OPERATIONS RETURN!

Operations returned to my HO scale SP Cascade Line after the long layoff this past winter and spring for house maintenance.  Nineteen folk helped me restart regular operations.  Most were regular crew members, but they were joined by two new crewmembers.  We felt the loss of a couple of regulars who had performed key rolls previously, but this allowed others to step in.

This session marked the introduction of the new car movement documents noted in the previous post.  http://espeecascades.blogspot.com/2016/05/improved-car-movement-documents.html 
That meant I had to spend much of the prior week staging the railroad and matching up the new operating documents with existing cars and car cards.  The new waybills were well received.  The “spot cards” will take a little more work with procedure.  Still, it was a good introduction.

The crew call board got a work out with a new crew caller.  The random draw for “seniority” and job bids left a couple of positions uncovered, so we had to reassign a couple of operators.  We also needed to match the two new crewmembers with an experienced crewmember.  Both had good experiences as a result of this pairing.

Bob S. works the Crew Call Board, checking the line-up and crews assigned.

As usual, a full crew worked Eugene with a Yardmaster, West and East Switchers, and the Eugene City Switcher (conductor and engineer).  Here, Pete J. works as the East Eugene Switcher.

The Oakridge Turn began the session ready to start work in Oakridge.  Joe B. and Vic N. work the Turn at Westfir.

Dispatcher Rick K. rides herd on the crews, making sense out of the chaos (and noise) for twenty folk.

New crewmember Bill M. departs Eugene with a RR-West train.

A RR-West freight pulls out of Cascade Summit toward Crescent Lake as Amtrak Number 14 starts down the Hill.

The Second Springfield job works the aisle-side industries as a RR-East freight rolls through town.

Finally, the Superintendent (me—on right) gets a chance to sit down and talk with one of the crew, Dave C. (left)