Hi All, I just broke through the computerize and got back into this blog so I can work on it again. It's been about 9 months since I got locked out by a cookie and scripting setting problem and temporarily gave up. A lot has happened in the Boston trolley modeling scene and you should enjoy hearing about the parts I can remember. The O scale members at the Bay State Model Railroad Museum (formerly The Bay State Society of Model Engineers) have been doing a lot of trolley and railroad operations. We are getting good at both types of operations and recently had another real smooth trolley OP session. 
The hobby has been blessed with the Williams by Bachmann 3 rail O scale Baltimore Peter Witt car and John Pilling jumped in and offered a high quality and easy to install 2 rail conversion kit. We figured out the circuitry and added small HO DCC decoders and now have 8 or 10 converted Witts operating at the club. They are good runners and there have been few issues. One member has installed a Digitrax Sound Bug with actual Baltimore Witt sounds using the speaker supplied with the car and it works super.
We have had a lot of discussion about modern streetcars and LRVs the last year. We want some modern models. Some of it focused on Portland Oregon which the wife and I visited in February 2011 on our way to California. As part of that visit we just happened to ride the Portland Streetcars extensively. We refer to them as the "2011 Two Rooms and a Bath" cars. I recently built a foam box mock-up of the car to see how it would track. It turns out that the car tracks very well with double power and goes everywhere without a hitch. I have included a picture below. 
I hope to be able to pass along some specific tips in some future blogs. DCC wiring and lighting approaches we have used may be the first topics to be added. This is going to be about building model trolleys, sharing good approaches and successes and helping each other to solve problems. I feel lucky tonight having squeeked this much through the blog. I know it will get easier?
