Having recently made my layout smaller, I had to re-construct the train sequence. I thought of just taking some trains out of the old sequence, but in the end I felt it would be better to start the train sequence from scratch. I also felt that to give a little more operational interest that I would re-open the East Branch, so I had to figure out what trains could run along it realistically. In the end, I chose to have B&OCT trains (with Chessie motive power) running from and to the East Branch. The operating scheme I am now running meant the East Branch really needed to be connected to another railroad, so I 'imagineered' a connection to Osborn Yard to the east. Potentially, any interchnage traffic from the east could run over the East Branch now. Previosuly, EJ&E trains came from Van Loon to the east of the the C&SFT. Now EJ&E trains travel from Joliet south west of the C&SFT, via Blue Island, to the C&SFT Interchange Yard.

In the end I have stayed with the same railroads - the EJ&E, IHB, and Chessie trains - as the railroads that connect to my railroad. I have had to remove the Canadian Pacific / SOO Line and MWSL trains from the train sequence all together. Maybe one day I can re-introduce them to the train sequence, but it's not practical at the moment. I had to change the types of cars represented in the various trains, as the way the train consists were previously really didn't work well with the smaller layout. I also don't have any through trains in the train sequence now, only trains that connect to the the C&SFT Interchange Yard. I have managed to keep some train meets at Calumet South.

I have found that the Team Track is now the busiest industry, followed closely by Midwest Foods and Northern Chemicals. The change to a smaller layout has also meant I now don't have as many cars on the layout, so I have been a little more selective as to what cars I have on the layout. Now I have up to 40 cars on the layout at any particular time, instead of the previous 60 or so cars. Actually, with 40 cars the railroad is really busy, and finding space at industry spurs and the yard can sometimes test an operator's operating ingenuity! Over time I will see whether I should cut the number of cars back to about 30 cars but I think 40 is about the optimum for the various trains that are run.