The Scarborough
Model Railroad Club
the Scarborough
Model Railroad formed in 1962, in what
was then the Township of Scarborough,
Ontario Canada, by a group of
enthusiastic teenagers meeting at an
Agincourt Hobby Shop. From April to the
Fall there were monthly meetings in
member’s homes. Then the club was
offered the basement of the Scarborough
Cleaners outlet at the Brimley/Lawrence
plaza in suburban Toronto.The club was
to stay in this location for 14 years!
during which time the club built a total
of three layouts two in the early years,
which were basically learner layouts for
the final version. In hind sight, one
could say that they didn’t learn enough
the main line for the last layout was
reputably built after the towns had been
built and had to be fitted around
existing layout structures, without
shutting down club operation. The club
focus was primarily on switching, in
part due to the layout size available,
in part due to the main competition the
Deleware & Rutland which was
aggressively mainline timetable
oriented.During this time period, the
club had a minimum of 8 members, with a
fixed maximum of fifteen members and a
membership waiting list which was always
full. In 1974, Scarborough Cleaners
closed their Brimley Avenue branch and
the club was forced to junk the existing
layout and move.The club found a
basement location down near Danforth &
Kingston Road. We moved again after 6
months, due to rent price gouging on the
part of the landlord. The club’s next
location (early 1975), where we are at
present on Jeavons Ave, was originally a
sublease of the basement from what was
then Centennial Kitchens. The basement
had been an upholsterer’s shop and was
pretty “grotty”, but the club was sick
and tired of renovating. The members
shovelled out the basement; slapped a
coat of blue paint on the walls and
started building.
Starting with the salvaged major and
minor throat areas of Scarborough (which
was all that was saved from the old
layout) all the layout bench work was
put up in 6 months. Scarborough Yard,
Scarborough Roundhouse, Scarborough
Industrial and the outside loop was laid
out and up and running within 9 months.
The inner loop mainline to Great Bend
was up and running in time for the
Club’s first Open House at about the one
year mark.
At this point in
our history, we formally
incorporated Scarborough Model
Railroaders as a “Not-For-Profit”
organization under the laws of the
Province of Ontario. Also at this time
and for the next few years the club held
their open house in conjunction with a
train show organized by the Albert
Campbell Library, until this petered out
and the club went out on their own with
the Open Houses in the Spring and Fall.
The club’s HO layout
has always been named the Scarborough
Terminal Railway, although exactly how
the management of this supposed
“Terminal Railway” managed to lay their
hands on and legally run on so much
prize Southern Ontario right-o-way has
remained a deep, dark secret to this
day. (Rumor of Gaston B. Meany, Tess &
Dudley Do-Right abound !)
In 1986 we
acquired the main floor of the building,
and the original N
scale layout was
started. In 1996, the N scale modeler's,
dissatisfied with their original work,
and with a rough idea of the layout that
they wanted, and with saws and
sledgehammers in their hands, demolished
the original N scale layout in an
afternoon. Bench work, and track on
plywood followed for a number of years.
The town of Waldron was the first to be
completed and scenicked.
A diamond, and a
duck-under were removed in 1998, due to
their limitation on train operations
(they limited the length of trains on
the mainline), and the saws came out to
a small section of the layout in what is
now the towns of Apex and Kaiser.
Construction has continued on the N
scale layout upstairs since. About 75%
of the scenario is complete, with 2
major areas not even started, we still
have many years of construction,
track-laying, wiring, scenery, and
structures to complete while we run
trains through the completed sections of
the layout. Today, the HO
Scale layout occupies
the basement, while the clubhouse and
the occupy the main floor.
Our open
houses in the
Spring and Fall have attracted 1000s of
visitors over the years. In fact, the
tradition of visiting the Scarborough
Model Railroad has passed from
generation, to generation, to
generation. One visitor commented that
he remembered coming to the open house
as a cub scout, and he has been coming
with his kids, 25 years later.
This is our 41st year.
In 2003, the NMRA convention came to
Toronto, and the SMR was on a number of
the layout tours. For those of you who
dropped by during the convention, we
hope you enjoyed your visit.
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