Fotherham

FOTHERHAM - 2009

Layout 15

The inspiration for this little layout came from Carl Arendt's book "Creating Micro Layouts", and on page 45 is a "Starter Layout for UK and U.S. Modellers".  I already had a baseboard for it given to me by dear old Ray Fothergill, he had intended to build an "N" scale layout on it, but had never got around to it.  I said I would one day build a 009 layout on it, and I have again named it after him.

The board was 51" x 7.5" (about 1.3m x .20m), very sturdily made from Sundeala and 2 x 1 timber but had no back scene, so I added this myself.  It featured a small integral fiddle yard, goods siding, passenger station and a kick-back siding to a coal yard of which this part of the layout was in front of the fiddle yard recess and was only about 4" wide.

(Click on images to enlarge)

No. 4 in the coal yard.

This was a tiny portable coal chute I made for the coal yard which can be seen on the left of the photo above.

"Llew" is nearly ready to leave from the passenger platform with two Egger Bahn coaches.  We have again used calendar pictures for the village back scene.

Leaving the fiddle yard, Sharp Stewart "Linette" and tramway coach - a very heavily modified European Klein Modellbahn 4-wheeled HO scale coach.

The fiddle yard for Fotherham, an ideal arrangement in a small space.

"Llew" leaves the goods siding with an old Parkside-Dundas van.

The station from the front.  The station building and goods shed were from an old Heljan kit.

No.4 and coal wagon being shunted to the coal siding.  This part of the layout is in front of the fiddle yard, and the section of old viaduct gave the layout a convenient  scenic break.

Right down the left hand end of the layout is the coal yard scene modelled in a depth of about 4", the other 3" is the fiddle yard behind the back scene. 

We exhibited this layout seven times, usually along with "Hawkins Tower" (which will be the next layout I describe)  after which I decided I didn't enjoy running it any more!  

It was later re-incarnated into another layout called "Ellerbank" in 2015.