Wombat Creek Tramways

I have commenced the construction of a new home for Chloe. I have abandoned the name ‘Young and Jackson’ for the hotel, so for the time being the hotel is unnamed. As of the 12th of April the building has come so far:

The building material is cardboard with a few sticks on balsa wood. All 70 windows and doors are cut by hand. The green parts are green because I used green cardboard. Nothing to do with the final colour.

The original building and the inspiration for the build looks like this on a rainy Saturday morning in April 2021:

Since Wombat Creek is set in 1963 I have to go back in time to find the right colour for the walls, A search on the internet gave me some photos but unfortunately in black and white. Instead I turned to Warren Doubleday from Melbourne Tram Museum. He dug into the archives and in no time came up with the following photo:

The walls are brown! Perhaps not the most inspiring colour. The window frames appear to be white. I intend to print the windows on transparent foil and in a printer ‘white’ equals ‘no colour’. Therefore I will need to change the colour. A few years later the window frames were brown as the walls, which is just too boring. I think I will go with a light grey.

Work on the covered walkway (canopy) along the Myer department store has commenced. The columns are meat skewers with footings made of M4 ‘lock nuts’. The crossbeams are made of cardboard.

At the moment I am constructing the ‘rafters’, which will support the roof.

The balustrades are up. They were easy to assemble with some tight fits on top of the columns. The roof area of the Bank is finished – at least for the time being.

My focus will now be drawn to street level. The two shops to the right of the stairs have to be finished. Canopies along Main Street and The Golden Mile are also on the drawing board.

In real life Melbourne the intersection of Swanston Street and Flinders Street features two iconic buildings – Flinders Street Station and Young & Jackson Hotel. The station has already been resurrected in Wombat Creek as ‘Wombat Creek Bank and Gold Exchange’, so time has come to the hotel.

A recent five day lock-down in Victoria gave me time to make a mock-up of the hotel. With photos from the internet and some time with Photoshop I came up with a composite image of the buildings. The first version may have been true to scale but appeared too big compared to the surrounding buildings. The photo shows the second version which sits a bit better with the existing buildings. Due to space limitations the Wombat Creek version of Young & Jackson will not be an exact copy of the original but, hopefully, it will be recognisable. For the time being I have no schedule for the build. I will need to pay a visit to the original to investigate a few details – including the bar!

While waiting for the balustrades to arrive from England my attention has been on the road at the back of the bank. It will hardly be visible from a normal point of view, but I know it is there and it must look right.

The area has been raised some 15 mm above the baseboard, which has caused a small issue with Myer’s display window. A few steps will connect the lower footpath to higher grounds. The surface of the road is made of fine sandpaper which looks quite real apart from the joints. Retaining walls will be built along the footpath next to Myer and in front of the vinegar factory. Why vinegar? It will give me a reason to model a famous sign (at least famous around Melbourne) of a skipping girl. Not sure how I make her skipping at night time. Neon lights in H0/00 scale are rare!

Life in Wombat Creek is pretty quiet at the moment. Recent work includes some ‘underground’ adventures. To make room for the basement of ‘City Hatters’ a crossbeam under the Bank has been moved 45 mm to the west.

The roof of the building is finished, finally. The central dome has been topped with a flagpole, which bring me to the following question:

How to model a flag?

A paper flag will look like – a paper flag on a stick!

The copper roofing has been finished with capping along the ridges, windows and ornaments. I still need to finish the roof with small spires and a flagpole.
The top of the facade will be finished with balustrades. Ordering pre-made ones from Britain is out of the question due to postage ($75+), so I need to come up with something else.

I had hoped Myer (department store) would be ready for Boxing Day sales. Despite three days of intensive construction work on the site the extension of the original store front still lacked roofing and other features. Hopefully the store will be ready for a ‘grand’ opening in January 2021.

After a few more frantic days of work the roof is finished and signs and railings are up. A taxi rank in front of the store is ready for use – unfortunately the town’s only taxi is on route to Gum Nut Valley.

As can be seen on the photo entering the department store will be a bit of a challenge due to the lack of a footpath near the revolving door, but I am sure that will not deter the customers getting to the good bargains.

Deliveries to the department store are through the doors at the back. At the moment the sit high above the ground but that will be rectified at a later stage with an elevated back-road.