My model has expanded to about 1500 feet of mainline and another 200 to 300 feet of sidings. All the lines are integrated into one system. But the older segment between the Copper Rail Depot Saloon and Kennecott still has some tight curves that prohibit use of the some passenger cars as well as many of the diesel locomotives. The original line ran within the bar itself from 1999 to 2001 when it was expanded to run to the Kennecott model, which is a 36 foot long replica of the historic site. In 2006-2008, the Cicely townsite was built to accommodate the larger, modern diesels and streamliners–mostly USA passenger trains. The latter was named the ALCANEX–Alaska-Canada Northern Exposure mainline. The original was the Chitina Local segment of the Copper River & Northwestern Railway that historically extended from Chitina, MP 131 of the CRNW mainline to MP 195–Kennecott. The Chitina model is overhead in the bar itself. The McCarthy downtown site is along the line above the garden railway between the bar and Kennecott. For several years the upper segment–the Chitina Local–was effectively abandoned. Much of the line was removed. Then in 2016 I connected the two lines with a roughly 250 new segment that includes the 12 foot model of the steel bridge Copper River crossing that was planned for MP 132 but never built. Instead a temporary wooden trestle was rebuilt every year after spring break up and sometimes more often when glacial flooding caused the trestle to wash out in late July to mid-August. Once the two segments were connected, I rebuilt the torn-out track section with wider curves that extend back into the bar at the original upper level. But that section remains limited by tight curves in the McCarthy section from the original layout and from limited space above the bar itself. However, I do run trains from the upper to the lower segment.
