Essay
A Change of Pace
By Nicholas
Kalis
One of a Series of Musings on
Building A LayoutGetting tired of “the same old same old” in your model railroad reading? Looking for change? Try a foreign magazine just for a year – that’s all you need to commit to. And you don’t need to learn a foreign language. Time and again we hear of a modeler who has long ago given up on Model Railroader. They never seem to return. What to do?
Try Voie Libre The Magazine of Railway Creators (French) in its English edition.
The cost for four quarterly issues is only €29.90 (Euros). Their mailing address
is BP30104 56401 Auray Cedex France. I never cease to be inspired by the clever
layouts LR Presse www.en.voielibre.com features thanks to its publisher,
Christian Fournerau. LR Presse want you as a reader, if not they would not
publish this magazine in two separate language editions, one French, the other
English. You don’t see any American model railroad magazine publish in a second
language.
Another
great alternative is the quarterly Narrow
Gauge & Industrial Railway Modelling Review www.narrowgaugeandindustrail.co.uk Sunnydale, Kimpton, Andover SP11
*NU, UK An annual £45.00 for overseas (US) subscribers. The
title is not a typo – yes, its title is that long! You will see great
photographs and great articles of typically two smaller layouts each issue.
Another
source of inspiration is the Australian-published quarterly Narrow Gauge Downunder www.ngdu.com.au . Similarly,
smaller layouts abound, though often of US prototypes. NGDU is published by
Gavin Hince at 25 Dwyer Street Clifton Hill Vic 3068. Their email address is mail@ngdu.com.au. This publication is all-color on
about 66 pages per issue. Often the subject is railroads set in tropical
climes.
Keeping with
our smaller layout theme, closer to home, try Narrow Gauge and Shortline Gazette published six times per year
here in the US by White River Productions P.O. Box 48, Bucklin, MO 64631 877
787-2467. A one-year subscription is $ 40.00. While the emphasis in this
all-color publication is as its title suggests narrow gauge and short lines,
many fine smaller layouts are often highlighted here. Fear not, Bob Brown is
still the editor.
But wait,
many will respond “I don’t like overseas prototypes”. A fair objection; take it
from someone who also not a fan of foreign prototypes, there is more than meets
the eye with these layouts. They shout creativity. And there is nothing more
creative than squeezing a great deal of model railroading into a small space.
And nothing will spark your creative juices more than seeing photos of and
reading about layouts that eschew forests of puffballs or around-the-wall
basement behemoths - the stuff of many American model railroading publications.
And if you
are still an armchair modeler, or returned to armchair modeling from prior
larger layout, these magazines inspire. Read a few issues and you will be
champing at the bit to build a smaller layout.
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