-click photos to enlarge-
Check out this wild project from the early 1950s! Ray Downs of Bay Shore, New York won first place in Railroad Model Craftman's 1952 Model Building Contest. The December 1952 issue of RMC has all the details, but in summary Mr. Downs wanted to get maximum efficency from a small area in building his HO layout. Boy, did he!
-pictured is the builder's son, Ray Downs Jr.-
The primary material for the entire structure was white pine painted silver. Ultimately his plan was to have 52 tracks feed from his oval-shaped pit. Though not all trackage is complete you can get the idea of what his intent is. What a way to display all your motive power! For all those guys with an overabundance of MTH, Atlas and Lionel locos this may be the ideal way to not only display the collection but operate it on-demand as well.
That giant gantry in the background operates to service the engine house. Wow!
More pics and text in the Dec 1952 RMC issue. See if there's a copy here!
