The S& N.E.s place in the world - and in my modelling room!

I have had some reactions to my plans for the new layout. This has caused me to restate the back story for the S&NE. Firstly, I decided to produce a better map, including the real B&M and New Haven.

Firstly, I have renamed Worcester to Sunset (just because I created this railroad name in 1970 for an N Scale layout I was building and it has stayed with me ever since!). As you can see, the B&M never came near Hartford and the New Haven had a long route east and north to get to Boston. The S&NE came into being because places along the actual route felt that they were missing out by not having a railroad. I have also assumed that, because the S&NE served Sunset, the two rail links from the B&M to the town (Worcester actually) were never built. I have left off any routes that aren't involved in this story (NH from New Haven to NY for instance)

Things went swimmingly until the Wall Street Crash. Up to that time, the S&NE ran regular freights and passenger trains from Hartford to Boston and did very well out of it. Following the crash, the passenger traffic fell of, leaving the railroad to finally close the line to passengers around 1933. The 2nd WW gave the freight traffic a big boost but the military personnel trains stayed on the New Haven/B&M route as they had the stock to carry the volumes.

This continued after the war until Budd produced their RDCs. The New Haven saw these as a way to provide a service directly to Boston so that their passengers didn't have to change at Springfield. They started out with three trains a day over the S&NE but slowly reduced it to 1 each way by the time we get to our scenario. You can read, in an earlier blog entry, how this affected the passenger facilities at Sunset.

As it provides a much quicker link between Boston and Hartford, the B&M runs a daily through freight in each direction. This also eliminates the need for switching at Springfield. It also runs a way freight through to Sunset. Both of these routes are headed up by a B&M RS-3.  The New Haven runs their RDC once a day to Boston. The S&NE runs a way freight each day in both directions and a through freight to Hartford.

This gives us the following trains:
B&M Through to Hartford (stops at Sunset for S&NE direct traffic to Hartford) (B&M RS-3).
B&M Return to Boston (stops at Sunset for S&NE direct traffic to Boston) (B&M RS-3).
B&M Way Freight to Sunset (B&M RS-3).
B&M Way Freight back to Boston (B&M RS-3).
S&NE Way Freight to Boston (SNE SW7).
S&NE Way Freight from Boston (SNE SW7).

S&NE Way Freight to Hartford (SNE SW7).
S&NE Way Freight from Hartford (SNE SW7).
S&NE Through Freight to Hartford  (SNE F3A).
S&NE Through Freight from Hartford  (SNE F3A).NH RDC from Hartford to Sunset and Boston (NH RDC)
NH RDC from Boston to Sunset and Hartford (NH RDC)

These, with the switching involved, provide a nice operating session for me.

Note: If I have the geography or the history wrong then I don't care. This story will do me.