As the COVID lockdown winds down -- for those who are vaccinated -- opportunities in model railroading are slowly coming back. I made my first visit to a shop (White Rose Hobbies) in over a year, participated in an op session (Dave Trone's West Penn), and look forward to shows this fall (Great Scale Model Train Show), and undoubtedly November open houses (modelrailroadopenhouse.com).

I had a very successful quarter on the Middle Division, with the only distraction being surgery for a miniscus tear in my left knee. Not too much trouble though. Here's a recap:

• Ten 26' curb-side-door trailers were built up in anticipation of Rapido's release of F30D TrucTrain TOFC flats in the third quarter.
• Car cards were generated for my entire fleet of locomotives, freight cars, and varnish.
• Hundreds of waybills were generated, most using prototype industries and commodities.
• All of the switch machines have been installed in downtown Lewistown and track was QC'd.
• A new local control panel design was implemented in downtown Lewistown. Over time, this design will replace all of the local control panels, but not at the expense of delaying operations.

Barring any emergencies, I plan to be open this November and start operating about that time. Here's the view forward:

• QC both WALL and JACKS staging yard throats and all tracks.
• Clean staging before replacing downtown Lewistown scenery tiles.
• Run all operations jobs solo as a test run.
• Have a QC op session to continue to test.
• Stage several mainline through trains.
• Clean the damned room for the open house!

Here is the full Report of the Chief Engineer.