Another 124’x23’ layout

[Railwaygun]

A quote from the sunday Times ( https://groups.io/g/ngauge/message/5280)

Last week's news that the tartan rocker Sir Rod Stewart has spent 20 years building a model railway has caused widespread surprise in our troubled nation. Models we knew he enjoyed playing with. Railways, not so much.

Still, it's true: while Rod's passion for miniature trains has been no secret, it was a surprise to learn he has spent more than two decades building an extraordinarily detailed 23ft by 124ft layout modelled on a 1940s American city. As the BBC's website breathlessly informed us — in a piece headlined "I am railing" — the star "has released 13 studio albums and been on 19 tours during the time it took to build". While some may marvel at him wasting his time in this manner, others do enjoy his music.

I wasn't shocked by Rod the Modeller's pastime. Two years ago, I too entered the shadowy world of the train enthusiast when I became one of the hosts of Channel 5's sleeper hit The Great Model Railway Challenge.

Modellers are keen to let you know how Jools Holland, Roger Daltrey and Phil Collins all have layouts. How David Hasselhoff and Bruce Springsteen are also said to dabble. And how Neil Young is not only an enthusiast but part-owned the Lionel trains brand in America and has helped develop its product line.

What makes them do it? What attracts men who in years gone by would happily go off the rails now to spend their evenings fettling them?

Perhaps it's that Proustian quest to recapture the certainties of their childhoods. Perhaps it's the sheer delight of making little trains go around and around. What's certain is that they're not alone.

There are hundreds of thousands of modellers in the UK — and the numbers are on the rise. Our television programme featured a broad selection from this parallel world, building layouts in a Great British Bake Off-style competition in a big train shed near Henley-on-Thames. Not many were international rock stars but they came from almost every other walk of life: struggling actors, steampunk enthusiasts, railway engineers, oil-rig workers, biochemists, pensioners, students and gutsy Scottish grandmothers.

Some were incredibly skilled modellers. Others stuck two woks together and called it a visiting spaceship. What they all shared was a desire to fashion a better world, if only in miniature, one tabletop at a time.

It's a passion that elsewhere in the world finds expression in such noble pursuits as saikei , the Japanese art of creating miniature landscapes. In Britain, we think of attics and anoraks, rather than artistry.

Stewart has built an extraordinarily detailed 23ft by 124ft layout modelled on a 1940s American city RANKIN

This is wrong. What we found in that shed in Henley — and what Sir Rod doubtless enjoys when, after a hard day's rocking, he turns to his flanges and fishplates — is a Zen-like dedication to detail, coupled with a chance for some remarkable creative expression.

I've had many surprises in my two summers filming with the modellers. One was those woks. Another is the broad mix of genders involved in the hobby, both binary and non. Perhaps the most unexpected, though, was how social the pastime is.

Some of our teams made vast layouts with family members, and built common ground in the process. Others had taken up with local clubs as a means of making friends. Community is a key attraction, particularly for older male modellers. Connecting to a network isn't just for train lines.

Clearly, railway modelling is a force for good, and any rock stars or TV shows highlighting this should be encouraged. To get your own sense of the vast scale of this miniature movement, why not take a tour around one of the shows that take place up and down the country. The Warley National, the UK's biggest, is on next weekend at the NEC in Birmingham. There you'll find everything from painstaking recordings of British branch line journeys to exquisite Japanese Z-scale models — at 1:220, small enough to put a layout in your suitcase. There'll also be some of the best modelling from the UK — including the winning layout from our most recent series.

A final thought on the power of this unheralded hobby. In 2008, it was reported that Phil Collins was so incredibly busy building a model railroad at his home in Switzerland, that the album he was supposed to be recording had to be put on hold — at enormous benefit to the wider community.

It's time to give all modellers, not just Sir Rod and his fancy layout, some respect.
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[Buffin]

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/comment/rod-never-runs-out-of-puff-with-these-models-3fzh5sxm3

Rod Stewart, 74, feared he would be mocked after revealing his 1,500 sq ft model railway, which monopolises the third floor of his LA mansion. What can you mean, Rod? The old joke: "What do model railway enthusiasts use for birth control? Answer: Their personalities." That sort of thing?

It's true that model railroaders are stereotyped as obsessives in woollen tank tops who resemble Coronation Street's Roy Cropper. Model railways are extreme doll's houses for adult men (I think we know they're mostly men). Women don't tend to immerse themselves so utterly in hobbies. How many grown females still collect miniature fireplaces for toy Victorian mansions to which they devote three hours a day? Or catalogue 1950s comics or 1970s football programmes? But, and this may surprise you, I envy it. I imagine it's the purest form of therapy. Time with a doll's house as a child was bliss, wholly absorbing and a healthy mental escape, something adults arguably need more of.

On tour Stewart booked an extra hotel room for what we're not allowed to call his "train set". Not very rock'n'roll but more civilised than snorting cocaine. If I was Mrs Stewart I'd rather he was fiddling with that type of model than one aged 25 with enormous breasts. Then again, some wives do come second to this particular man-cavery. Hence another model railway joke: "My wife says if I buy one more locomotive she's leaving. I sure will miss her."

[Bealman]

Personally, I think that's hilarious! 

If you really want a laugh, check out last November's VIZ magazine's "A day in the life of a railway modeller"

But do remember that it is VIZ magazine.

[grumbeast]

Personally, I think that's hilarious! 

If you really want a laugh, check out last November's VIZ magazine's "A day in the life of a railway modeller"

But do remember that it is VIZ magazine.

I don't really give a toss what other people think of my love of railroads, model or real, however, I'm prepared to feel a little bit of righteous indignation over this kind of 'so called' journalism, it's just another example of pointing out the other and laughing at them (albeit towards a hobby, rather than something less optional).  They could just write a neutral article, they could even be positive, but no, they have to have their snyde little passive-aggressive digs, even the first more positive article calls it a 'shadowy world'?  really?  with my eyesight getting worse I need as much light as I can get!

I wouldn't care if it were an individual with an opinion, we can deal with that, but a journalist has influence and reach.

Darn, getting angry now, gotta calm down.

and on a positive note, Rod's layout is absolutely stunning, going to go and harumph and look at pictures of his layout

[Bealman]

Yeah, good idea. 

I don't let stuff that parades as journalism these days bother me at all, I ignore it.

Geez, even back in the early seventies, I never took anything in The Sun seriously (except page 3) 

As I say above, if you really want to see a real dig at railway modellers, check out that VIZ comic strip.

But not if you are easily offended nor see the funny side. But, I guess you have to take a look to work that out. Catch 22!

(It's quite sexually explicit, too, by the way. Just warning....)

[Graham]

now we've had Rod show his layout, maybe some of the other big names can show off their skills, it all adds to the marketing of the hobby regardless of scale.

[Bealman]

There was an article in RM some years ago about an impressive OO layout, called "The Mersey Beat," as I recall.

In it, the builder says he got a phone call one morning which his wife answered. She told him that there was a Roger Daltry on the phone for him. He replied that the only Roger Daltry he'd heard of was lead singer of The Who, but answered it anyway.

Turns out it was THE Roger Daltry, who reading about his layout, lived nearby, and said he could give him a hand with his layout.

A couple of Saturday mornings later, Roger turns up at this blokes house with scenic materials, says, "Hello, I'm Roger, and these are my mates Bryan (Ferry) and Phil (Collins)"

How cool is that? 

[Graham]

wonder who we could call on in Aus to pop round to help on the layout. The only "celebrity" I know of who openly promotes model railways is a local radio station host.