July 2023 - New Walthers Grocery Warehouse

[James Costello]

Certainly a unique structure and a welcome new addition to the N range from Walthers....

https://www.walthers.com/concrete-grocery-warehouse-kit

[Englewood]

Very nice!

[nkalanaga]

Don't need one, or have room for it, but it looks good.  And it's nice to see a warehouse big enough to actually warrant rail service.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Don't need one, or have room for it, but it looks good.  And it's nice to see a warehouse big enough to actually warrant rail service.

I mean... is it? Like, that boxcar looks to fill up 25% of its space.

[packers#1]

Yeah, it’s a great kit but it reminds me more of a beverage distributor that would have previously had rail service but handles everything by truck now. Great foreground structure for an industrial park though!

[MK]

Buy 2 kits and splice them together?

[thomasjmdavis]

If it was a brick building, with older doors, I would buy it.  It is  12" on it's long side, which is a realistic size for a (small) prototype building.  Unfortunately, it is much too modern for me.

[mu26aeh]

At $60, I'll buy evergreen and scratch my own

[Rossford Yard]

Buy 2 kits and splice them together?

Or buy one and build it as a background flat, doubling its size.

I like it, too.  Like a few others, I think my structure space is more than filled on my layout, and who knows....I might always expand, LOL.  It would have been handy last night, as I needed a foreground structure, but dug around and found an old ME metal building that worked just fine, especially since it fits the front fascia and faces away, so any fine detail is more than likely wasted for normal viewing.

I applaud Walthers for keeping up the good work in N.  I thought they were going to re-release the steel mill set in N, which also would have been handy since they are pretty pricey on eBay when available.

[nkalanaga]

12" would have room to unload four 40 ft boxcars/reefers, or three 50 ft, so would be fine for the 1950s and early 60s.  I know similar buildings were in use by the late 1960s.

With that many truck doors, I doubt that it would have been used for storing stuff for extended periods.  Most of what came in probably went out almost as fast.  Certainly meat and produce wouldn't sit around very long.

[C855B]

Yeah, it’s a great kit but it reminds me more of a beverage distributor that would have previously had rail service but handles everything by truck now. Great foreground structure for an industrial park though!

Perfect for a rail-served beer distributor. Two 60' insulated boxcars could be spotted inside. Couldn't tell if the kit included a roll-up door for the rail entrance, but that's how it would be done. What I don't get is the truck door on the backside where the spur would be.

The narrative says 1970s, but this design is more likely ~1985 or later.

[garethashenden]

What I don't get is the truck door on the backside where the spur would be.

Kit makers seem to think there need to be doors on all sides. People doors, sure, but not loading doors.

[packers#1]

Perfect for a rail-served beer distributor. Two 60' insulated boxcars could be spotted inside. Couldn't tell if the kit included a roll-up door for the rail entrance, but that's how it would be done. What I don't get is the truck door on the backside where the spur would be.

The narrative says 1970s, but this design is more likely ~1985 or later.

It doesn’t look like it, but given everything they’ve released it wouldn’t be too hard to kit bash. Although you could also definitely leave them parked on a spur behind since there’s the one insulated door back there. Walthers has a door kit where you could easily add a second one on the back wall. That’s how the one that shared the industrial park my plant in Olive Branch is as set up. nevermind, I checked google satellite view and was wrong. I swear I thought it was a covered dock but it might have gone inside the building in a little addition.Also, I only say former rail served because, since I’ve been growing up, the ones I’ve seen of this size didn’t get rail service anymore even though the tracks were there. And if I were to mode an industrial park, that’s how I’d have it set up scenery wise 

[Tristan Ashcroft]

       On the topic of building size: here's a (maybe it works!, who knows, I did it) link to the Google Streetview image of a building that until sometime in 1996 or maybe 1997 was getting a standard 50 ft boxcar (or maybe occasionally a couple?) about once a week or maybe less frequently than that.  I only noticed flange grooves in the dirt of a crossing on the way in a couple of times while I was living there (1994 to 1998):  https://goo.gl/maps/QW9LSZ9h7Y7ARoKf9 
      My understanding at the time was they were distributing Kellogg's breakfast cereal and probably other stuff (I probably got that impression from one of a couple of my professors who were active in Huntingdon County Business & Industry).
      While we're here, oh hey, those rails are the old Huntingdon and Broad Top in Smithfield (across the river from Huntingdon) PA.  A few years ago, NS took the frog out over at Hunt, and I guess when PTC came through the dwarf signal guarding the H&BT probably got taken out of the live circuit as well (or even finally removed).  Other than that, the rail still exists as far as the warehouse.

[John]

At $60, I'll buy evergreen and scratch my own

Me too. But I would print the windows doors and accessoroes