My first instinct is to be generally inclined toward something Wisbech and Upwelly. I already have 4 of the D&S W&U tramway coaches. They were built while I was in the progress of migrating towards P4, but at that stage I had only got as far as EM. As a result their wheels will need some attention if I am to maintain my general disinclination to follow the Goodall approach to P4 wheel dimensions. These W&U tramway coaches once pipped a David Jenkinson 7mm scale 12 wheel Midland dinner to the coaching stock first prize at the Derby show. While I am very happy with my W&U coaches I was always somewhat mystified by this result. I can only assume that perhaps Mr Jenkinson had won a few times before?
The W&U depot at Outwell Village would make a fine model, with an interesting and quirky track plan which includes, right at its heart, a significant bend. Always useful when trying to get a layout into a limited space. The real glory is the setting. Coming from Wisbech, the roadside tramway enters Outwell in close proximity to the Wisbech canal which then locks down into the Well Creek a navigable waterway. This in turn curves round the tramway deport that exists in part to serves a wharf on the creek. To reach the deport, the tramway bridges the creek and enters the depot yard about one third of the way along its length, making for an interesting track plan. If you choose your period with care, it featured a siding that crosses the running line on the flat. Then the pièce de resistance was the last (or first) point which is situated in the middle of the T road junction outside the yard. From here the track leaves the village along the bank of the creek on its way to Upwell.
As well as the tramway itself, within the likely bounds of any layout are the canal, the creek and much of the domestic housing for Outwell village, and the church. The down side for such a layout would be a certain lack of operational interest as, from the tramway’s point of view this, was not even a train crossing point. While I suppose it is just as viable as the average shunting plank, I do like the ability to run a good variety of trains that do an interesting variety of different things while "on stage". I can envisage spending years building the layout and particularly its associated array of buildings, then dying of terminal boredom half way through the first morning of exhibition running. And of course Outwell Village Deport has been done before, at least twice.
Alternatively, if looking for something with greater operational interest, I probably need something that was a proper railway, and I do find Wells-next-the-Sea a very appealing prototype. The station itself is ideally model sized, requiring little if any compression to make a reasonable centrepiece, although the same cannot be said for the three approaching tracks from Heacham, Dereham and the harbour branch. These spread themselves out to nearly all points of the compass and would need some form of compromise to generate a layout that wasn't entirely surround by fiddleyard.
There are lots of characterful features, like the platform road with platform faces on both sides, and the engine shed, one road of which doubled as the goods shed during the day. The whole track plan was a testament to the GER’s total lack of fear of complicated point work. Working the station in the way the GER did also presents a few operational issues as, despite being the terminus of all three approaching lines, it originally had no run round loops, at least not for passenger train use. As built it was equipped with ticket platforms on the approaches to the station at which the trains stopped. Then, while the tickets were checked, the loco was removed and the journey was completed by allowing the coached to roll into the station proper, conveniently down hill, by gravity. Another interesting modelling challenge.
There again there is also the possibility of combining my interests. This suggests that perhaps the GER, rather more pleased in my imagination with the success of the W&U than it actually turned out in truth to be, built a second Tramway in the Wells area. Following this line of thought I have an outline Templot generated track plan which incorporates the bulk of the existing Wells station with the addition of as W&U-esk tramway in lieu of the Harbour Branch, with a roadside tramway platform in the station forecourt. We can all dream. However the truth remains that I am unlikely to start a new layout from scratch as those parts of chez Will into which such a thing might just fit, already have other dedicated uses, and are already full.
So, falling back on something requiring a lot less work or room, I considered the Un-Built Kits Pile. Not surprisingly given my declared interests, it happens the UBKP contains a London Road Models – nee Riceworks – J69, not to mention its little brother an un-rebranded Ricework J65. These tickled my fancy, particularly as Exactoscale have produce exactly the right wheels for the job, the same ones being used on both loco’s so long as you're careful which class members you chose. Also I was at least intellectually interested by the Exactoscale approach to wheel system design. Others might describe this as having more money than sense. The question remained which loco would I go for.
At this stage C&L had just taken over the distribution of the Exactoscale wheels, and I was, at best, unsure how you decided from their website, what a full set of the necessary bits for a single set of wheels actually entailed. Lets just say that there are rather more bits per axle than the experience of other manufactures products might lead you to expect. Assuming that C&L would know what I wanted, not as it turns out a necessarily safe assumption, I sent off a letter to Mr Llewellyn requesting an appropriate set of 6 with all the trimmings, and the necessary additional assembly tools. It was arranged that I would collect my purchase at Scalefour North, and, on being handed a neatly wrapped and remarkably heavy package, I was just a bit surprised at the size of the overall bill. I knew they were expensive, but not that expensive… Being very English and not wishing to cause a fuss, more money than sense prevailed and I paid up. Careful inspection of my purchase revealed that my order for 6 x 4’0” 10 spoke wheels plus all the bits had been interpreted as 6 axles of… . I haven’t bothered to review my letter to see if it was Mr Llewellyn's reading or my writing that was responsible for this mixup, I just accepted that a choice had been made for me.
It was not either the J69 or the J65, it was going to be both.
By now the reasons for my thread title should have become clear, and further posts will be more factual than aspirational, starting with those wheels. I just hope Mr Rice forgives me for pinching his artwork off the box tops.
Edited to recover an image of Wells next the sea trackplan, the original link being broken
A lighter version of the T18s they appeared in 1819 and had smaller cylinders side tanks and cab although they shared a boiler, wheel base and wheel size. Intended from the start as passenger engines, they had screw revers and the ten spoke balanced wheels fitted to the passenger T18s. Put to work on the intensive Fenchuch Street/Blackwall service, over time they gravitated to the GER periphery and occasionally beyond, doing good service on various byways such as the Colne Valley and the Mid Suffolk Light. Some even spent their declining years shunting docksides, though never apparently suffering the ignominy of lever revers and unbalanced 15 spoke wheels that was the lot of their bigger cousins given similar jobs. A relatively simple development history saw the occasional boiler upgrade, extra coal rails, the fitting of higher profile metal roofs and loss of the distinctive GER stovepipe chimney that occurred to most GER classes. J65s had the endearing habit of appearing in public slightly undressed, that is with the front coupling rods removed to make them 2-4-0s. The last one left us in 1956. 
