M&Pa Route in Development

F

frogpipe

Yesterdayz Trainz Member
From Wikipedia:
The Maryland and Pennsylvania Railroad (reporting mark MPA), familiarly known as the "Ma and Pa", was an American short-line railroad between York and Hanover, Pennsylvania, formerly operating passenger and freight trains on its original line between York and Baltimore, Maryland, from 1901 until the 1950s. The Ma and Pa was popular with railfans in the 1930s and 1940s for its antique equipment and curving, picturesque right-of-way through the hills of rural Maryland and Pennsylvania. Reflecting its origin as the unintended product of the merger of two 19th-century narrow gauge railways, the meandering Ma and Pa line took 77.2 miles (124 km) to connect Baltimore and York, although the two cities are only 45 miles (72 km) apart in a straight line.[SUP][2][/SUP]

Passenger service was discontinued on August 31, 1954, and the section from Baltimore to Whiteford, Maryland (just south of the Mason-Dixon line demarcating the Pennsylvania-Maryland border) was abandoned in June 1958. Most of the remaining original railroad line was abandoned by 1984. The Maryland and Pennsylvania Railroad acquired a former 19-mile (31 km) Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) branch line between York and Hanover in the 1980s, now operated by a successor corporation, York Railway.[SUP][3][/SUP]
Click to expand...


Screenshots of my rendition of Baltimore's Jones Falls Valley:

frogpipe_20120927_0001.jpg


Looking down North Ave, B&O on the bridge, Pensy (Northern Central Railroad) below that. M&Pa is on the far shore.

frogpipe_20120927_0002.jpg


View from the roof of a church that once stood where I-83 now passes over North Ave.

frogpipe_20120927_0000.jpg


Looking down on the NCR yard, North Ave bridge in the foreground.
 
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I was gonna say something nice, but your attitude towards "Oh no, no comments after 2 or 3 hours? no-one must like it" doesn't help...
 
EEEEEW, THAT'S AAAAAWEFUUUL!!!!!111!!

Seriously, looks okay to me, altho I was never a big Ma&Pa fan even back in the old Model Railroader days when it was in every issue. Dunno what it was like when you were here back in 06, but my experience with the Trainz community since I joined in 2010 has been occasional comments if you totally blow someone's socks off, otherwise the majority don't have much to say. Possibly that's because the Trainz community has a higher percentage of creators than MSTS or railsim/railworks, so everyone is too busy creating their own routes and reskins to look at what others are doing. Don't really know anything for sure, but I am used to getting more bug reports with previous trainsims.
 
Well that makes sense, since Trainz has tools you can actually USE unlike MSTS! Ma and Pa certainly got a lot of press in MR didn't it? Worlds only 1:1 model railroad as it's been called...

Thanks for the kind words (and the help in other matters here)
:D
 
I will be watching this closely. I love any route that depicts a short line. Have any of you guys heard of the Kishacoquillas Railraod in Bellville PA? That would be an amazing route for trainz. And frogpipe, are you free-handing the terrain , or is there a dem map?
 
Free handing, tho I am using basemap objects to layout the tracks to scale. Streets are more loosely placed. I elected to do it that way to accommodate the limitations of terrain geometry and fitting existing objects such as buildings.
 
frogpipe said:
Wow... That bad? :(

(30 views)
Click to expand...

Like Sniper said, I've got a thread of my reskins that I've been working on for a year or so now. I've got some stuff that has never had a comment made on it (but has plenty of downloads), while other things got an entire page of comments. Don't let it get you down.

I've got family in Catonsville and am planning a vacation to Baltimore and DC next summer. I love the area and will be watching to see how this route turns out.
 
Thanks again. I grew up in Baltimore, tho I'm in California now. It won't be an exact model of the city, that's for sure, but it's coming along...
 
I haven't noticed it before and i'm always interested in new layouts being showcased as well as established layout threads.

I like what i see and look forward to more screens as it progresses.
 
A few more, got a few more blocks up in the distance. Added Sissons Stone Yard just east of the B&O tracks. Funny thing is, I'm not planning much more of the B&O and only a little more PRR, just enough to have meaningful interchange tracks with the M&Pa. Both the PRR and B&O will have portals which will spit out trains every now and then, just as some kinetic backdrop.

frogpipe_20120929_0006.jpg

Shot from the North Ave bridge, a B&O freight makes it's way south toward the Howard Street tunnel

frogpipe_20120929_0004.jpg

Shot from the North Ave bridge, a B&O freight train, exits the Belt Line tunnel and heads across the Valley

frogpipe_20120929_0002.jpg

Sissons Stone Yard and spur, next to the B&O Belt line on the east side of the valley
I only know where it was, not what it looked like, so this is a TOTAL guess....

frogpipe_20120929_0008.jpg

Bird's eye view of the valley, PRR GG1 and coaches in the foreground on PRR tracks, opposite back is the PRR interchange track with the M&pa; B&O curves at top left toward it's tunnel below 26th Street
 
Really looks good. I use Falls Rd often and while its greatly changed it, you have it to a T. Some of the old Ma and Pa tracks are still there. That must have been quite a busy area in that time. B&O, WM, Ma&Pa and Pennsy all within a few yards of each other.

Rob
 
Grew up in Cockeysville, a stones throw from where the NCR crossed York Road at "The Underpass", went to elementary school on the campus of Towson State, where M&Pa once ran (even found some spikes in "the Glen" as a kid), Great Grandpa worked for the B&O at Mt Claire.... So I had a HEALTHY interest in, and exposure to, the railroads as a kid.

Of course that was in the 70s and 80s so most of the trains were long gone :( Which lead to a great deal of musing about how it used to be, that I can now express in Trainz! :)

After years of seeing Ma and Pa all over the magazines I was very surprised to see it wasn't already done!

I'm just having a ball "Seeing what it was like" to ride and drive trains in the Jones Falls Valley :D
 
Looks good to me.
Though I am a greater fan of un-modified screenshots, but thats just me.

Commentswise, I agree with the other guys.
No comments doesnt necessarily mean bad quality.
:)
I´ll be watching this.
 
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