Monday, February 20, 2012

Detroit. The Motor City. Hockeytown. Motown. The name quickly conjures images of industrial growth and decay, urban vitality and blight. At one time, the epicenter of the Arsenal of Democracy and soon after, the poster child for racial unrest and white flight.  The Detroit Terminal Railroad rose and fell with the fortunes of the city it served, like a boat riding on the tide of the ocean. Born out of the industrial revolution that turned Detroit into a boomtown and raised on post-war prosperity, the DTRR grew leaner as Detroit faltered, eventually put out of its misery by Conrail in 1981.

The DTRR was solidly blue collar. Its workers toiled in anonymity, calmly going about the business of keeping Detroit's mighty industries working.  It dealt in auto parts, scrap metal and coal. In the end, it was just another victim of the economic pressures that crushed so many other Motor City institutions.

In my world, however, the DTRR lives on. It survives to the present day thanks to the continued benign neglect of its caretakers and the occasional lucky break. After buying out the Grand Trunk Western's share, Conrail kept the DTRR on its books as a financial straw man, a place to transfer losses and a closet in which to hide its skeletons. The employees became adept at operating in the margins, making the best of the resources on hand and living off Conrail's table scraps. Then, Conrail went under and CSX and Norfolk Southern couldn't find a way to split up its Detroit assets equally.  Instead of the Conrail Detroit Shared Asset Area, they took over joint ownership of the DTRR and used it to operate the old Conrail physical plant.

What follows is a consideration of the design elements, concepts, structures, and details of modeling this proto-freelance model railroad of the Detroit Terminal Railroad after having risen from the ashes once more.

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