Operating on Wattle Flat
early 2021 the Borderline Operators were invited to visit , the layout of noted Queensland-based modeller Darren Lee. is a medium-to-large HO scale layout that broadly depicts parts of south-western New South Wales. While the yards strung along the main line are based on NSWGR prototype designs, the layout does not represent one specific location or line: rather, it depicts a line running through locations that were proposed for a rail line that was never built. The yards at each station have track designs from NSW railway towns as diverse as Cooma in the south-east and Merriwa in the central west. The layout was designed to be operated by visiting crews in a way that closely mirrors train operations on the NSWGR in the 1970s, the era depicted on the layout via liveries and rolling stock. Darren explained it had been his intention to essentially build a layout that would be operated by friends and visitors and he envisaged, while an operating session was in progress, he would rarely drive a train himself. He saw his role during operating sessions as being a combination of guide, troubleshooter and ‘gopher’. is operated. I have a sneaking suspicion that this scenario, of building a layout for others to run your trains on, is possibly quite foreign to many modellers. However, it closely matches my own experience on the two operations based layouts I’ve built: in HO scale and now in O scale (1:43.5). Operating a train across a layout, shunting sidings and making up a new train to go back down the line — all the while working under a set of rules that mirror the prototype the layout depicts — can be an immensely rewarding experience. However, doing so takes a lot of concentration; far too much concentration to allow you to:
