Model Trains and More Trains – Crossville TN

…continuing with the recent visit by our friends Bruce and Margaret from the St. Louis Missouri area.

The ladies were going shopping…ARRRG!  What could Bruce and I do…where could we go that would be fun and interesting?  Remember the model train layout that we visited in Oak Ridge Tennessee?  I decided that we’d go a bit further this time…to check out a much larger layout in Crossville Tennessee.  Crossville is about an hour from our home and we had lots of time before the ladies would return.

The first unusual fact about this model railroad club’s layout is that it actually occupies a large space in a local enclosed mall.  The Crossville Outlet Center isn’t huge but it features a Maurice’s store, Legg’s Hanes Bali outlet, Rack Room Shoes, a Vanity Fair Outlet, Dressbarn, a gamer’s store, and several more local operations including a church.

 

Customers certainly don’t have a hard time finding their way to the Crossville Model Railroad Club’s presentation of “The Wonderful World of Trains”!

We happily entered this adult/childhood fantasy land!  FYI, the exhibit is open to the public Tuesday – Friday and Sunday from Noon until 4 pm.  Saturday’s hours are from 11 AM until 4 PM.  Best of all, although the club does appreciate donations, admission is free!

This is a large space with 5 different model railroad scale layouts covering over 4,600 square feet.  Scale models included are G (the largest), as well as O, HO, N and Z.  FYI, if you have children, ‘Thomas the Tank Engine’ and his friends are part of the operation.

The room at the back left center of the photo houses the Upper Cumberland Railroad Society Museum…with lots of railroad artifacts and memorabilia.  I didn’t take any photos of it because I was too busy checking out the model railroad layouts…and I forgot!   

If you like dioramas, there are plenty of them here for you to marvel over and appreciate.  This photo show a military base complete with a guarded gated entrance, a water tower and a ‘rail gun’ along with matching rail cars. 

Note the different levels involved in this complex layout.  There are things to appreciate in every direction.  I personally like this little town laid out along the tracks.

The Crossville Model Railroad Club was founded back in 2001.  Membership has reached 65 over the years since.  Members volunteer over 7,500 hours of their time to operate the public display, run the trains, and repair the existing layout.  I’m guessing that a lot more time is spent building new scenes and related equipment as personal fun projects as they’re a bit tied down with visitors in-house.

The first inspiration Bruce saw regarding improvements or additions to his own multi-level home model train layout was this nifty airport.  It’s interesting to note that this big model railway operation features no less than 23 airplanes and 9 helicopters in the various vignettes.  

Bruce’s career was in safety, accident prevention and loss prevention.  He was completely ‘taken’ by this HO gauge fire scene with the burning building and the flashing lights.  Another project for his home based model railroad!  Warning to Margaret... He's going to need more room!

Just for your information response to this fire was prompt with structural damage being held to a minimum by the fire department.  However the impacted structure was the regional office for the Internal Revenue Service and “unfortunately, most of their records were impacted!”

Of course, my favorite locomotives are the old fashioned steam types…so I was partial to this scene showing a train passing by a railyard full of iron ore rail cars.

The Club’s “HO” layout is the biggest and most detailed with 4 operating mainlines… They are the “Southern”, “Norfolk and Western”, “Tennessee Central”, and the “Louisville and Nashville” railroads.  Between them, they have 742 feet of track in the layout.

This 2 level scene with the road above the town along the rails is a perfect example of a model railroader’s creative mind.  With a ‘gentlemen’s club’, a pawn shop, tattoo parlor and a liquor store this obviously isn’t the best side of town.  However, local authorities are trying to clean it up with a raid on that strip joint/gentlemen’s club.  They even have a police dog helping them!

This roundhouse reminded me of the one that existed in my hometown of Jackson Michigan when I was a youth… That town was ‘hopping’ in those days, both as a rail hub and as a manufacturer of auto parts.  Also note the coaling tower and water tank, both a necessity in the early days of railroading.

Reality is that America loves beef!  This appears to be a busy stockyard attached to a processing plant… “Swift Products” refrigerator cars await the finished product.

The Club’s HO display features a plethora of critters.  They include 37 horses, 89 cows, 12 dogs, 14 pigs, 7 sheep, 16 chickens, 12 pigeons, 7 deer, 5 monkeys, 6 seals, 5 bears, 2 gorillas and a lion.

Here is another fire scene…obviously set in a different era.  There is railroad track at 3 different levels of this photo.

This scrapyard full of scrap metal is being attended to by a large railcar style crane that loads the scrap into the open rail car.

 

The mainline railroads based on the complete HO display operate at least 15 passenger cars as well as 361+ pieces of freight rolling stock.

The landscaping alone is amazing.  Tunnels, hills, trees, grass and everything else are a major undertaking in themselves.  In addition, over 500 lightbulbs illuminate the buildings, signs, lights, etc.

This is the main railyard for the HO layout.  After all, the hundreds of pieces of rolling stock have to be kept somewhere when not in use.  This layout has 6 different rail yards, with this one alone involving 72 feet of track. 

This bucolic farm scene in the mountains…complete with horses, cows and pigs…is very nicely designed and composed.  It makes me want to visit the place! 

Of course, complex city/town scenes like this really demand a lot of pre-planning and construction.  The membership is truly dedicated.

Just putting together the display tables required 768 feet of 1 x 4s for table frames and more than 1300 feet of 1” x 2” lumber for leg braces.  As for the table tops, 36 sheets of half inch plywood and half inch homosote plus 8 sheets of 4X8 Plexiglas were used.

The fun really is in the details…at least as far as I’m concerned.  Note the woman hanging clothes on the rooftop with her child playing nearby.  What her ‘husband’ is doing with his pants down around his ankles is anyone’s guess!  The guy next door is just sunning himself on his rooftop deck…

I thought that it would be appropriate to end this portion of my post with a big circus parade!  Beyond the school bus, one circus wagon after another is coming down Main Street past a large audience, many of which are comfortably seated in bleachers along the route.  Note the elevated trolley line at the right of the parade.

The complete HO layout including the circus parade features 275 structures, almost 1,400 people, 471 autos, 297 trucks, 3 scooters, 11 motorcycles, 6 bicycles and 2 lawnmowers. It also includes a ‘still’, 5 outhouses and “Jimmy Hoffa’s final resting place”.  I missed seeing that last one!

This was a fun place to visit, at least for Bruce and myself.  It’s a model railroad ‘high’ as well as a diorama lover’s dream.  FYI, we did kick into the donation bucket. 

The Crossville Model Railroad Club and Upper Cumberland Railroad Society Museum is located at 229 Interstate Drive just off Interstate I-40 at Genesis Road.  Phone: 931-210-5050.  Their website with some great photos can be found at http://crossvilletrains.org/Welcome/. 

So after all of our ‘railroading’ efforts, Bruce and I decided it was time for lunch.  I’d heard about the Vegas Steakhouse and Bar in Crossville, so I decided to give it a try… Bruce patiently waited for me to take a picture.

The dining areas are a bit dated and a little ‘cave like’, but everything was clean and well maintained.  It was well after lunch so the restaurant wasn’t busy.

As has happened frequently in recent times, I forgot to take photos of the food until it was too late in my case, and just barely in time to grab a photo of half of Bruce’s Turkey sandwich.  Bruce said that his sandwich was OK but nothing special.

As for my French Dip/Roast Beef sandwich, it was a bit like eating over-done paper thin “Steak-umm”…thin-sliced frozen pieces of semi-dry tasteless ‘steak’.  Without the au jus accompanying the sandwich, I would have had to bury it in ketchup to make it palatable.  As it was, I dunked my sandwich in the au jus and then the ketchup.

To make matters worse, our waitress had an ‘attitude’ going on!  Surly would be the best description.  It’s not like either of us gave her a rough time or tried to joke around with her.  She should have stayed home for the day…or tried another line of work…like prison guard.

For what it’s worth, the Vegas Steakhouse and Bar is located at 3152 North Main Street in Crossville Tennessee.  Phone: 931-456-2850.  They are on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/Vegas-Steakhouse-Lounge-334060323446838/.  

Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them…

Thanks for stopping by to see what a couple of obsessive old guys have been up to!

Take Care, Big Daddy Dave