TOMA Phase One: Developing a Rolling Stock Roster

Earlier this spring I attended several of the online NERX clinics, including one by Drew James on developing a realistic or plausible rolling stock roster. In developing my initial rolling stock roster for this first TOMA section, Nooksack and a sceniced staging module, I am using notes from his clinic, some information from a Great Northern 1955 Annual Report that I found online, and some of my planned industries for the 4th Subdivision. This roster is focusing on freight cars; passenger and engine rosters are a different topic.

Percentage of Railroads Represented

Drew James, in his clinic, suggests considering the era, the setting, and the type of railroad. In my case this is 1954, Whatcom County in Washington State, and a branchline of the Great Northern Railway connecting with the mainline in Ferndale and interchanging with the Northern Pacific. I described this in a recently posted rationale. He then goes on to suggest developing a target percentage of the railroads represented in the roster and ultimately creating a spreadsheet of cars. Keeping in mind that this is the percentage of different railroads, not kinds of cars, at this point, here is his suggestion for target percentage:

• Home Road: 50%
• Connecting Foreign Road: 25%
• Foreign in Region: 13% (This would include such roads as Milw, UP, CN, SP&S, etc.)
• Foreign Outside Region: 6%
• Private: 6%

If I pick a total amount of around thirty cars for this first iteration of the 4th Subdivision, his target percentage of rolling stock would work out like this:

• 15 Great Northern cars
• 8 Northern Pacific cars
• 4 foreign in region 
• 2 foreign outside region
• 2 private

Percentage or Number of Different Car Types

I have guidelines for the number of cars from different railroads, but what about the numbers of different types of rolling stock? Just a few days ago, I found a Great Northern annual report online from 1955 that included information about the amount of freight revenue by different commodity groups in 1954. While this may not reflect my branchline, it does give an overview of traffic pattern (and hence types of rolling stock) for the Great Northern in general. Here are some percentages and notes theorizing about variance based on location in the Pacific Northwest:

• Forest Products: 15% (a lot from the PNW, so percentage may well be higher)
• Agriculture: 31% (almost 2/3 of that grain)
• Manufacturing and Misc.: 31%
• Mines: 18% (Most was iron ore, 25% of that is other)
• Animal and Petroleum: around 2% each

The freight traffic along the 4th Subdivision is much more likely to be impacted by the types of industries present than the traffic patterns of the railroad as a whole. So, an inventory of industries and likely traffic should also be considered. 

• Nooksack:
• Cannery: boxcars, refers, tank cars 
• Fuel Dealer: tank cars
• Grocery Warehouse: refers, boxcars
• Team Track: gondolas, flatcars, boxcars
• NP Interchange:
• Limestone: hoppers
• Miscellaneous: boxcars, refers, all kinds
• Farther East:
• Silica Sand: covered hoppers
• Copper Ore: ore car
• Lumber: flatcars, gondolas, boxcars

Using the same 31 total cars I built an initial breakdown of car types. In addition to the general and specific commodities and industries considered I was also influenced by a chart of "railroad cars in service" from 1955 in Jeff Wilson's Freight Cars of the '40s and '50s in coming up with a first draft of target numbers for different types of cars: 

• Boxcars: 12
• Hoppers: 3
• Tank Cars: 3
• Refers: 3
• Flatcars: 2 
• Gondolas: 4
• Covered Hopper: 3
• Ore Car: 1 

A New Spreadsheet and Other Considerations

With my rolling stock having gone through a second move and with these target numbers in mind, I plan to create a new Excel document for this first phase based on Nooksack. I have a spreadsheet of rolling stock that I created in Meadville for the first version of the 4th Subdivision. I hope to become more familiar with sorting functions in Excel, so that I can design this new spreadsheet with railroads represented and car types easily sorted. Even without new Excel skills, I can always resort to analog techniques with color pencils. 

Revisiting my standards may well be another consideration as I develop, review my existing collection, or add to my rolling stock roster. A much earlier post describes my existing standards, and another post explores combining mechanical standards with weathering. I haven't yet written about or fully determined what standards I might develop for level of modeling detail for this new version of the railroad. In developing this new roster, I am striving for a level of plausibility and realism based on overall impressions and assumptions rather than researching and recreating actual car lists from September 1954. (Although a first step in this direction might be obtaining a 1954 edition of the Official Railway Equipment Register.) At this point though, near flawless running and overall impression of realism take higher priority than insisting on contest level rolling stock. On the other hand, I have nothing against improving my modeling ability or raising my expectations moving forward.