Greater Houston Train Show, February 15, 2014

These are just a couple of quick photos taken around the layout. These one-day shows are very hectic. Set-up started at 6:30am. However, we had plenty of club members on hand, and, combined with the smaller layout, we were ready for the crowds at 9am, but the doors didn't open until 10. That doesn't happen very often! We ran until about 4:30pm, and we were out of the door by 5:15, thanks to several extra volunteers helping us. Shown in the photo are Steve's new American Models MKT flat cars (two for trailer-on-flatcar service). The green steam engine in the distance is Rusty's recent purchase that will eventually undergo a re-painting.

Bob built the tall club sign stand for this show. It was now pretty obvious who we are, and what scale we model! In addition to the standard backdrop panels, we also had enough of Bob's new "sky" boards to encircle the entire layout. Things are starting to look nice with our all-blue theme. Near photo-center, this show introduced Ria's first fully-scratch-built structure, which is a cow shed (to the right of the large foreground tree, near the cows). The three foreground trees on the corner module on the left were built by Peter right before the show.

We actually had a lot of trains on our layout. Here, Bill's MKT "Texas Special" American Models train is flying by our passenger station. We usually had two passenger trains and two freight trains running on the layout. Lots of action (and the occasional accident). Guest operator John O. was able to try out his S-Helper Service F unit on the freight track, making for a challenging three-train juggle.

As usual, these photos were taken when the show was momentarily quiet. Turnout was very good, especially considering the temperature was in the 70s for the first time in a long time.

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