ROLLIN' AROUND THE BEND Model railroad provides escape for church education minister |
| Permission given by the LUBBOCK
AVALANCHE-JOURNAL; appeared on February 23, 1996 written by Ray Westbrook When Bob Batson walks into his closed-in two-car garage, a 1/160th replica of reality makes the world go away. The three-dimensional snapshot he created of Central Texas railroading in the 1960's opens a door into a figurative wilderness area where a church education minister is able to step away from stress and rest awhile. He created the room's scenery, which occupies everything except walking space, with the touch of an artist. One building, so realistic in miniature that it cannot be readily detected from a real scene when viewed in a photograph, brought him a first-place award in a national contest in 1990. Gesturing toward the model train layout that spans the room and enters through a tunnel into a closet area, Batson said, "It's Central Texas, where I grew up. I built every tree--I've got over 1,000 trees." He decided from the start that he wasn't going to sit and watch trains travel endlessly in a monotonous circuit. Instead, he opted for an operational system that mimics a real railway company. "I can't just put on a train and run it and sit and watch it. You get to a point where you don't enjoy sitting and watching a train going in circles." He said, "Basically, there are two types of model train layouts. One is a display, and the other, newer concept, is an operational layout," he said. "Display basically runs in circles and you watch trains. Operational is designed to operate trains as close to the prototype as you possibly can. That's what I have designed and built here." The trains move along tiny tracks set in forested hillsides against a backdrop of blue skies and white clouds. Batson dismisses expressions of wonder over the total impact of the layout, and in particular the individual portions such as the skies. "I did that in a single evening. It's just a pattern," he explained. Batson and four or five other members of the Lubbock Model Railroad Association gather occasionally in the room to operate the multi-train system through the use of headset phones and computers. "We actually have a dispatcher who controls the movement of the trains on and off the layout," Batson said. "I've got a computer-generated operating switch list that tells what cars go where. In order for this to work, you have to have an off-line staging area." He explained, "We use a fast clock. One hour of real time is equal to 12 hours of real train time," he said. Employees of the fictitious Texas Central Railroad deliver boxcars to industrial sites and pick up waiting cars on order, they maintain a passenger train schedule and they synchronize routes of several through freight trains that have only a purpose of hauling cargo to other off-system locations. "When you get into either display or operational, then you can go freelance, which is making it all up, fictitious. Or you can go prototype, which is real, and you try to capture the real spirit of the railroad." What makes the railroaders run? "There is a lot of escapism to it," Batson offers. "When we are in here operating during a session, the world gets shut out--it's gone. "And I don't have to have a group here. I can operate this by myself, running trains and delivering cars." Except for his passion for railroading, Batson could be considered a typical Lubbock resident. He is married, has two children who are in public school, and works at a full-time job. His children are not following the model railroad route. "They are not disinterested, but they don't take a big interest," Batson said. His career in the full-scale world is that of education minister at Highland Baptist Church. In the future, Batson plans to expand the railroad layout. "I would like to knock this wall down, he said, referring to a closeted staging area, "and extend the layout on down to this whole wall and go into another closet for a staging area." Although Batson built all the houses, commercial buildings and scenery on the model train layout, he had help with the wiring system. "Friends said my wiring wasn't any good. Mine looked like spaghetti." he remembers. "I can run three trains from this panel," he said, opening a cover to reveal a complex wiring system that looks like the inside of a sophisticated piece of electronic equipment. Batson, traces his absorption with model railroading to 1977, when he was an English teacher in Bowie, TX. "This is true," he says in prefacing the account of how he became a fan of model trains. "One of my kids in freshman English class was reading a model railroading magazine. I took it away from him, and then started looking it over." Batson was never really able to look away after that. Now he has a collection of about 500 rail cars plus a variety of both diesel and steam engine replicas. Almost all of his equipment is in N-scale, 1/160th of normal size. Most model railroaders use the HO-scale, which is 1/87th of actual size, he said. "Nostalgia, escape, fun is why I do it. I grew up in a small railroad town in Central Texas. I think it is kind of a way to recapture that." |
|
PHOTOS BY JOE DON BUCKNER, AJ STAFF |
