For the first time in a long time, the HVL has its own place in cyberspace.
History
The ‘Hunter Valley Lines’ (HVL) is my umbrella for all things modelling, and it has been since mid-November 2000. As I write this initial post of the new HVL website, the domain is about to have its 26th birthday. It’s hard to believe time has flown so quickly. And that so much has been done and also much has not been done. I suppose that is life summed up in a sentence.
When I started this whole web-drama, my main aim was to document my railway modelling and layout plans. That goal has spread across the web to:
Andrew’s Trains – which houses my thoughts on small layout designs and the excellent work of others in the field, and
MartinFamilyweb – which became a parking lot for scale modelling content after I refocused the Andrew’s Trains site
Where I am
Over the years, I’ve built a rich and diverse history for the ‘company’. Much of it documented and some of it not. Little of it has been made public. This site will become that repository. As I go about the daily grind of life, I’ll find the time to bring my Word documents online, provide access to my operating paperwork, tools and whatever else I can find in my trove.
Where I’m going
I’ll also be documenting my currently stalled layout, The Evans Hollows Industrial. It is time to move it forward from the build almost-complete stage to track down, wired and ready for testing. Until finally I have a working layout ready for the exhibition scene here in South-eastern Australia.
Technical notes
This site is self-hosted. It lives in my house, runs on my hardware and is under my control. I’ve had a few instances over the last 26 years where I built websites only to find them shuttered and partially lost to the speed of the internet boom. I don’t expect much traffic, but am looking forward to moving all of my other content to this site in the next few weeks.
I’ve been working for almost four months to get my self-hosted setup running as I want. I am pleased with what I’ve achieved on my own (and a little help from Google’s Gemini). Now is the time to sit back, write and publish my own story, in my own way.
Hope to hear from you soon.