I must not make myself clear

 33 Years ago, when I was a member of the Antelope Valley Model Railroad Club, we regularly had heated discussions about adding to the Narrow Gauge portion of our layout. 

“Why are we spending a significant part of our resources on a part of the layout that is only used infrequently by one member for his Narrow Gauge steam engines?” I said this quite often at business meetings. 

What is your takeaway from my statement?

I’ll tell you what the majority of the club thought and said. “Paul Catapano hates steam engines”

Then I got a TRAIN LOAD of flak from the membership when I brought my standard gauge 2-8-8-2’s down to the club with an “endless string of coal hoppers”. 

“I thought you hate steam engines?!” “That’s what you’re always complaining about at business meetings”, “You want to ban steam engines from the club! Now you’re running your own!”

Again, I must not have made myself clear. What I was complaining about was how we were allocating our resources, and that SEEMS clear by my original statement. Now you know why I don’t like clubs.

Now I’m being told, I hate TTTO ops.

I’ve said repeatedly I do not like the trend in TTTO ops of the layout serving the dispatcher and operator, as opposed to having the dispatcher and operator serve the layout’s needs. As a layout owner I want the traffic to be fluid. I do not want trains, needlessly, in my opinion, delayed while two people, the dispatcher and operator dictate and repeat back an order. 

Two people derive a great deal of pleasure out of the TTTO game they play at the expense of the remaining operators.

So when I say I do not like time consuming orders when a simpler form will suffice; when I say the vast majority of TTTO pertains to safety on the prototype, and therefore should be dispensed with on the model; when I say the back and forth dictation between dispatcher and operator is incredibly wasteful, and should be dispensed with; when I dispense with the operator position all together, and have the dispatcher write and issue orders directly to crews;

When I say, and do all these things, everyone says I hate TTTO.

I LOVE TTTO. I hate the wasteful allocation of resources. In this case the resource is play time on the model railroad.

In my opinion we build layouts,  that are designed for “Operations”, TO HAVE FUN. Trains in motion, switching cars, TTTO, these are all fun. I really like how TTTO puts the decision making back in the hands of the crews, and out of micro-managing dispatchers. I love how a local can accomplish its job simply be putting out its flags, and not the mind-numbingly stupid and annoying on radio back and forth with the dispatcher. I do not like, as a general rule, the red light-green light aspect of CTC operations*, BUT really enjoy negotiating the layout with a time-table in my pocket, and a clearance and orders in my hand.

I love steam engines AND TTTO. I hate miss allocation of layout resources, time, and fun.


*Now, “ Paul hate’s CTC”. 

I like any well conceived and presented op session, whether it’s trolly cars, steam engines, diesels, or monorails. I like any traffic control system that works well, whether it’s TTTO, DTC, or CTC. I like any car forwarding system whether it’s tab-on-car, CCWB, or switch list as long as it’s well presented, thought-out, and documented.

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