What to do with created Great Lake Iron Ore routes and sessions

I am trying to decide what to do with a route and sessions I have created over a couple of years. I have worked on railroads and what I have made is a reflection of real-life experiences and places. There is a reason or an experience for just about everything in the route and sessions. The route’s name is “Great Lakes Iron Ore.” It is about forty miles of main/branch track. The route and sessions are a composite of tracks in the United States of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan, railroads Duluth, Missabe, & Iron Range RR, Great Northern RR, Northern Pacific RR, Soo Line RR, Chicago Northwestern RR, and Milwaukee Road RR. The era it is focused on is the steam/diesel transition of about 1960. It will work for fine in any era. It has a harbor with an ore dock and an iron range with both open pit and underground mines. There are roundhouses, small towns, and commercial sites. Its traffic is iron ore, coal, fuel oil, wood pulp, and other mixed local traffic plus passenger trains. It also has two railroads sharing facilities such as the Chicago Northwest and Milwaukee Road did at Escanaba, Michigan.


What I would like is to make it available to those interested this type of operation and history. Ideally, it would be nice to have it hosted on some website where I and others could discuss the colorful history of this area and era. For instance, per old timers I talked to, at the height of the Korean War there were up to 4,000 ore cars a day going over the Great Northern scales at Allouez, Wisconsin.


Again, I am about realism. I run JointedRail locomotives and they are gorgeous but their running characteristics are poor. In order to be more real like, have changed smoke, braking, air pressure, physics, and sound . All of these changes I am happy to share. I still have my Air Brake Rules book.


The sessions could use updated ore cars and gondolas with auto-numbers and realistic loads.


Is TCCP with way to go with posting on the forum occasionally? Put it on the free DLC? Or what other options are available? Suggestions?

It looks like a beautiful route.

If you put it on the DLS it'll get a lot of users. You can start your own community thread with a post in the "Freeware" section.

You can build your own site around it if you're up to that, but that will only last as long as you are willing and able to maintain it.

:B~)

Look forward to seeing it if you put it on the DLS.

Terry

On the DLS would be nice, TCCP has a lot of hoops to jump through before it is released especially when it comes to sessions. I doubt you would get modified JR stuff passed.

WOW! really nice route. Congratulation!

Your achievement and effort together with wish to share is great. DLS is best for everyone.:Y:

Very nice looking route, alot of detail and thought put into the design. Will follow this thread to see where it goes.

Ok, with advise given, I will try to get the route/sessions on the DLS. Looking for volunteers to see how bad missing dependencies are. There are some JointedRail dependencies. Others I may not be aware of. I will email route to your private email for testing.

you should consider moving all rolling stock out of the route. Any rolling stock you have modified will not be uploadable without permission of the author. This will cause problems for anyone tring to use the sessions. Any rolling stock uploadable, you can leave in the sessions. You can post suggestions for the ones you have modified.

rcwarner1953 said:

Ok, with advise given, I will try to get the route/sessions on the DLS. Looking for volunteers to see how bad missing dependencies are. There are some JointedRail dependencies. Others I may not be aware of. I will email route to your private email for testing.

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I'd be willing to help out with that. If you're still looking and want to take me up on my offer, my DM's are open

UnionPacificFan1005 - send me a private email with an email address I can attach the cdp file to, about 20 meg.

Per comments/suggestions from UnionPacificFan1005 I am working on updating the route. I also am updating the ore cars by MILW who I have tried to reach to no success. I would like to get the updated ore cars on the DLS before I post the route. The ore cars need ARN and a more realistic humped load which I haven't learned how to do yet.

Update to any one following this thread. Spring has finally arrived here next to Lake Superior (USA). I am trying to beat the hordes of mosquitos and black flies, which will appear shortly (gets better in 2-3 weeks), and get my outside work done. Before posing to the DLS, I am working on updating tariacuri’s ore cars to use auto numbering and other updates. I am using attachmentmaker to place a plane on the side of the cars. This works but I am stuck on how to get the number digits to work. I have started a Blender tutorial, but per above, it may be a while before I make progress. Will update thread when posting to DLS.

rcwarner1953 said:

Update to any one following this thread. Spring has finally arrived here next to Lake Superior (USA). I am trying to beat the hordes of mosquitos and black flies, which will appear shortly (gets better in 2-3 weeks), and get my outside work done. Before posing to the DLS, I am working on updating tariacuri’s ore cars to use auto numbering and other updates. I am using attachmentmaker to place a plane on the side of the cars. This works but I am stuck on how to get the number digits to work. I have started a Blender tutorial, but per above, it may be a while before I make progress. Will update thread when posting to DLS.

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Take your time and upload the route when you have time. I understand what you're going through with those black flies and mosquitos. I live in Southern New England, and we get them as well. It doesn't help that I have a swamp and a pond behind me that's fed with a cold water fast running creek.

Not sure how I missed this thread, but be happy to QC as well. Grew up 2 blocks from the Milwaukee yards, so tend toward anything Milw Rd.

Any update on this route? I am willing to help. We really need an Ore Route!

I love your opening-post pictures. That is my favorite era, and I have a particular interest in that region as well. I have a general rule against downloading routes that are not packaged or not free, but this route tempts me to make an exception. Has anything become of this?

MasterTracklayer said:

I love your opening-post pictures. That is my favorite era, and I have a particular interest in that region as well. I have a general rule against downloading routes that are not packaged or not free, but this route tempts me to make an exception. Has anything become of this?

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Sorry, I don't check the forums very often. Yes, today I uploaded to the DLS (waiting approval) the route, 4 sessions, and about a dozen support items. It is freeware, you will need TRS22 to use it. If all goes well, I intend to post on the forum "Freeware announcements" when it is available on the DLS. I also intend to start a blog to talk and discuss railroading (particularly in the Great Lakes region of the US) in that general era.

GLIO now on DLS, see Freeware Announcement.