Help........please!

[IanL]

Hi, I'm Ian. I live in Northern England in the UK and am about to start building an N scale model railway based on the Olympic Peninsula west of Seattle. It's an independent line called the Olympic, Dewarin and Windsor Valley (two fictional places roughly where the real Port Angeles is!) and is shared in ownership by the GN and NP, much like the real S, P and S.
Can anyone on here point me towards some photo sites that will help with architecture and building design in this area? I'm actually building a stretch of line along the north coast of the peninsula where it runs through the town of Dewarin, discovered fictionally by a great grandparent while travelling with Captain James Cook. Yes I know I'm dreaming. Tell me you don't!
I need to build harbour side, waterfront and local industries and am struggling to find pics to help plan them. Year is 1954, which I guess makes it harder.
In return I can help if anyone needs info about railways in the UK - full size or model.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions....... 

[daniel_leavitt2000]

I use photography from newspapers quite often. I model 1998. While not old, I like to see the differences in store owners, vehicles, road projects etc.

You can try this newspaper for some pictures:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/home/index.html

You can also search photos by location on
www.rrpicturearchives.net

Try watching video clips of news articles from the area. One local station is:
http://www.komonews.com/

The local PBS (public broadcasting tv station) will have a lot of usefull human interest stories with photos, video and insights into the area.
http://www.kcts9.org/

[randgust]

What you're describing sounds suspiciously like todays Puget Sound & Pacific.  I'm very familiar with the line.  Contact me offline and I can provide digital photos.  I can't go back in time to 1954, but the scenery is pretty consistent.

http://www.railamerica.com/ShippingServices/RailServices/PSAP.aspx

http://www.railamerica.com/ShippingServices/RailServices/PSAP.aspx#map

It's a mix of heritage lines from the period, primarily NP, and some others.

[IanL]

Thanks to both of you. I'll give those sites a try. I've found some useful old NP pictures of dockyard installations and industry in Tacoma in a Washington State museum archive, and some stuff about Grays Harbour. My line starts in a similar kind of place to the PG and P, but heads up the west side of the sound and along the north coast, then down by the Pacific to join the PG and P at Aberdeen. It gives me lots of potential for operating my 2 favourite railroads, the GN and NP, and to create one of my own. Scary for someone who's never been there ( I've seen Port Angeles on the horizon from a boat out of Victoria on Vancouver Island, but that's all!) and only got interested in US railroads a year or two ago. I have one book about the GN and one US model railroad book - it's a start! (Lots of English ones........)
I did discover the Seattle and North Coast railroad, which lived for a while in the seventies, run by the Milwaukee Road. Completely independent of any other trackage, it had a terminal at Port Angeles and ran to  the ferry harbour further to the East where it linked to Seattle. I'm starting with that, but my port has grown bigger and justifies the rail link down to Olympia, Tacoma, Seattle and Portland.
The stuff of dreams, I know, but the stretch from Dewarin (Port Angeles) west along the Juan De Fuca Strait and south along the Pacific coast to Aberdeen would be one great tourist railway today...........