A couple of us came up from SE Michigan to take part in this operating session, yesterday.
We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and found the GRMRHS guys to be great hosts. The club's layout represents the PM/C&O's Chicago-GR, GR-Plymouth and GR-Petoskey lines, including the branch to Manistee and the bit from Baldwin to Ludington.
To fit all of this into the building, they have different lines running in the foreground and in the background of each section of benchwork. It ends up looking confusing on the track plan, but I was pleased to see how well it worked when actually running trains, particularly since you wind up concentrating on your own train, rather than those in a scene in front of or behind your own. It's a trade-off necessary to get all of the track in place, but one that I thought works well here.
I found that the the deck heights for their double-deck benchwork felt comfortable to me (at 5'10") and made switching pleasant on both levels.
There's a broad spectrum of what people define as operation. I've run on layouts ranging from those where "operating" meant just running in circles and keeping out of everybody else's way, to a couple where full prototypical rules and practices were enforced and lots of paperwork was involved. The session here is very relaxing and enjoyable, with the barest minimum of paperwork I can remember seeing anywhere. The working mainline CTC makes it perfectly clear when you are allowed to proceed, and a card-less and list-less method of car movement is very easy to understand.
If you've never been to any kind of operating session, I'd recommend the sort of session that the GRMRHS held yesterday as good introduction. Each train we ran had a sense of purpose, and no part of the experience felt overwhelming.
Here are a few photos I shot after the session.
The coaling tower at Ludington, which serves both the steam locomotives and the car ferries
The swing bridge at St Joseph
Thom Post's meticulously scratchbuilt Lake Odessa depot
Thanks to Mark, Hank, Wyett and the others for a very enjoyable operating session!
