MRL in Miniature

About a year and a half ago, we moved to the town we now live in. Around the time we moved, I asked those in a Yahoo group I am a member of whether there were any members in the region we were moving to.

John informed me that he lived about an hour from the town we were moving to, and we made an appointment to meet. But that appointment was cancelled at my request.

Last night I visited him for the first time, and saw his layout and loco and rollingstock collections. He models the Montana Rail Link, a regional class II railroad that runs along trackage it leases from Burlington Northern's southern Montana main line between Sandpoint, Idaho and Huntley, Montana, near Billings. John has two MRL layouts - a 'small' 6x6 feet (approximately) around the wall layout with an operating area in the middle, and larger under-construction layout, which I estimate would be about 15 x 7 feet in size. The smaller layout is 'finished' (as much as a model railroad ever is finished), and has a number of industries, some switching areas, lights in buildings, crossing signals.

I have added some photos of his 'small' layout to my photo galleries:

http://www.stanfordhosting.net/jimsjunction/gallery2/main.php?g2_itemId=...

Links to MRL Information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montana_Rail_Link
http://www.montanarail.com/