Progress

A little background... I am modeling the Los Angeles Junction Railway in HO, circa 1985.   From the BNSF web site:

The LAJ is a wholly owned subsidiary of BNSF and provides switching service on 64 miles of track primarily in the industrial areas around Vernon, CA southeast of Los Angeles. The LAJ was planned in the early 1920s as the switching railroad for the Central Manufacturing District in the cities of Vernon, Maywood, Bell and Commerce.

Specifically, I am modeling what is is called the "Long Laguna Lead" from A Yard in Vernon, into Commerce.  Why?  Well, I am a freight car nut and this stretch has/had a really nice mix of industries, large and small - paper mills, a malt elevator, pet food plant, borax detergent plant, chemical companies, produce distributors, etc.   Company names like Great Western Malting, Hills Pet Nutrition, US Borax, Emery Chemicals, General Felt, etc.  

After finally settling in on this as a prototype to model, it really just snowballed from there in terms of information available... example, a guy by the named of Charlie Slater who worked on the LAJ in the 1970s, posted several track diagrams of the various leads of the LAJ including his notes on carloads and traffic.  Long Laguna Lead map (do note I am not modeling everything shown here, except for Cal Mat <now Great Western Malting>, Kendall <now Hills>, General Felt and LA Paper Box):

I also found some paperwork a friend had given me in the 1990s, when he (briefly) worked on the LAJ.  Lots of ideas when I get to the Operations phase :)

Picture of Great Western Malting (circa 1940s/50s), this is from the LA County archives.  (That's Malt Avenue crossing the tracks, with a diamond in the street crossing - the box cars are where they loaded the malt, barley loads were brought in on the backside of the elevator.)  Below is a more modern picture I took (really glad I took a few pictures of the elevator.  It has since been torn down.)

Anywho, I am about I'd say 75% done with the benchwork phase of my little switching empire in my basement.  Total "mainline" run is about ~100', starting at A Yard out to Garfield Ave in Commerce where it ends at the US Borax plant.  I don't have an actual track plan yet, I am more of a visual person in terms of playing around with the track and where things should or will fit.  I am more or less using the prototype for guidance too (thanks Google and Bing aerial photos!)

Construction is basically 1x4 frames topped with 2" foam.  Mostly hung via shelf brackets along the wall, but there's a section (approx. 12' x 10') that is on legs.  If it looks similar to Free-mo construction, it is, some of these are repurposed modules.  From here, it curves left to go about 21' along one wall, then another 55' out towards the other end of the basement where A Yard will be.

Played around with some freight cars to envision how things will look.  Here's a little proto-freelancing, as I moved the Vons bakery and milk plant over onto my version of the LAJ (the prototype is in Commerce, just "across the street" if you will).  I like Airslides so I had to do it... plus, its a neat plant.