NEW ITEMS FOR A NEW COLCESTER...

The new Colcester layout is going to benefit from a host of new buildings and features which are aimed at enhancing the layouts scenic appeal.

First off there is a new bicycle rack which will go in front of the new International Station, a concrete bus shelter which will most likely serve the Abbey ruins but could equally be placed elsewhere too, A Police office building and a new Crew Rest Room building which will be added to the Depot area.

Two new road vehicles have also been bought, a British Gas van and a Mobile Police Camera Unit in Yellow, the latter mainly because i had never seen one before and i thought it looked good...!

Ive also purchased another Y-Point to complete the need on the new plan for the access to/from the central avoiding line which runs through the middle of the International Station - a feature which will see a lot of use as the present Station setup created a bottleneck when all the platforms were in use thus the avoiding line will allow for bi-directional travel for slow freight or non-stop services to pass through unhindered.

This leads neatly to signalling, and for this another basic Red/Green two light signal by Train Tech has been purchased, these will be steadily increased now that chipping of the loco fleet is almost complete.

However the two biggest purchases are by far the last two - A new Gaugemaster DCC01 Controller to replace the Hornby Select one which has served me well up to now - i just feel the new layout needs a new controller with more options available to use and ive tried out the Gaugemaster one a few times in-store at Great Eastern Models so i feel confident this will be ideal for Colcester.

The last item has been purchased to replace three other non-DCC loco`s with one new DCC one - another Class 90 but this time in Freightliner livery which will increase the freight fleet to three loco`s and add electric hauled traction too. Freight will be something with increased visibility on the new layout but it will still be predominately a passenger focused scenario.

Here is a selection of pictures of the new item. if you to see them all then go to the GALLERY PAGES on this site...