John Stevens’ Pan Am Railways Crawford Notch Branch
The layout is a proto-freelanced depiction of Pan Am Railways(PAR) operations in southeastern and central New Hampshire and southern Maine. In the real world, this was Boston & Maine (BM) and Maine Central (MEC) trackage that was merged into Guilford Transportation Industries which later became Pan Am Railways (PAR). Much of the trackage that is modelled was abandoned in the 1980's. The layout has been under construction for about 4 years. The layout is in two rooms with one room having three levels and the other room two levels. When going between the rooms, you walk under the top level of the layout. I have about a 40 foot section of benchwork to complete.
The track plan is a point-to-point, single-track main line with 5 passing tracks. One end has a 5-track stub-ended staging yard the other end has a 5-track loop staging. The layout has 2 helixes connecting the 4 levels. The area modeled represents the area from Troy New York to East Deerfield, Massachusetts. The time frame is the summer of 1957 just after the start of the McGinnis era on the A & M..
The scenery is progressing to about 70% at least roughed in. The backdrop is hand painted on walls
and hardboard. Most of the scenery is paper shell, some carved foam board with ground goop covered with Woodland Scenics products along with misc. other materials. Have been using front silvered mirrors to extend rivers and roadways into the backdrop.