SKALLY LINE Alpha - Any Recommendations for a 40-Mile Shortline in Minnesota???
So, with ORTS and the fall and demise of MSTS (exception with the SFM program), I'd like to go back to the days when I started kindergarten in Pine City, MN, on the Saint Croix Valley Railroad (a 40-mile shortline purchased from BNSF by a group of executives from Minnesota known as the KBN Inc. in the year ending 1997). I remembered hearing the RailAmerica and BN Leslie RS3's blaring through four different crossings in my hometown. It seems like a dream to finally be able to relive my childhood years prior to 1997 when BNSF sold the ex-NP "Skally Line" to KBN and named the line "St. Croix Valley Railroad".
But today marks a new dream - a dream so powerful, I can virtually man-handle it with confidence. It's the architecture and design of the ORTS version of Saint Croix Valley Railroad, known as the "SKALLY LINE Alpha".
The ORTS route should be a 40-mile trek across forest, river, lakes, and wetland along Old US Highway 61 and I-35.
-Starting in HINCKLEY is the two-track holding yard for interchanging with the BNSF.
-Down the map we go to Mission Creek TWP where 417 people died as a result of the Great Hinckley Fire of Sept. 1, 1894.
-Next is a town called Beroun, where my father was affiliated with the William O. Machart American Legion (Post 347). He got me interested in trains and there lies my hobbyist movement.
-Next down the line is Pine City, my childhood home, a legend of a ghost train in 1883 disppearing into nearby Devil's Lake.
-Next is Rock Creek, a wetland and southern end of Pine County's section of SCXY trackage.
-About 10 miles south is RUSH CITY, the HQ of the railroad, home to a failing Ardent Mills elevator and propane loading facility south of the HQ building.
-Next place down is the Titan Transloading Facility. BNSF shuttle sand trains are loaded or unloaded here.
-Finally, the southern-most terminus lies at a town called North Branch, a fertilizer mill lies here.
I will be hopefully using US3Tracks as the standard track texture for the SKALLY LINE Alpha. It's a non-signaled route with plenty of switching and branch-running opportunities. There's plenty of coniferous and deciduous trees along the route as well, along with standard grade crossing signals (including a set of Grizwold Xing signals). With the exception of the town of Harris on the north crossing, the grade crossings are based on 2019 observation.
BONUS! One locomotive will be available to download from the cloud once the route is ready for verification. It's a SCXY SD40M-2 #1326 in the Northern Pacific-style "Radio-Equipped" livery that was prototypically acquired in May 2014, and it's ready-to-run for sand trains from Titan Transloading to Rush City.
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Originally Posted by Boat23
