Looking east down NW 59th Street in 2013 we see several boxes spotted in front of SALCO, a swimming pool chemical supplier in Miami’s East Rail industrial park.

For many, many years I’ve bounced around the idea of building a second version of my old East Rail layout. The questions being: where would I put it? What form would it take? Is it crazy to do so!?

It’s been a slow decision in coming but ultimately I came to the conclusion that the layout had been so successful, on so many fronts, that it was worth making a replica. One of the main issues I faced with version 1 was dust control. It was located in my workshop and, no matter what measures I took, dust seemed to find a way to become an issue. I have a small photo studio in my basement. With a little re-arranging of furniture it became the ideal space for a version 2. Locating the layout there would largely eliminate the old dust problem.

Over the years I played with a few iterations. Ultimately I decided to stay very close to the original design. The leg holding the canal stays essentially unchanged. I did some streamlining on the left leg of the “L” by removing a few spurs that were overkill but, other than that, it stays pretty close to the old plan.

Getting a quick launch and establishing early momentum is crucial. It took ridiculously little time to get the bench work back up. I’ve temporarily placed some Atlas code 83 track down as “proof of concept”. At this point I can pick and choose my projects and develop and detail the project at a leisurely pace. Stay tuned!