Essay - Comments about LDJ71

 


Essay

A few words about Layout Design Journal 71 . . .

  • I am grateful Byron Henderson published my "Fascia Color Ideas from Display Layouts" in LDJ 71 page 36.
  • I do wonder, however perusing this issue and others how we - the Layout Desing SIG - differ from the Operations SIG www.opsig.org?   Is the LDJ not simply duplicating what The Dispatcher's Office covers on a quarterly schedule? Not everyone is planning an operations-oriented layout; see Linda Sand's "Why do you want a layout" in the Layout Design Primer. I learned perhaps decades ago from our Layout Design SIG that there were many approaches to our hobby - some were interested in railfanning; others curating a museum exhibit; while others are interested in industrial archeology; and still others in operations - to name a few. See "Introduction to themes, eras, roles, intent, geographic location, etc." also in our Primer and authored by your blogger. 
  • Yet issue after issue of our LDJ seems fixated on operations as the be all and end all of our hobby. I get it, that is Tony Koester's drum beat too - the operations approach seems to have captured the mainstream of model railroading's printed world. Our SIG should not be playing - so to speak - follow the leader; we should be leading and adhering to some of the guidance in our own Layout Design Primer.
  • Once again, in LDJ71 the basement buster layout seems to take precedence - even Robert Stafford's ten-turnout layout featured seems to imply that it is an example of a simple layout - which it is not. Modelers around the world often build exciting exhibition layouts with just one to three turnouts and yet seem to please the crowds attending various shows.
  • In conclusion, I would ask our LD SIG leadership to consider whether we perhaps have become fixated with: 
    • track planning versus layout design; 
    • basement behemoths versus layouts that most heretofore armchair modelers could accomplish; 
    • operations versus the many other avenues of model railroading. 
  • While the counterargument that "we can only publish what authors submit" has some merit, the deeper question must be how can we signal to potential LDJ authors that articles about other than basement buster layouts and operations are not only welcome but encouraged? In the LDJ's early years my takeaway was that layout design was more than track plans and operations - it encompassed planning for scenery, lighting, a crew lounge, innovative fascias and valances, and a whole slew of considerations - let's bring the SIG back to that.

Revised April 1, 2023
Revised May 1, 2023
Revised June 29, 2023


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