Whistle Music Tracks Ahead Brought to you by Kalmbach Publishing Company producers of an online source for rail-related information, where you can discover model trains, toy trains, garden trains and even real trains.

(Horn) Kato Manufacturer of precision railroad models and the UniTrack System Music Hi I'm Spencer Christian.

On this episode of Tracks Ahead we'll visit master model builder Howard Zane and look at his highly detailed layout and splendid scratch built structures, we'll see the last of the breed of inter-urban railroads in the US and we'll take a ride on the Australian Orient Express in northeastern Australia but first, it's time for a little quiz.

What is the single most visited site in Washington D.C.?

Is it the White House?

The Capitol?

The Smithsonian?

Wrong, it's Union Station, the train station gets and so much more visited by over 23 million people each year.

After watching this, you'll see why.

Ancr: Washington D.C. it's arguably the most important city in the world and for nearly 100 years now, Union Station has welcomed people here.

Located just two blocks from the Capitol, Union Station is itself a destination.

This magnificent building has played host to countless Presidents, dignitaries, and every day travelers and commuters.

The two levels of concourses are lined with 130 stores.

There's a nine-screen movie theatre, seven full service restaurants and dozens of casual places to eat.

Cliff: Many people come here just to "ooh" and "ah" at the incredible architecture that this building represents and also the era it represents.

It was a time of grand public building projects and this station is a magnificent example of the turn of the century emphasis in this city to turn the city into a world capitol.

This is the gateway to that world capitol, it fulfills a role even in the 21st century it fulfills it very well.

Ancr: Opened in 1907, Union Station was designed specifically to serve as a gateway to the capitol city; it's monumental in every respect.

If you laid the Washington Monument on it's side, it would fit inside Union Station.

When it opened, it covered more ground than any other building in the United States.

David: It's called Union Station because it's the union of the various railroads that existed at the time, which would be the Penn Central and Baltimore Ohio Railroad and the Union Station.

You'll find them in a lot of cities throughout the United States, but it just means that the different railroads had come together.

Ancr: It was the largest train station in the world, it was a sparkling gem until the 1950's when folks started traveling by plane instead of train.

The entire building was actually closed in 1981.

Cliff: Because the roof leaked so badly that mushrooms were growing up out of the floor, it was a tragic situation.

Ancr: But a unique public and private partnership would bring it back to life.

In 1988, after a 160 million dollar renovation, the building reopened, restored to its former glory.

Union Station is now the hub for Amtrak's Headquarters and Executive offices.

Amtrak riders and commuter rail passengers pack the place; there is indeed a synergy.

Cliff: In terms of Amtrak we run approximately 80-85 trains a day depending on the day of the week.

The combined total if you include MARC, The Maryland and the Virginia Railroad Express and Amtrak it's about 208 trains on an average weekday.

The number of passengers runs into the 25,000 - 30,000 per day; it's a very busy place.

If you add the popular Washington Metro Rail System the number gets into the very high thousands because this is a major metro rail station for the heavy rail transit system for the Washington area.

A lot of people come through on the Metro as well.

That feeder system, obviously it takes people to and from work everyday but it also is a way to get people to the inter-city trains that Amtrak runs.

In order for the investment in this building to be amortized, to be justified, the investment in the restoration of the architectural aspect of this building, there needed to be a payback.

In order to do that, it was decided that a retail center could be incorporated into the transportation segment of the building.

There were some skeptics back in the mid 1980's when that was proposed and frankly I was one of them.

I was very wrong, this turned out to be a major anchor for this entire part of the city.

Ancr: All the trains here are coordinated by the people who work in the Union Station Control Center as well as what's called the K-Tower.

It's a mind-boggling amount of coordination needed to keep everything running so smoothly.

Zack: They make up the trains as required, they position the trains in the terminal for departure as required, and they make space available for the arrivals.

Cliff: K-Tower can watch trains on what they call a model-board, it's really an electronic map of the track layout here.

There are approximately 30 operating tracks within Washington Union Station and they're all inter-connected with a spaghetti-like system, of switches, signals and catenary wire, it's an extremely complicated system.

K-Tower, if you will, is the location that choreographs the movement of all these trains, the switch engines, work trains, long distance trains, and the commuter trains all have to be coordinated in a way that's efficient, safe and quick.

Ancr: Union Station is an impressive sight in an impressive city.

Cliff: This station is architecturally one of the masterpieces among all railroad stations.

Just in terms historic preservation, it was imperative that this magnificent building, the façade and all it's features were saved.

Ancr: Union Station is a testament to the importance of rail travel, a monument to both look at and walk through.

Washington's Union Station is actually Amtrak's third busiest station after Penn Station in New York City and Philadelphia's 30th Street Station.

Sometimes when you walk into certain places your jaw just drops and you stare and say, "wow", we're going to take you to such a place right now.

It's in Maryland and it's the home to a breathtaking scale layout and a fantastic collection of brass model railroad pieces.

Ancr: What you notice when you walk into Howard Zane's basement is that every nook, cranny and corner is filled with trains.

His HO scale layout is realistic, entertaining and simply impressive.

It's nearly two and half thousand square feet of painstakingly constructed fun.

You see principle and passion in how everything is laid out.

You see hours and expertise in the often self-designed, in scratch-built structures.

The Piermont Division of the Western Maryland Railroad is a beautifully scenic depiction of a West Virginia Coal Hauler.

It's more than just an excellent layout.

It's a work of art.

And the designer is truly an artist.

So what it is it about model railroading that appeals to a gentleman with impressive credentials in Industrial Design and Fine Arts.

Howard: It's an art form.

Model railroaders are perceived, as over-age, over-weight adults usually male.

Unfortunately doesn't have to be that way but 99% are male.

We're perceived as fools that never had good sense to put their trains away after Christmas.

It is not that way, it's an art form that encompasses many skills and better than the word skill, I'd like to use the word challenge.

Because the challenges our carpentry, model-building, horticultural, electronics, you can go on and on, and even computer technology.

It's like a microcosm of everything in life.

To start you have to build the benchwork therefore, you have to know how to use power saw, or handsaw and cut wood, then you have to know how to attach and screw them together and build your benchwork.

Then from there you build roadbed that could made out of plywood or splines or any method you could conceive.

Then from there you'd have know track laying, wire the track, then you get into scenery, the sky's the limit.

Model railroading, when I said it was an art form it's multi-dimensional art if you a drawing it's two dimensional.

If you build a relief a model is three dimensional.

But there are more dimensions.

The other dimensions when you get into model railroading you have sound, smell, and you have animation.

Ancr: Howard Zane is committed to the integrity and preservation of both the hobby and the fine art of model railroading.

His own in-home railroad has been a continual work-in-progress since he began building it in 1983.

The landscape is beautifully crafted; the detail is as excruciatingly accurate as it is visually entertaining.

Howard: It's a veritable time capsule, it's a ten year span right after the war, WWII up to 1955.

All the vehicles, people, rolling stock are pretty much accurate for that period and it's a mythical area in northern West Virginia, usually Teller or Marion counties where they pull coal out, and send it into the major cities, so it's really coal hauling layout, even though we operate general freight, we have passenger services, peddler freights and etc.

but it's loosely based on that.

Ancr: As if this wasn't enough to consume the time and talent of one man, Zane has yet another railroad related passion; he's both an appraiser of and an investor in, beautiful brass model railroad cars, collectable pieces of art.

Howard: Some of these locomotives have every nut and bolt cast into it in the prototype car; it's the ultimate in detail.

There's a lot painstaking effort goes into these things.

The thing about brass is a dichotomy here is that every year they get better and better as far as quality and mechanical.

It's almost up to mechanical perfection but a chance of ever running on a layout gets slimmer and slimmer because of the price.

The second worst sound in the world, is a brass locomotive hitting the floor.

You just don't want to hear that sound.

So anybody that's going to spend $2,000 for a locomotive is not going to run it, I'd say 80-85% brass today ends up in cases.

Ancr: When you first get into the hobby of model railroading you strive for simplicity and simple pleasure.

When you look at Howard Zane's layout and collection, you can see how pleasure can turn into passion.

Howard Zane cares so much about the hobby that he helps produce the Great Scale Model Train Show, which is the largest model railroad show of it's kind.

Inter-urban rail lines were a part of every day life in America, these days they're nearly extinct.

The last of the breed still runs everyday.

It's a money making, thriving example of what rail used to mean to a lot big cities.

Before we journey to Indiana, let's take a trip on a premier railroad train.

This time we'll take a nostalgic look at how rail travel both used to be and still is.

Passenger: It just keeps on rolling it just gets better and better.

Passenger: I have to say I've never experienced a train like this before.

Passenger: Realistically it's absolute luxury it's just opulence, from the service to the product itself.

Passenger: The Orient Express is the best.

Ancr: The Orient Express is synonymous with class, sophistication and opulence, in fact there are simply not enough superlatives to sum up this train.

It is the Great South Pacific Express, better known as Australia's Orient Express.

The eventual destination is the Kuranda Rainforest just outside Cairns on the east coast of Australia but destination is not the point of this journey, it is the journey that lies at the heart of this world-class excursion.

Pascal: We do our best to make sure people leave happy.

People look forward to the trip, it's a trip of a lifetime; they look forward for many weeks, months, and years.

Ancr: For passengers it is a return to an elegant time in history that has never faded aboard the Australian version of this legendary train.

They are greeted by the entire crew as they board the plush coaches; it is the first glimpse of the vital combination that creates the Orient Express experience, the coming together of train and staff.

Kate: We're one on one, we're a very friendly staff so we always try and have that close connection with them and they enjoy that.

They come to Australia and know that the Australians are so friendly.

Ancr: Attention like this does not come by accident nor easily; each member of the team is carefully selected.

Pascal: We've made a strategy in the beginning to hiring people, 50% on their skills, 50% on their personality.

Depending on a case-by-case scenario we might increase the personality percentage and decrease the skill personality, it's very hard to get everybody to work happily in a confined space for six days at a time.

We have to make sure each time we bring a new person, the new personality doesn't breakdown and adds value to the rest of the team.

Ancr: The setting could not be more conducive to refined relaxation; a kind of Nirvana on rails.

The attention to detail goes far beyond the artful carving of the paneled walls, further than custom stained-glass, it is often the combination of smaller things that go to creating a grand experience, fine etching on glassware, waxed seals on personal soap.

Passenger: We were saying with all the beautiful books and brochures that we looked at, that when you actually get into the train, the detail all the beautiful brass, grains, the fabulous wainscoating and everything in there.

The photos don't do it justice, it's stunning and we keep finding little things, we're loving it.

Pascal: We go to a very great extent as far as how to treat material fabric, how to wash and dry a sink full of china, we've got our china in Italy, we bought it especially for us, glasses are made in Hungary; all those kind of things.

Even if we do forget at some point, it is a beautiful surroundings; we do treat it with very much respect.

Ancr: Meals are the culmination of talents aboard the train.

Here you find all the pieces working together with the sole purpose of passenger pleasure.

Peter: Firstly we want it to be uniquely Australian.

We described the train like a cruise on land and we try to use all fresh local produce.

We pick fresh produce all along the way.

Up in Cairns we pick up fresh seafood, vegetables, fresh tropical fruits and again up all the eastern side of Australia.

Before a ny of the meals get on board the train; we'll be sitting down between ourselves working out the food and wine lists together.

We work closely that way.

A lot of our wine staff on board, dealing with the wine is very experienced and very knowledgeable at helping the guests choose.

Personally I enjoy the seafood side of things, especially out of Brisbane, out of Cairns we can get some magic seafood, Morton Bay bugs is a personal favorite, which is a slip of lobster really, but much better than lobster, much sweeter flavor, they're beautiful we enjoy using them.

Kate: Our guests expect the best, as I said before, we always exceed their expectations.

Ancr: In this part of Australia expectations are high with regard to scenery both inside and outside the train.

Traveling aboard a train is after all one of the finest ways to see things.

Australia's Orient Express makes a few stops but the chosen pauses in this rolling journey are truly spectacular.

The Orient Express flies guests out to the reef for yet, another experience of a lifetime, floating over this marvel of nature.

The Kuranda Rainforest is another natural wonder that the Orient Express reveals.

It's a different kind of rail, the sky rail, where you float above this virgin rain forest.

This soaring form of transportation was created so that no roads would be built below; no trees felled to blaze trails.

Down below Aboriginal rangers guide you to the maze of green splendor.

Milton: This area here, a lot of it is unique rain forest, because around the boardwalk itself there are over 60 different species of trees, not only that, my tribe the Debugi, once roamed through this area; camping, collecting bush food for their people.

What we have here is a Lawyer Vine.

The Laywer Vine consists of the "Wait-a-while."

And why this is called a Wait-a-while that's exactly what it does to you, it grabs hold of you and you can't move.

See how that attaches to my shirt?

That's the reason why it's called Wait-a while.

I think the sky rail itself is for all to come up and see the beauty of the rain forest.

Ancr: Australia is a land of buried beauty, it comes in natural forms and man-made creations, the Orient Express is a porthole to such magnificence.

Passenger: It is unique, it's the epitome of total indulgence, it's so beautifully done, it's quite over-whelming; and I feel very honored to have been able to do it.

Kate: I hope that throughout their holiday here in Australia that this has been the most memorable part of their trip and that they tell everyone back home that they've got to come.

Passenger: I'll tell everybody that they must do it; they must savor it even if they have to sacrifice other things, if they possibly can, to have that experience once in their lifetime.

Music Ancr: You're looking at the last of a breed, the South Shore Line.

It's the only true inter-urban running the rails.

John: There used to be railroads of this type all over the Midwest, we had numerous railroads in Indiana and over the years the popularity of the automobile, this mode of transportation slowly disappeared.

Except for the South Shore Railroad.

Ancr: Don't get the idea that this is one of those nostalgic things holding on by the skin of it's teeth supported by donations.

The Line is not a charity case.

In here it's standing room only.

John: The success of this system today I think it can be attributed to the foresight of Governor Ottis Bowen, the legislators and the community leaders in northwestern Indiana that saw the potential of maintaining this service and improving their service and not letting it disappear.

You literally have a situation now with the cost of gasoline, gasoline prices escalating, that we literally don't have the capacity to meet our current demand.

Ancr: The beginnings were humble, back in the old days it was just one link of a vast network of inter-urban lines.

First called the Chicago and Indiana Airline Railway, it was renamed the Chicago Lake Shore and South Bend Railway with an eye toward expansion.

In 1925 Samuel Insull bought the line at auction renaming it the South Shore and South Bend Railroad.

Right off the bat he started updating and built new stations.

This is the last of the Insull Stations in existence.

John: It was rather unique in the sense that part of it was a train station the other part was really a residence for a caretaker and the person to actually issued the tickets.

A few years ago, we improved that station and now on a national list of historic places.

It's been restored to it's original look, the back end of it is no longer a residence.

It's been converted to a museum for the town of Beverly Shores and the front end of it remains a passenger station.

Ancr: As with other inter-urbans of the day it went bankrupt and was resurrected time and again.

Things looked particularly bleak until the mid 1980's, when purchased by the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District.

Slowly fortunes turned and people again climbed aboard.

John: After the war, the railway had it's hey-day in terms of passengers riders, close to 6.2 million passengers, and back when Insull took it over there was roughly 1.7 million passengers.

Since the end of the war we've seen a dramatic reduction in riders up to the point NITC took over in 1977 and since we've seen a dramatic increase in riders to the point now we're carrying roughly double the number of passengers we were in 1977.

Ancr: For riders it's a part of everyday life, while some cities are bringing commuter rail back into business, here the South Shore Line, it never really went away.

John: It was an initial vision to preserve the service and now we're beginning to see that vision paying off, that it's desperately needed, it was needed back in the oil embargos in the 1970's early 1980's and now we're seeing that again.

The Orient Express has many trips around the world so check with your local travel agent.

Thanks for being with us and please join us next time for more Tracks Ahead.

Music Tracks Ahead Brought to you by Kalmbach Publishing Company Bringing you Trains Magazine every month for over 60 years And Classic Trains Magazine covering railroading's rich heritage Kato Manufacturer of precision railroad models and the UniTrack System Walthers Manufacturer and supplier of model railroading products serving the hobby since 1932.

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