Owner Inspiration & Techniques on the Santa Cruz Northern

The Santa Cruz Northern runs from San Jose, California, over the Santa Cruz Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. You live near this area, and is that why you decided to model it? Yes it is, Allen. I grew up spending summers down in the Santa Cruz area. I've always had a love of the Redwoods and the ocean, so it gave me an opportunity to model an area that I like. Now, your layout is called the Santa Cruz Northern. There was no such railroad. So how does that all fit together with the area you're modeling and what other railroads' history do you work into that? Well, Allen, back about 130 years ago now, there was a railroad called the South Pacific Coast, and it was a narrow-gauge railroad that ran from Alameda down the East Bay to San Jose and then over the Santa Cruz Mountains. It was eventually taken over by the Southern Pacific and then a big portion of it was abandoned in about 1940. My little bit of revisionist history is that the line was taken over by a jointly-owned subsidiary of the Western Pacific and Santa Fe, which is, there's a couple, three instances in the greater Bay Area of multiple large railroads owning a subsidiary, jointly sharing the operating. And so that's what I theorize occurred here, and the Santa Cruz Northern moves from a connection with the Western Pacific and San Jose which does exist, down over the Santa Cruz Mountains to Santa Cruz. When you began planning the layout in 1984 or so, double-decking was considered kind of risky and experimental. Why did you decide to do that? Well, Allen, it was even worse than that. I'd built the first Santa Cruz Northern, which was a double-deck, and it fit in a 10x11 bedroom. And I started that in 1977. And I was really pushed for space. Had to have it. I had read John Armstrong's "Track Planning for Realistic Operations", and I just believed. John said, "This is what to do." And he clearly is, and he is the godfather of-- Track planning. There's no question. He said, "You can build a double-deck layout, "and here's what it should look like, "and here's how it joins together." And I said, "Oh, okay." And I did it . You took it on faith and did it. I didn't know that he had never done it. And it worked just like he said it would.