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The North Shore & Western Modular Club in Chicago is a 100 percent NMRA cub that exhibits its HO-scale North Shore & Western layout about four times per year. At November’s Trainfest in Milwaukee, the club displayed a condensed version of the layout, which typically spans 45′ x 21′.
In 2014, the club also displayed at High Wheeler Train Show at Harper College in Palatine, IL; the Southland Model Railroad Show at Richards High School in Oak Lawn, IL; and at Glenview (IL) Public Library. The club will once again display at the High Wheeler Train Show Feb. 28-March 1.
The NS&W, which is loosely based on the Chicago & North Western in the Midwest, consists of two main lines and a branch line – all of which are electrically isolated from each other. Typically, the setup consists of 28 modules.
The layout blends DC and DCC operation. The outer main line is powered by DC; the rest of the layout runs on DCC. Trains originate from a staging yard that includes a turntable.
About 10 active members help keep the layout running when the NS&W is on tour. All are members of the Fox Valley Division/NMRA. Regular Fox Valley meetings are held at the Gary Morava Recreation Center, 110 W. Camp McDonald Road, Prospect Heights, IL.
“Sometimes we join up with other modular groups and make one giant layout,” club president Jeff Jarr noted. In 2012, the NS&W joined three other clubs to form a 100′ x 21′ layout at a World’s Greatest Hobby on Tour event.
Many of the modules are based in the Midwest where the C&NW roamed until its merger with Union Pacific in 1995. The C&NW was known as the “Pioneer Railroad” because a predecessor, the Galena & Chicago Union, was the first railroad to run out of Chicago in 1848.
Three of the Windy City’s Metra commuter lines now owned by Union Pacific were once part of the C&NW network.
For more on the NS&W, please see the January/February 2015 issue of Cowcatcher Magazine.
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