New Direction?

In the Army we used the "Military Decision Making Process", or MDMP, as a tool for planning and to make operational decisions. The idea was to take the basic problem at hand and follow a very structured and deliberate decision making process to evaluate all of the possible influencing factors so a commander can make the most effective decisions on how to resolve the problem. As an example, the operational plan to invade Iraq in 1991 (Operation Desert Storm) was developed by the staff for General Norman Schwartzkopf over many painstaking months of careful planning using MDMP. Everything from beans to bombs has to be taken into account.

We use pretty much the same process in a much more simplified way when we try to figure out what to have for dinner or what to buy for our next car. Life is full of making decisions and re-evaluating plans, and most of the time we don't even think about it when we do it.

Model Railroading is no exception, and layout planning is perhaps a little more structured than we realize. Making a list of "givens and druthers" is a perfect example of the model railroader's decision making process. We have an idea what we want to create (the basic problem) but we have to force ourselves to think about all of the influencing factors involved with building a layout. As we then progress through the planning and construction of our layout, we have to constantly re-evaluate criteria and if necessary make adjustments to the plan. Many times as we progress, new issues pop up and depending on how critical the new issue might be, it could very well force us to re-evaluate our entire plan.

This is kind of where I am right now with my layout planning. I think I have spent more time planning my layout than Stormin' Norman's staff did to plan Desert Storm, or Ike's staff did to plan the Normandy Invasion.

Recently I arrived at a point where I decided to take a new direction because I realized my main goal of creating a union terminal layout was simply not going to work the way I envisioned it would. My list of givens and druthers for passenger operations just won't fit within my 13' x 27' space. Rather than spend any more time dwelling on the realization that I can't do a union terminal layout, I have decided to just move on in a new direction.

New Direction: NYC Clark Branch in Cleveland OH.

Back to Cleveland, which is where I originally started my model railroad planning journey. The old CCC&St.L (Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago, and St. Louis, or "Big Four") mainline into Cleveland became the NYC's Clark Branch when the Big Four was taken over by the New York Central in the early 1900's. This area has always fascinated me as I look at railroad maps of Cleveland and to me is an excellent example of riverfront railroading in Cleveland. Today most of it is gone except for a few tracks and much of it is operated by the Flats Industrial Railroad now.

Clark Branch starts in the south at the NYC Cloggsville Yard where the Clark Branch joins the CUT branch and the electrified line west of Cleveland Union Terminal. The branch then shoots north up a peninsula between the winding Cuyahoga River where it crosses the river right below CUT. It then continues northbound along the east bank of The Flats through the Warehouse District, finally joining the NYC's Water Level mainline between Chicago and New York City at a point just east of Bridge One which is the drawbridge at the mouth of the Cuyahoga River.

DK Yard is the main feature of the Clark Branch. In it's prime days, DK Yard served the Warehouse District, Republic Steel Nut & Bolt Division, and an industrial area inside another peninsula of the Cuyahoga River, as well as several industries right along the yard tracks. Clark Branch also interchanged with NKP at Cloggsville, Erie at DK Yard, and with PRR just to the west of Bridge One. DK interlocking was at the Erie interchange and OX interlocking was at the lift bridge below CUT where the line crossed the Cuyahoga River next to the Carter Road lift bridge.

I think Clark Branch offers a great opportunity for me to model Cleveland based on influencing layouts I still refer to, which are Bill Denton's Kingsbury Branch and Chuck Hitchcock's Argentine Industrial District. It will basically be an around-the-walls industrial switching layout with staging at both ends, interchanges with Erie and NKP, and plenty of riverfront railroading.

For now the passenger cars will have to stay in the boxes until someday when I have the room to incorporate passenger operations the way I would like.