CB&CNS Model Railroad
My Freelance Version of The CB&CNS
Cape Breton & Central Nova Scotia
The CB&CNS operates a 245 mile shortline between Sydney and Truro, Nova Scotia. It was incorporated in 1993 as THE CAPE BRETON & CENTRAL NOVA SCOTIA RAILWAY when the Sydney and Hopewell sub divisions were purchased from CN. by the Texas Based Railtex Inc. They began operation with a fleet of MLW C630M's and MLW RS18's purchased from CN. Most of these Locomotives were finished in a black with yellow paint scheme. I am in the process of building my freelance version of the CB&CNS Railway in HO scale. I decided to take my version back in time to the late 1970's, a time of better prosperity for the railroad in this area. The names of localities on my layout are of real places, though some things such as the rail yard at Little Harbour are fictitious, also the location of place on the layout may not always correspond to the actual geographical location of that place. There was coal mining in the Thorburn area at that time, with a coal fired generating station at Trenton, so the layout operation is based on that with the mainline generating the freight traffic for industries in the area.
I'm still building my Locomotive fleet. I have completed six of the ten MLW C630M's I'll require, a MLW RS18, and a GP18. The prototype GP18 was purchased by the railroad, to replace an aging RS18's. The last purchase by the CB&CNS, bearing it's own reporting marks, was a GP9, painted a dark green with yellow. One rather interesting fact about the CB&CNS, was all the operating locos were named. The MLW RS18's were named for Canadian Prime Ministers, the C630M's and the C636 were named for Scottish Poets and Authors or CB&CNS employee's
Photos of the six completed MLW C630M's, the MLW RS18 and the GP18 models, may be seen by clicking the links on the NAV bar.
