FTP servers textures and objects can be uploaded and shared with others. Consider what would happen if:

10 people who had different skills got together and decided to create a steam locomotive:

One person gathers the research material needed for the project
One person makes the boiler another the cab.
Another person does the textures and paints the model
Another person makes the bogies.
The animation guru animates the model
Another person likes to make gauges.
Another person puts the elements together and makes the cab interior.
Another person animates and makes the cab interior work
Another person makes the engine and config file.

This is a project that probably would be completed. Part of the reason it is difficult to get so many people together is that there is a shortage of content creators who can work together on a common project many don’t wish to work with novices. The content creation learning curve is steep and long but I don’t understand why a novice could not make simple 3d items for a project, have that worked critiqued and their work used in a project. Novices could definitely make items like headlights number boards and dozens of items to use in making the model. Their work on such a project with supervision of more experienced hands would make them much better much quicker. I believe this is what is needed to advance trainz to the next level.

 

[jadebullet]

Conrail wasn't that bad once they recovered from the nighmare that was fixing all of the broken PC junk.

BTW, are you saying that this isn't classy?

 

[RRSignal]

FYI, strench707 is modelling the NEC. He is a regular poster here and was posting railroad.net to get advice about modeling the line realistically. Hwoever, I believe he is developing it as an AMTRAK route rather than historic PRR. It might not be too difficult to work off of that to make it authentic Pennsy - that is, with more tracks and proper PRR signals!

 

[RRSignal]

Because it was.


Anyway, it is the same reason why there isn't alot of Reading stuff. Noone has really made it yet, and alot of people focus on the newer stuff rather than the old stuff.

I am working on some Reading stuff though, so maybe, there will be someone out there who wants to create things for that OTHER Pennsylvanian railroad. (Besides George of course.)


PS, I am saying this as I am watching an AI driven PRR steamer huff and puff around George's Cape May County Route.

What are you working on? I am interestered in developing SEPTA routes, starting with the ex-Reading side.

 

[jadebullet]

Reading Shamokin Division as a rebuilt R&N route.

Reading Bethlehem branch. (Beth to Phil.)