This website has been archived from TrainWeb.org/rockylines to TrainWeb.US/rockylines.
This website is dedicated to my model railroading endeavors.
My name is Michael Maass. I live in Keizer, Oregon, USA. My current layout is being built in what used to be the Living Room of our house. It is now "The Train Room"
The layout has two levels in one corner of the room and they are connected by a helix in the "center" of the room. The helix is double lined and the design was set up so that I can run a train continuously without needing to stop and reverse at all. Kind of like a "fancy" oval!
The scenery will eventually resemble the area of Oregon between Vernonia and Olney Oregon, as if the Spokane, Portland and Seattle had built through the Oregon Coast range in addition to the the lines they operated between Portland and Astoria along the Columbia River and would have extended from the line they operated between Portland and Banks Oregon
Previous layouts I have built at my residence were also in this room or out in the garage. It has moved back and forth based on the needs of the family and the space I wanted to use. I have yet to be able to "complete" a layout! So, I am hoping that this layout will be the last one I build and it will be "completed", keeping in mind that a layout is never "completed"! There is always some new detail to create and install. I have also built layouts in other houses I have lived in or in a shed I specifically purchased for building a layout.
It is my "plan" to eventually create pages on this website that will have photos of previous layouts, the construction of this current layout, as well as some of my photos of the "real thing" out on the rails, as well as my railroad collectibles.
Finally, I would like to give a "shout out" to my friend, Brian, who is a person who has worked for railroads and I been in a model railroad club together. We both left that club during the COVID-19 for our own reasons. I asked Brian to help me design the layout right of way as well as the bench work and helix connecting the two levels. I asked him for his assistance because of his experience and mad skills and attention to detail. With that being said, he and I both are human and do miss some details as we engaged in the construction of the layout. So, my current construction endeavors are going slower as a result. But, this hobby is supposed to have challenges, otherwise there would be no fun!
At the top of this "Index" page, I have posted photos of two hats, one on either side of the trainweb advertising. One is for my original free lanced railroad called Rocky Lines. This line was named after the cat, Rocky, who helped my wife and I in raising our daughter. Rocky was a rescued cat who I brought home before Cathy was pregnant with our daughter and who would rock her in cradle to help her sleep and she would also use him as a pillow when taking naps. He lived with us for a long time and through several moves. The second hat, Panther Brothers, is for my second free lanced railroad which is to be subsidiary of Rocky Lines. Rocky Lines is general freight and passenger service and Panther Brothers is for hauling of natures products, mainly logs and other forest products and for gravel and ballast for the MOW work for the entire line. Panther Brothers is named after a pair of black kittens we rescued one winter when a young female brought her kittens to my back door for food. She had three kittens with her at the time, two black cats (Panther Brothers) and a striped kitten which we call stripes, who still shows up in yard once in a while. The two black cats were named Midnight and Spot. Spot got his name due to the white spot on his chest and the single white whisker he at the time. Eventually, Midnight decided to return to the life of a feral cat after rescued a third kitten by the same female cat. This new kitten is also black in color, so we still have a pair of panthers in our household. Our current pets are Spot, Tigger, Binx, and Tess (all cats) and Sophie, a little dog who is now very old and had been rescued from a puppy mill. All of our pets, except for the fish are rescues of one sort or another and photos of them will be included with the layout photos as the cats are often found under or on the layout
I use the Digitrax system to power my tracks. I use many different brands of decoders in addition to Digitrax. I use this system because it is the system that is in use at the Polk Station Rail Model Railroad Club, of which I was a member until late in 2020. This system is actually quite simple to use in my humble opinion.
May 26, 2021
