Hello everyone, What is the difference between a branchline and a shortline. Also, I'm just getting into this hobby and I have no real knowledge about railroads, especially regarding the locomotives makers and models. What are some good ressources about railroading in general? BTW this forum rocks, everyone is really helpful, thank you Charles
The difference between a branch line and a short line is who owns it. A branchline branches off of the main and is owned by the same company. A short line can also branch off a main or be it's own self-contained system and is owned by another company (though a larger RR company can have controlling interest). A great resource for locos and model makers is Spookshow's encyclopedia. NMRA has a pretty decent beginner's guide. Hope this helps.
Or, put another way, a Branch Line is a track that is owned by a company that also has a Main Line. A Short Line is a small railroad company. Short Lines may or may not own and run trains on Branch Lines, but so do the Class I railroads. I would HIGHLY recommend John Armstrong's The Rialroad: What it Is, What it Does. See if you can get it from your local library, or through inter-library loan. It's a great introduction to many aspects of (prototype) railroading.
Ditto on Armstrong's The Railroad: What it Is, What it Does. Very groovy book. I found it at the Cal Berkeley Transportation Studies library. Another great resource is Armstrong's Track Planning for Realistic Operations (3rd Ed.), which includes some of the more useful bits from the other book and gears it specifically for model railroading. Even if you're not going to design your own big layout, Track Planning for Realistic Operations is a wonderful resource about how railroads work and ways to get the most out of building and running your model railroad.
A branch line is a sub-part of one specific railroad system. A short line is a whole smaller railroad. Such as a regional operation. A Class II or Class III as they classify such these days.
One of the fun things with both branch and shortlines is the modeling potentials whether it is prototype or freelance. To me the branch and shortlines have much more modeling attraction than the mainline. Usually the shortline will have older, sometimes rebuilt, motive power, or they lease thier power from the big guys. Usually it is the smaller and lighter power that can be found on both, although there are some branch and shortlines that have heavier rails and can take almost anything. My designed modeling locale has the mainline, with a branch line that is also served by a shortline that used to be a common carrier. However branchlines and shortlines both are not limited to a few miles. There are some that easily exceed over a hundred miles of track.
Thank you for your answers! For now I'm not planning on designing my model railroad. As I said in a thread last week, I'm planning on building plan 39 of 101 track plans on a HCD in n scale. But, I just ordered Track Planning for realistic operations. The thing is there is so much stuff that looks interesting to model that I want to model everyhing. Does the perfect model railroad really exist? Anyway thanks to you all for the help. Charles Here's the track plan I want to build
Yes, the "perfect" layout is the one you are building. It doesn't matter if it meets all of your requirements or not. What is important is that you are enjoying your time. I too want everything in mine. I daydream about having a warehouse size space to build it. The "Grey and Grandure" will be modeled as a short line connecting to the CP and GN. It is basically: Huge Oval - for continuous running The Grey and Grandure running down the middle from one end to the other Large yard / Open staging, (in an "L" off the oval), - for freight setup Passenger station - running everything from steam excursion to bullet trains Since I don't have all of the space I want some of the scenery will be modular so i can swap it out.
