You can step out any time you like, but you can never leave.

Thats branch or short line modelling for me. A brief chat with a viewer at the NEC in late November brought that thought forefront. They chatted for a few minutes and mentioned they’d been following the blog from its early days. Day one came from wanting to write specifically about Albion Yard away from the other online content I was writing. I knew Albion would have a story, it was already shape shifting, quite literally with interchangeable buildings that allowed a completely different appearance to be generated quickly, particularly useful for capturing peoples imagination with a different take on the same footprint and track plan. I didn’t realise that story would be a constant though.

The picture above was a popular one, the background a mix of Howard Scenics houses, and an HO scale Berlin apartment block. But the core layout was a small, out of the way yard that only local people would know was there, the sort of thing that was hidden in plain sight behind a factory unit or row of houses. Shelfie2 at the NEC drew similar comments, it caught viewers imagination that it was a plausible small coal disposal yard tucked away down a rural back lane in Northumberland. That was my intention of course, but looking at the picture above and the one below there’s a common theme, even though they’re ten years or more apart. OO, off the beaten track, a backwater, 08’s, the dying embers of a railway system, once busy, now becalmed before the final closure.

I look at future plans, Shelfie2 above has a broken promise. Do I spin the viewing side 180 degrees, why not? It is a view I know works better than the one I ended with. The lighting rig and the control system can all be changed, relatively easily. While it will be the same layout I do wonder if it will ‘give’ me a second layout. Being so used to seeing it from the existing viewpoint will it light any fires seeing it in reverse? The thing is, I know it looks better in some aspects that way round. Some copicing will need to be done, the back wall of trees will need attention with gaps built into them to open views down into the yard. And thats an interesting bit, looking down the hill instead of up it, blocking the shadows onto the backdrop trying to capture the depth of the landscape and the Cheviots in the middle distance. How to get that Housman ‘Blue remembered hills’ feel quoted by Iain Rice and so effectively captured in Geoff Forsters Welsh Marches layouts.

The layout can of course evolve, its one that I’d considered ‘finished’, its done what I needed it too. Thoughts are that it can drop into a Forest of Dean system I want to build. Not as a location as such, but as a ready to run section to run trains to and from to start with. A planned visit later this week to a good friends rail system will no doubt provide further inspiration for its future.

If I spin it I still haven’t left the Hotel of course, just swapped the room furniture..