Photos of the Model Railroader staff's Layout Progress 2008

Tour of the Model Railroader staff's home layouts

Published: April 29, 2009

Each winter the staff members of Model Railroader, Classic Toy Trains, and Garden Railways magazines organize a tour of each other's home model railroads.

The tour, years ago dubbed "The Progress" (because we PRO-gress from one basement layout to the next), usually is scheduled for the lull weekend between the NFL conference title games and the Superbowl.

Why the middle of winter? We all live in Milwaukee and surrounding areas, so the tour gives most of us something to look forward to besides shoveling snow.

Staff members, co-workers, friends, and family meet at a diner for a hearty group breakfast, and then, armed with maps and timetables, drive from one staff member's home to the next. An equally hearty lunch stop is made at mid-tour, usually at a restaurant adjacent to active railroad tracks. This year our lunch was at the famed Saz's BBQ restaurant in Milwaukee, next to the Canadian Pacific tracks.

Like most layouts, ours are rarely finished. But that's all right. Any staff member can volunteer his layout for the tour regardless of its state of completion; we once visited a layout that wasn't much more than chalk marks on a basement floor.