Amtrak

Proto-Future 5, Part 1: Inaugural Borealis, Day 1 – Keystone, SEPTA, Airport Philosophy, and the Metric System for Sounds

This episode is the first in a four-part series detailing my trip to ride the inaugural Borealis between the Twin Cities and Chicago. In it, I motorcycle to Harrisburg, ride the Keystone to Philadelphia, struggle with SEPTA to the Airport, speedrun both the PHL and MSP airports, and give a preliminary exploration of Minneapolis, philosophizing extensively along the way.

Proto-Future 4: G4 Buffet: Lewistown, Layout Diary 1, and the Grocery Store

This nontraditional episode gives you three vignettes on Amtrak and the podcast, my layout and its construction, and bicycling infrastructure and car-dependency, as well as helping me catch up on scripts and test out field recording.

Proto-Future Prologue 3: Rochester, MN

An alt-history of the Las Vegas Talgo as if it was purchased by MNDOT and used to start the Northern Lights Express 25 years ahead of schedule.

This episode recounts impressionable articles, near-future Amtrak routes, and how I went from modeling the 1890s On30 and choosing a diesel locomotive just for fun to completely abandoning the On30 layout and starting over to make a new layout based on a concept for regional transportation in a state which I've never lived in and barely visited.