Some pics of the route itself...

Approximately 40 miles down south from the Massilon steel mill is where the route project begins. And the past couple of weeks, that's where I've been mostly. Here some WIP pics to look at.

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Rich

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Picture an upside down Y and you have the gist of the New Philadelphia route. The pictures above were taken from the New Philly to South branch which I have finished. I'm presently in the New Philly area and already making the turn SE onto the second branch. Another branch extends west from New Philly which I plan to do simultaneously with the SE branch because it's pretty small, just a couple miles ending with another mill complex. The picture above is from New Philly's mill looking towards the main New Philly yard (hidden from view) and the SE branch in front of us. The area is fairly completed with much of the small detail already placed. Crossing gates and the signage won't be placed until I can get a good look at the new crossing gates RS.com plans to release soon with their next update.

If you enlarge the picture by clicking on it and if you can make out the buildings in the background on the left side of the picture, that's where the southern branch arrives in New Philly.

Rich

And just 'cause I can do it, here's a pic from the South branch looking towards the mill. - Rich

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I should mention all these pictures are to be considered rough draft completions (WIP). The final detailing pass through the route won't happen until I've finished the whole route.

Here's a picture of the New Philadelphia area showing the merging of the two branchlines. I've moved north of this area and will return to this area to begin construction on the SE branch as soon as I have finished where I'm at presently.

Rich

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Here's the latest WIP pic. This is of the mill in New Philadelphia. I wanted to maintain the character of the real mill which still resides in New Philly today but I noted a number of buildings were torn down. So I filled in the gaps with some of my own. The history of this mill is a mystery to me as what little I could find of the mill says the employee population was about 250. Looking at the 1994 satellite image of the mill, there looks to be an open hearth furnance there so it's hard to fathom the mill having so small of an employee population. Details... details... details! Nevertheless here's WIP pic of the New Philadelphia mill.

*see in post after next post*

BTW, in the previous overall pics of New Philly, this is a very small branch of a mile or two which extends east of New Philadelphia. If I would turn the camera left 90 degress you'd be looking at New Philly.

Rich

A couple of those buildings look familiar. Do you have someone down there shooting pictures?

The east and west branches are probably the remnants of the old Pennsylvania Railroad Tuscarawas Branch. It extended west and south to Cambridge and Marietta. Ring a bell? My grandpappy worked in the Cambridge yard for a time. Conrail abandoned the whole line in the 70's and Chessie ran those as branches. Now RJ Corman has it.

Right around that junction is the city limits. Everything north is Dover, everything south is "New Philly".

Do you have an interchange with the Wheeling and Lake Erie at Justus? I love interchanges, you can use any kind of car, anything you can't find a customer for. Goes back to when I build model railroads,

North of the mill in Massillon, there was an interchange with the Pennsy mainline.

Hi Mike,

Watcha mean do I have someone down here shooting pictures, you're the guy up there! lol!

But no. I have satellite shots but not even one pic of an external view of either Massilon or New Philly's mill. And my satellite shots are in b&w from 1994 (googleearth) as most of the buildings are gone before the satellite pics when color. It's been fun, really.

Justus. The simple answer is no, and yes. The interchange is not really setup just yet. You're refering to the big yard up at Brewster, right? That I want to include as an expansion pack which then the interchange will be represented and maybe the line running up to Navarre too. It's kinda sketchy at this point because with Railworks I'm not sure yet how I'm going to setup the expansions to work with Steam. This is an issue where I'm being told, "oh, no problem, we can get to work" but I won't believe it until I see it.

Rich

Here's a WIP post of the overall mill and then a more finalized pic.

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Rich

Well New Philly is "down there" to me. I'm about an hour to the north.

Expansion, to follow that same line, would be to run north from Massillon to Warwick. The line to Navarre is a different railroad.

Going north of the mill in Massillon is an interchange yard with PRR/PC/Conrail/Norfolk Southern. North of that is a large sand and gravel pit. Move up a couple miles is Canal Fulton. They have a canal boat that can be seen from the tracks. Horse drawn or mule drawn. Tourist attraction. Then a few more miles north is Warwick and interchange with CSX.

Right, the line to Navarre is a different line but in a round-about way they connect. I actually already have them connected but I'll follow-up on that at a later date. This route, if I can do the expansions like we did them in MSTS will be like what I did in Ohio Rail. Ohio Rail wasn't as much a route as a region. That's what this route through expansions could turn into. I'm more focused in on the steel operations in the area rather than the route itself.



Ah, so that's what that is. That interchange is already part of the route. I could extend the route up to Warwick, it's doable. But what is the purpose of the 3 long but skinny yards they have there? Another interchange?

Rich

Ya, Warwick is the interchange with the CSX, Massillon is the interchange with the Norfolk Southern, and Justus is the interchange with the Wheeling.

In Navarre is an intermodal crane facility. A good place for containers and trailers on flat cars. It didn't work out as well as they hoped, but it's now a lumber transload facility. So you could use it for either.

Kind of like Trantham Trucking becoming Marietta Lumber, but in real life.

There's a container place right in town that has a spur. There's a couple other places closer to Canton, but I'd have to drive down one day to see what they were. Road trip.

Further into Canton is Timken Ball Bearing, which has it's own steel mill. Then an oil refinery. The Wheeling calls this "Gambrinus". We run an excursion through there every fall, so I get see things you don't get to see from the roads.

If you go two miles west of Justus on the east-west line, there's a large yard and a huge shop building where the Wheeling does it's locomotive and car work. I worked in that shop (and out on the fuel rack). They built their own steamers in there at one time.

Couple of quick pics since I've moved into the southeast area of New Philadelphia on the last branch to be completed.

From New Philly steel mill...

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Southeastern area of New Philly has some busy areas right next to the track.

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Rich

Couple of newsworthy mentions here.

The first is how the route will be released. I've decided to release the route in part. This is a tenative decision until I examine the "technical" aspect of trying to do such a thing. The second is I learned today the steel mill is slightly north of New Philadelphia in Dover. The two communities are very close but it's more correct to say the mill and the yard is in Dover. You won't see much mention of New Philadelphia any longer. The third mention is the route is taking on a name finally. Since the route and its planned extensions are more about a theme, if not a region, I'm calling the route Ohio Steel. I've also considered Ohio Rails 2, Steel Region. Here's a breakdown map of the route.



My current progress is the rough draft portion of Stone Creek to Dover and Dover to the Steel Mill is completed. I'm working done to Uhrichsville, currently at the bend there in New Philadelphia.

Rich

And the most important thing: When will it be released? When? When? When?

Edit: Ok, according to Railsimulator.com's Christmas Showcase the Ohio Steel will arrive on Nov, 12.

"Dover (OH) Expansion Pack

Coming soon is another release from All Aboard, Ohio Steel. Ohio Steel brings back the days when men worked with their engines pulling huge tonnage in steel amongst mammoth steel mill structures crowned by dirty smoke billowing from the tall smokestacks. Ohio Steel brings back to life the life of a steel mill engineer servicing branchline customers and the switching operations which for many is the heart of the railroading experience!

Dover (OH), to be released soon, is the first of two planned expansion packs for Railworks which replicates the Dover and New Philadelphia steel mills and the two branchlines Dover to Stone Creek and Dover to Uhrichsville. The second of the two part expansion pack for Railworks recreates the route stretching northward from Dover to the massive steel mill in Massillon and the interchange just north of it. Future versions of Ohio Steel will include the run from Massillon to Canton (featuring a Blast Furnance and Basic Oxygen Furnance) and the huge rail yard at Brewster. Astute railroading enthusiasts will know this is not a route handled by a single railroad. Hence the name, Ohio Steel. If you have an interest or a passion in railroading and steel, keep your eye out for Ohio Steel."

source:RS.com Showcase

"Ohio Rails 2"

You do realize it's only 30 more miles from Stone Creek to Cambridge.

Really?? That's awesome! I'd rather expand south down to Cambridge than north to Warwick. Be more interesting too. Lemme go check that out, I'll be back at ya on that. - Rich

Looks like the rail line is gone and not represented in google. - Rich

It's tough to follow, very circuitous. That's a really rough region.

Here are some USGS quads that you might be able to look at and follow the route.

http://www.railsandtrails.com/USGS1900/OH/index.html

The Newcomerstown map shows the line coming down into Stone Creek (right about the E in Jefferson) and continuing on to the Cambridge map.

Newcomerstown has interchange with the PRR/PC/Conrail/Ohio Central/Genessee and Wyoming and the Wheeling and Lake Erie/NIckel Plate/Norfolk and Western/Wheeling and Lake Erie.

This will give you some idea of what customers were along the line in the 40's. Of course they dropped off as time went on. But you can see what was in that area. Page 165.

http://www.multimodalways.org/docs/railroa...%205-1-1945.pdf

Thanks for the excellent reading.
Its too bad that many of the industries in the Chicago Division are no longer with us, but I do recognize a few. The tracks were pulled from Schererville, In. to the 59th.st yard in the late 70's and whats left around the old stockyards is switched by the N&W
.
Thanks for the look in the past.

Route name: Ohio Steel
1) Dover & South (WIP)
2) Dover to Massillon -on hold til Dover & South is completed

Dover & South continues to move rapidly towards conclusion. From Stone Creek to Dover, the rough draft is complete. From Dover to the Dover Steel Mill branchline, the rough drafted is complete. I'm halfway down the tracks from Dover to Uhrichsville (what kind of smart-aleck came up with a name like that? Uh... richsville? ) where the track ends at a large industrial complex which does Aluminum. I believe it's a global company. Anyway, the pic portrays the halfway point marked Here (think.. You Are Here ). I'm actually a little bit past that.

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Rich

Edit: As of this time I'm more closer to the next sharp bend that turns southwared below the red arrow. My goal is to have the rough draft of the route done by Oct. 1.

With just a few hours away from completing the rough draft of the Ohio Steel, Dover Div., it's pop the champagne time, as for the past 10 years there's always that moment of euphoria when a route finally comes to fruition. And this one has. Take a look...

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This is the end of the line, or in this case, the Alersis Aluminum Recycling Plant, one of the largest in the US. It will have a different name in the route as I couldn't represent it faithfully and nor could I figure out where the tracks used to go since they've all been removed except for one single track that looks to have been abandoned but not removed yet. It's a pretty large facility and so I added input/output tracks as well as coal feed tracks to fire the boilers up with. I read while building this facility that the Aluminum industry, just itself, uses 1% of the electricity produced here in the US.

And here's the last development pic of the Dover Div I'll be posting, the progress map marking my progress through the route. I'm at the very end with most of the big and small detailing applied throughout the route. What's left is minor or very small detailing like traffic signs and stuff like that. The bigger stuff that needs to be done is stuff like naming the sidings, touch-ups, looking out for floaters and such, and the schematics and manual. Oh, and of course, scenarios. I anticipate ten for this part of the route and then another ten when the next part of the route is completed, Massillon.

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Gotta go create a webpage for the route (yuck!) make a movie or two, stuff like that. I hope you enjoyed the "making of" the route.

Release will most likely be the usual that I release the route early through the All Aboard website (paypal) and then through Steam pending RS.com's approval.

Rich