Castle rock…

Entering a tunnel somewhere in the braghanza ghats …

Churchorem yard….

YG4332 clearing the yard at Margao stn

Margao station and town

A YG 4332 has started its morning duties with a freight load towards Castle rock. While a YP has just arrived from Kolamb with the passenger

After the passenger has left, the freight train proceeds towards Castle rock.

Braghanza Ghats title screen

MSTS, MG Steam & the Margao-Londa Branch Line

Its official now.  Well almost.. I had targetted Aug 15 to release this route. The Beta version is ready. I have uploaded the route to train-sim.com, and I expect it to be visible for download pretty soon..

Now a bit about the route:

I have tried to depict the MG branch line between Vasco-da-gama on the coast, to Londa junction on the Miraj-Hubli main line of the south-central railways, as it existed in the prior to gauge conversion. Purely inspired by wonderful pictures of the Braghanza ghats on the IRFCA site (www.irfca.org/gallery) and scenery I witnessed during my Goa trip last september, I decided to take this up  as my first major route-building project.

I have tried to keep the geographical locations, and elevations as accurate as possible, with the help of DEM (Digital Elevation Data) available publicly on GIS sites for our region with a resolution of 50 meters. The stations, scenery are imaginary though again I have tried to give the MG branch line feel, aged, simple buildings and structures.

Hope you will enjoy the route. A few screen shots are on their way for your visual pleasure.

Happy Independence Day !!

Manohar Natarajan

New Route Update …

Dear Reader,

 I had made significant progress on the route since my last posting… The current status is that all track work is completed, signals placed and one round of railway objects (stations, mileposts, speedlimits, yard markings) done. Currently I scenery detailing is in progress…Have posted a few more screen shots… Can you guess the route. Clue: An important MG route till 1980s. Converted to broad gauge and serves an important tourist spot…:-)

A city in the making

Beating the summer heat !

Its long since I updated this blog, so here is some update…Other than trying to cope up with the summer heat, I started working on a new Indian railway route…It will be based on a real IR route, I am trying to get it as close as possible to the real route..It is actually an MG branch, and not in existence now, so there are quite a few challenges up there…

Here are a first few screen shots showing the route under construction…