Welcome to my blog. The purpose of this blog is to document the building of my HO scale model railroad. I was born and raised in Council Bluffs, Iowa, a city rich in railroad history. At one time there were many railroads with operations in the city including the Union Pacific, Milwaukee Road, Rock Island, Burlington Route, Burlington Northern, Chicago North Western, Wabash, Milwaukee Road and the Illinois Central Gulf. Some have fallen and some became part of a larger railroad. Today Council Bluffs is serviced by 2 class 1 railroads, The Union Pacific and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe and also a class 2 railroad the Iowa Interstate Railroad that operates from the old Rock Island yard.
The model railroad will be what is called a shelf layout, it simply is a 2 foot or less deep shelf attached to the walls. It's a space saver but will not be short on action! The primary road will be the Iowa Interstate Railroad (IAIS) but the Chicago and Northwestern and the Union Pacific may be respresented at times as well. The layout will depict some of the industries and businesses in Council Bluffs . Some are current customers of the IAIS and some no longer receive railroad service but for the sake of layout operation we will pretend that they still do today. Construction will start soon and you can watch along as the railroad progresses. You can read and follow along on the Layout Construction threads in the side bar.
Thanks for looking!
