Prototype Waybills

Operations on my layout have evolved from basic car cards and waybills, to switch lists,  and now to what some call “prototype waybills”. Before I get too deep into this subject, let me state that “I consider prototype waybills to be an extension of the layout scenery” and nothing more.

My adventure with prototype waybills started when I was searching for an alternative to traditional car cards and waybills. I was never comfortable with how the smaller car cards stacked up in hand. The pack of cards was always thicker at the bottom because of the waybill pocket. This led me to baseball card sleeves and that’s when I landed on Tony Thompson’s blog about prototype waybills.

I spent days reading about the concept and in my eyes, it seemed like a good fit for my operations. If you read Tony’s blog you will discover several different ways to go about implementing this system. I have tried several variations and finally settled on a car card with the information printed at the top like traditional car cards and a separate semi prototypical waybill. The biggest compromise with this system is the car information is above the words FREIGHT WAYBILL.

On a prototype waybill the railroad name is at the top of the waybill. That name would change depending on what railroad created the waybill, regardless of the car’s name.  Let’s say the Pennsylvania Railroad had an empty AT&SF boxcar sitting in one of its yards. The PRR could do one of two things.

  • Route the car empty toward home, the Pennsylvania Railroad makes no money in that situation.
  • Load the car with a load heading west. The Pennsylvania Railroad makes money, and the car is heading toward home. 

 

In the second scenario that would result in a Freight Waybill with 620 – The Pennsylvania Railroad – 620  printed on the top of the waybill and assigned to the AT&SF car. As you can imagine that complicates the creation of prototype waybills.

Again, the railroad name at the top of the waybill is all scenery as far as moving your cars on the model railroad go, but the name would change. 

Prototype Waybill System

The system utilize clear baseball card protective sleeves to hold the car cards and waybills.

Much like traditional car card systems the car information at the top. Optionally you can print the word HOLD on the reverse side of the car card and eliminate the HOLD box on your layout. Because the cards lay flat it is easy to have 2, 3 or 4 waybills in each car card to create cycles around your layout. 

I prefer to use a single sided waybill on white paper and use empty car bills on yellow paper.

Some cars, like tank cars, require waybills in each direction because the car has residual product inside. For those situation I use a waybill printed on white paper in one direction and a waybill printed on blue paper for the return trip.

In this case an empty tank car of oil is returning empty from colonial fuel to the fuel distributor it originated from. So for this car it will have two waybills that stay in the car card sleeve because that car always goes to the same location on my layout.

For those who are interested in trying out this system I am making my spreadsheet available for download and would love to hear your feedback.

You can create Car Cards, Waybills, Empty Car Bills, Work Orders, and Engine Cards. 

The spreadsheet was created with free open-source software, and will run on both Open Office and LibreOffice. The spreadsheet should also work with Excel and I am including a .xls version as well.

6 Responses

    1. Thank you Frank. I wanted to give the area of the waybill that was filled in a typewriter look. All the waybills I found were typed in all caps.

  1. I like the idea. I’m doing something similar for my new railroad. On my existing layout, I use the traditional CC/WB system. My new car cards are in a larger format baseball card sleeve. They aren’t quite as slippery as others. It too plan to insert waybills into the sleeve in front of the car card.

    I too use one box per industry on the current layout and plan to do so on the new one as well, as I find it more effective for my operators. All cars that are holds, keep their destination waybill in place, which is the industry they are at. For outbounds, I have the Via line populated on my existing waybills. That’s the quick trick for operators.

    With my new CC/WB system, Holds will keep the destination waybill indicating hold. Outbounds will have a new waybill in place with a destination elsewhere online or offline. I model SP, so SP and SSW cars will have the waybill pulled and be routed to the major yard for an empty pool. Non-home road cars will get a mix of destination waybills or pulled waybills. My car cards all have a ‘when empty return to x’. This is generally covered by the waybill.

    I have a first pass of waybills based on what Tony Thompson has done with a few modifications. I’m going to download your spreadsheet as they seem to be a bit clearer. I was trying to replicate the SP waybills, but the text is pretty dense.

    Feel free to reach out if with any comments.

    Thanks for sharing.

    Rick Watson
    OpSIG President

    1. That is great Rick, thank you for posting. If you need any guidance with the spreadsheet let me know but it is pretty straight forward. I am planning on what you talked about in your second paragraph. A new waybill or Empty car bill for the next move.

  2. As a piece of scenery, I think these add a lot! They introduce the commercial role of the railroad that is modeled. They get me thinking about where the cars have been, “offstage”. I think they are pretty cool.

    For what it’s worth, I think most of the oil came from the terminals at Curtis Bay, Mayland. Or possibly Canton. Though this is just educated surmising along with the detail that a dedicated Curtis Bay – Bethesda train operated in WWII . . . and a look through the 1948 1% waybill sample that shows that almost all the petroleum delivered in Maryland (and DC) originated in Maryland. If I remember right, both Tidewater and Mobil had Curtis Bay terminals.

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