From an old newspaper article in the "Eureka Springs Echo" dated in what appears to be sometime in 1884 or 1885...

EUREKA SPRINGS RAILS LINKED SOUTH!!

Rails of the courageous Eureka Springs & North Arkansas were linked today. A daring traveler can now board a train at Eureka Springs, and proceed south through some of the most inhospitable terrain known to man, transfer to another line at Esna, and eventually arrive at the riverfront town of Ozark, Arkansas.

Alas, the ES&NA failed in its bid to be first to the zinc mining region just south of St. Paul, Arkansas. The ES&NA's bitter rival, the Ozark Northern Railroad, reached the region first by a scant few months, and has thus capitalized thereon. However, by virtue of the ES&NA using what is essentially the only north and south route through this rugged and isolated region, the ES&NA has now placed the Ozark Northern in a position that it will need to avail itself of the ES&NA in order to move its zinc ore to northern markets.

However, zinc is not all the ES&NA will avail itself of for revenue. The virgin timber rich area assures timber oriented traffic for many decades to come, as well as a vast abundance of various specimens of aggregate for gravel, ballast, cut stone, and such. The aggregate deposits are nigh infinite in use and essentially inexhaustable in supply.

The great town of Eureka Springs looks forward to continued growth and prosperity with this good news concerning the future of its very own railroad.

Wow. The rail situation at Eureka Springs is going to be almost exactly like I envisioned it and hoped it would be. That is, I was wanting to have a tight and confined terminal rail facility (which was graciously provided by the prototype!), and then leaving south, immediately start working hard to gain altitude. Along the way I wanted to pass through storefronts and such, maybe even some street running. Veering away from civilization, the climb would steepen and be a real struggle to get out of the Leatherwood Creek Hollow.

Welp... I've got my wishes! Though the mainline rails won't get truly near the business district, I hope to run an industrial lead up far enough in order to model some of the town that I find so fascinating.

Okay, enough of the dreaming... below you'll find the first in-game look at my virtual reality of the Eureka Springs & North Arkansas. You're looking at the summit just south of Eureka Springs.

See what I was telling you about the tumbled and very rugged nature of this portion of the Ozarks? The distances between the valley floors and summits is not as great as the found in the Fly Gap area of the Ozark Northern... but my oh my... what a jumbled mass of mountains!

Having fun!

Have roughed-in a facimile for the prototype* Eureka Springs facilities.

Not perfect, but "do-able". I may need to shift it a bit to the west (left)... but at least I have something in place that captures the flavor of the rails of the prototype* that was at Eureka Springs!

Once the engine shops and supporting structures are in place, it will be kinda' neat.

Getting to be bed time... more later!

* Prototype: Eureka Springs Rwy circa 1883-1899, St. Louis & North Arkansas 1899-1912.

Nice to see you finally made it to Eureka Springs. Looks like enough of a hill to give an impression of a vertical town.

Coming along very nicely! I'm looking forward to this route. Keep the updates coming...

Al

Hi Mervyn!

Actually, that area is the widest and most accomodating area available for rail facilities in Eureka Springs, hence the reason the prototype put it to use it back in 1883.

The actual city area was FAR more vertical. Attached you will see some RE pics of the actual town area, as well as a few prototype pics.

(to be continued)...

The other direction...

The "Flat Iron Building" at the junction of Spring St. in the 1900's...

(Note how dramatically the elevations change from left to right!)

A scene from the 1880's....

And last pic for now, a contemporary scene including the Flat Iron Building. Trust me, these photos do NOT adequately convey verticality of this fascinating town.

Hi Al!

I've been on a roll, huh??

Lessee'... in about 10 days I laid 57 miles of mainline through some very tumbled terrain, and (from south to the north) have the basic industrial/pass tracks in place for the towns of:

* Hickory Gap (Pass & Team track on first summit north of Esna on the Ozark Northern.)

* Limestone (Small yard, wye, team track, short/steep, switchback branch up to limestone a quarry.)

* Witter (Pass w/team track)

* Venus (Pass w/team track)

* Aurora (Pass, auxiliary track, industry spurs, lumber mill tracks. Based on protoytpe track at North Arkansas RR town of "Shirley".)

* Summit #2 (Unamed pass track.)

* Hunstville (Pass, two yard tracks, spur switches laid, industries to be determined.)

* Holman Creek (Pass track.)

* Withrow Springs (Small siding for excursionists to the Withrow Springs, which is a spring/creek that comes out from a low ceiling cave.)

* Forum (Pass w/auxiliary track, switches in place for some form of wood-based industry complex. Will likely have a wye as well.)

* Lookout (Named for a map location. Pass w/auxiliary track, currently has a wye, but the wye may be removed if Forum gets a wye.)

* Unnamed Pass Track

* Liberty (Nearby map location, name may change. Pass, auxiliary track, wye, and good location for a possible small town w/industry spurs. This town is at the top of the northbound descent down the "The Corkscrew".)

* Turpentine Hollow (Pass Track.)

* Bear Hollow (Pass track, team spur, auxiliary siding, wye, tracks leading to a sawmill complex, and the truncated remains of a logged-out branch in place still used as the switch lead to the mill complex.)

* Keels Creek (Pass track, auxiliary track, small engine service area, team track. This is at the foot of the steep northbound climb over the divide to Eureka Springs. Helpers will dispatched out of Eureka Springs to here to help northbounds over the grade. Edit: Compact wye added to faciltate turning the helper engines.)

* Summit #3 (unnamed pass track primarily in place if needed to double a train over the grades either side.)

* Eureka Springs (Spur/branch in place to the business district for "onesy-twosey" customers, the yard facilities, engine shops/service, freight house track, team track, wye, and ??)

All of this, plus the southern extension of the Ozark Northern to the riverport town of Ozark!!

I've created a monster.

You better lay down or you'll pass out from hyperactivity! Either that or your computer will spontaneously combust!

I'm not sure I understand all this. Is this 'whole' thing gonna be one BIG route with all your other Arkansas routes connected?
Is that what we're looking forward to here?
'Cause that'll be cooooool if it is!

Rickster commented/asked:

"I'm not sure I understand all this."

That makes two of us!

"Is this 'whole' thing gonna be one BIG route with all your other
Arkansas routes connected?"

If/when completed, the route package would include the new extended Ozark Northern and the ES&NA connected end-to-end for two different railroad companies in one route "package". The completed ON would be about 36 miles long, the completed ES&NA would be about 57 miles long. Below you'll see a repost of a map w/annotation from Activity Editor that shows the rail lines and illustrates the concept. Bear in mind the squiggly line at the north end of the ES&NA portion now squiggles all the way to the black dot labeled "Eureka Springs"

Now, if by "all your other Arkansas routes" you mean the released St. Louis & North Arkansas, the A&O Sub, and the incomplete CoalBelt project, then no, that is not the case. The Ozark Lines project would only contain the Ozark Northern and the ES&NA.

"Is that what we're looking forward to here?
'Cause that'll be cooooool if it is!"

Depends on what you meant as to how cool it will be!

Oh, OK, I got it, now.
That's cool enough. I want one. LOL

Hi gents!

means this, that we`re getting the whole Ozark Northern??? :-)
Can`t wait to get new pics from it!

Cheers,

Christian

Haven't seen nor heard from Andre in awhile.
Yeah, he's expanding the ON both northward and southward.
It's gonna be one 'big' route eventually.

Hi Grindre!

This sounds great :-) I am loovin`this old RR-stuff!!!

@laming:

I`ve one suggestion regarding the forests at your routes.
Is it possible to deepen them a lilbit into the background? I used "sceneries"
("forest-walls") on my Monson RR which made the forests looking like
very deep and big reaching until the horizon. Framreates are
still high but it looks much more like a real forest then dark-green
ground texures. I already begun somewhen in March withe depening the
forests at the ON but I had to stop this project due to lack of time.
May be I am a too big perfectionistc ;-)

Here 2 screens from my Monson RR:

Click to view attachment

Click to view attachment

BTW: The MRR will be released soon :-)

Cheers,

Christian

Andre,
Where did you ever find this photo? I have built an S scale model of this building without the benefit of this angle. Got it pretty close. Will have to post a photo of my model here when I get home tonight.
Bill

Hi Bill:

Alas, I don't recall what Eureka Springs website I retrieved that photo from. I do recall I was using Google. I still scrounge and scour every now and then and sometimes it is fruitful. You know what they say in the Ozarks: "Sometimes even a blind hog kin root up an acurn."

@chripsch

The technique you describe works well for shallow hills or rolling hills. The problem is when you have quite a bit of vastness or significance to the mountains. Take for example the Ozark Northern scene you get headed south leaving Fly Gap. You're on top of the ridge and there's valley and mountains for miles. Simply no way to cover such vistas with thick vegetation. Been there, tried that.

Whether we MSTS mountain lovers like it or not, in my opinion MSTS does its best job modeling flatlands, shallow hills (such as your Monson) and rolling hills. Depth and vastness can be accomplished with more success on such routes.

Re: The Ozark Lines.

This is a big project. As with all my stuff I like to work on now, there is no time schedule, nor do I have any idea how far I'll get with it. The Ozark Lines route project certainly has a lot of promise... but there is also a lot of scenery to be placed... a LOT.

Plus, past several months (when indulging in MSTS), I have been working on the Colorado Midland. Track for the original goal is essentially 100% on that project. In fact, just last week I sent off two CM discs to my two tester guys to look over and operate on the track to find/report problems.

So... the Ozark Lines hasn't been furthered since this thread. HOWEVER... with me, ANY project can get RESURRECTED at ANY TIME. So who knows?

In fact... I wonder what the Eureka Springs yard and shops area would look like with stand-in structures??? Hmmmm....

Andre,
Here is my version of the building in question. Note that my sides do not agree with the photo yo have. I worked from a later photo taken from a different angle that seemed to shoe 3 equal walls on the "bow" of the building. The scene is clearly not yet finished as signs, people, roof details, and so on are yet to be added.
Bill

Bill, that is some seriously fine modeling there. Well done, sir!

I was just noticing the grade on that trolley track next to the building. SHEESH! Straight up!