Many people have a memory of building a model railway trains around the Christmas tree every year. The worst part is always at the end of the season when you have to put the train away. The good news is, you do not have to ever put up the train if you create your own scenery in which your model train can travel through. With all the different options available for you to use, your options are only limited by your imagination and creativity.

The first thing you will need when creating permanent scenery for your model railroad train is what is known as a benchwork. This resembles a small table, but not quite as thick as a regular table you would eat from. While you can set up a model railroad on a kitchen table, it is less expensive to buy benchwork. It is also a better idea to buy benchwork because the price is far less than having to buy a new table for your meals. Kits are available for purchase at most retailers who sell model railway trains for hobbyists.

For those looking for ultimate customization, you can build your own benchwork. The process of building your own is a bit more complicated than simply buying a kit. Since most people who get involved in being a model train railroader are very detail oriented, it is no surprise this is a very popular option. By building your own table, you will be able to create the exact shape and size, which will suit the needs of the model railway trains you will be using the scenery for. If you are unsure how to get started on such an endeavor, there are many different blueprints you can look up online. While these may not tell you exactly how to build the scenery you are looking for, they can provide an outline to help you to get started. Take into consideration such things as height and portability when creating your design. If you plan to take your scenery apart for transportation to a show, you will want to be able to separate your scenery into pieces. This is accomplished by building the table as interlocking pieces.

Once you have your base, it is time to create the actual scenery. It is possible to create a topographical landscape by using styrofoam. Hobby shops sell preformed mountain landscapes as well as valleys, lakes and rolling plains. Those looking for absolute control will use new styrofoam and cut it into the shapes they want. This allows you to create the exact scenery you want for your train railroad to travel through. Creating a drawing ahead of time will help you to put every mountain and lake in exactly the right place before you commit anything to a permanent setting. Once you have the form in place, you can cover with moss or paint to accomplish the look and texture you is looking for. Trees and buildings can be purchased or built depending on your skill level in order to add a sense of realism to the landscape you have created. Lakes are accomplished by pouring colored polyurethane into a depression and allowing it to set. Since scenery is such an important part of model railroading, you will end up spending a lot of time creating the one which is just right for you.

Creating realism is in the details. In order to make those looking at your scenery feel as if they are looking upon actual scenery in real life, there are certain tricks you can use. You can use larger materials such as trees and houses in the foreground of the landscape while using smaller material in the back. This creates the feeling as if the mountains in the back of the landscape are much farther away than they actually are. You may also want to use more detail in items up close while details farther away are more obscure. This causes the viewer to believe the back of the landscape is too far away to make out the details.

Above all else, you want to have fun in what you are doing. Showing off your talents and creativity should be something which brings you pleasure. Make sure you invite friends over to see what you have created soon, and have fun!

Adam Fletcher is a model train expert over 25 years. To find more great tips click here model railway trains. Or visit web site and discover Free Mini Course about Model Trains http://www.modeltrainstutorial.com.

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Lingerie modeling is a traditional form of modeling in which models will only wear underwear and bra or other sexy and lacy garments. That is why this type of modeling is included under "glamour modeling." Lingerie modeling requires much better body tone and proportions than other modeling fields. This type of modeling exposes the models' beauty to maximum limit and also increases their charms. Models engaged in lingerie modeling come in many shapes, heights, sizes and colors. They may be petite, plus-sized, tall or thin models.

Lingerie modeling is widely present in fashion shows, catalogues, photographer's books, websites and calendars. Today, lingerie modeling is practiced more widely as an adult entertainment event, rather than an informative event. Many sports agencies in the United States arrange such modeling events in happy hours. These lingerie modeling shows offer an opportunity for couples to watch together, which is a good opportunity to know the preferences and likes of others.

There is always a great demand for models performing lingerie modeling. Today, more and more teenagers and children are engaged in this industry. Although lingerie modeling industry wants models of virtually all nationalities, black, Latin and Asian models have greater demands. Irrespective of nationality or age, the model must maintain a good body tone, with an active lifestyle involving exercise and balanced diet.

If you want to be a lingerie model, you can either work independently or with an organization/modeling agency. If you decide to work as a freelance model, you need to track assignments and non-exclusive contracts with your own abilities. You must create a good portfolio of photos that shows your personality and earlier assignments. If you sign a contract with a modeling agency, it is their responsibility to expose you to the world. US cities such as New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Miami offer good lingerie modeling future to young models.

The payment for lingerie modeling can vary with modeling agency, show type and model rating. It is often the double of normal modeling rates. The payment is usually above $100 per hour, which can go up to thousands when the show is for major print ad and/or campaign.

Lingerie provides detailed information on Lingerie, Lingerie Model, Discount Lingerie, Plus Size Lingerie and more. Lingerie is affiliated with Corset Training.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kent_Pinkerton

Modeling and talent agencies have the power to transform a total unknown into a world-famous star. Millions of people flock to their doors, answer their ads and send them photos every year - all at the hope of getting signed, getting work and getting famous. And that is why the climate in the world of aspiring models is so ideal for top rate scam artists.

Modeling and talent scam artists will take your money, crush your dreams and not lose a minute of sleep over it. They are always a few steps ahead of the law, and have refined their trade to sharp point.

Here are some of the most common scams currently found in the modeling industry. If you feel you've been a victim of any of these scams or double-dealings, contact law enforcement immediately!

1. Legitimate modeling agencies never use small newspaper classified ads to find talent. If you're learning about a "top Hollywood agency" in the local Penny Saver, you can be sure you won't find the girls from The Hills interning there. Think about it. There's an abundance of talent approaching real agencies every day - why would they need to find more via a $25, 100 word print ad?

2. You should never have to pay a dime of your own money to be represented. Real modeling and talent agencies do not charge their models for representation. An agency will (obviously!) take their cut when you get booked, but will never ask for your hard earned cash up front. If they do, run far away (then contact the Better Business Bureau at www.bbb.org)

3. Beware the photographer hard-sell! Many unscrupulous agencies will push you towards their "recommended" photographer. Oh they'll make him sound great - as if not working with him means you aren't even serious about success. But don't be fooled! Chances are, the photographer is kicking back money to the so-called agency - which is illegal! Pick your own photographer and forget about the agency that's pushing the hard sell on you.

4. There's no such thing as a guarantee (no matter how great you look). Many less-than-up front agencies with give aspiring models an iron-clad guarantee that they will get work and make money. NO AGENCY can promise such a thing. Whether or not you get booked for a job depends upon a variety of factors that no entity can control. Look into an agency's past successes and then make a judgment about whether or not you want to move forward.

5. Don't go nude. One of the most potentially dangerous situations an aspiring model can encounter, is a photographer that pressures individuals to pose naked during their first shoot. This kind of behavior should set off warning bells very quickly. Many times, these so-called professionals will claim that they want to create a bond between themselves and their subject. And going nude will do the trick. Baloney! Never, ever do anything of this nature if you don't feel comfortable or have received personal references or recommendations about the photographer.

Identifying prospects has come a long way since the days of simple list buying. With the hype flying fast and furious, sometimes it’s difficult to sort out truth from fiction and to put things in the proper perspective. Without worshipping buzzwords, however, two of the most important developments in recent years have been the rise of statistics and databases. These have allowed companies to create more accurate profiles of their prospects, even giving rise to the term “prospect modeling” itself. Let’s see how these two developments have helped shape prospect modeling.

Types

With the creation of commercial databases of Census data in the late 1970’s, the first easily-available customer demographics were born. Using these statistics allowed companies a high-level view of customers and their behavior. Coupling this with statistical analysees of that data, updating the data (with between Census polls and surveys), and bringing in other sources (such as driver’s license records, courthouse records, and so forth) allowed for the classification of people into certain population strata, generally called types. Single mothers might be a type; new homeowners might be another type; residents of cities with a population over one million people might be another type. These types are as specific or as general as the data allows, although it is difficult to narrow down to prospects of a particular business without purchase data. Still, these statistics allow the establishment of certain types of customers and potential customers, providing that first pass at bringing prospects into focus.

Specificity

Because companies themselves have purchase data, they can use it to correlate general demographic data to provide detailed information about their customers and potential new customers. Additionally, they can pull together relevant data measurements and discard irrelevant ones, thus sharpening their focus further. In a nutshell, having statistics allows you to determine trends and customers in the abstract, while adding purchase data to the mix allows you to determine characteristics of customers in the specific – your customers and potential customers. Thus statistics allow for a great deal of specificity in prospect modeling.

Location (Geodemographic Statistics)

Yet another way that statistics can aid in modeling prospects is through geodemographic data; this data correlates Census and commercial data with geography, identifying where current customers and likely new customers reside, work, or even shop. This type of information may be more useful than it first appears. For instance, if you knew that likely customers lived in the Northeastern U.S, as opposed to the Midwest, you might be able to play off of regional identification to more effectively market your wares. Or if you knew that your customers shopped in large urban centers, but lived in the nearby suburbs, or dwelled primarily in zip code 32901, then you have more clues about them which can help you model new prospects even more efficiently. Why is that? New prospects have much in common with current customers, and the more you know your current customers, the more you will know your future customers.

Plus size modeling is a growing industry that is gaining popularity and acceptance throughout the world. Because plus size models and modeling has gained popularity in the last ten years, the opportunities have broadened considerable, but all modeling shoots for a plus size model are not the same. Plus size models will discover major differences between shoots, whether operating as a free agent or with representation and between different markets.

When you decide you want to try plus size modeling, you need to consider whether you want or can get representation right away, or if you want to act as a free agent. Finding representation can get you into many doors, but in some cases, if you are just starting out, you may want to be a free agent and market yourself to build your portfolio and get experience.

Finding representation can be challenging. You'll need some photos of yourself and you may need to try several agencies before you find the right one. Some agents want to see professional headshots, while others prefer a simple Polaroid. In many cases, they prefer to see your “raw material” and then they'll help you find and cultivate a desirable plus size model “look.” If you find representation, you should remember that the agent is working for you but you still need to take an active interest in your own modeling career. You should know what kinds of jobs they are promoting you for and why you are or are not getting jobs.

As a free agent you may have more flexibility, but you'll need to carefully protect yourself and make sure you're booking legitimate, paying jobs. Regardless of your status, you should constantly seek feedback, and do your best not to take it personally. Consider yourself a product that will be effective selling a product, or not. You may need to alter your look, gain weight, tone up or change your hair to be more marketable. Make sure you remember on thing; you won't be right for every job no matter what you do.

If you want to be a plus size model, you do need to consider that there are different kinds of plus size modeling and different markets for different sizes. Here is an interesting guide to some of the different markets and needs for plus size models.

Plus Size Lingerie Modeling: Really good plus size lingerie models are hard to find. Not only are companies and agencies looking for well proportioned and sexy women from sizes 10 to 18, they are also looking for toned, curvy bodies that will really make their photos pop! In many cases, a lingerie photo shoot will also be different than that of a catalog or fashion shoot. They may want sensual, sexy or even playful moods and you need to be comfortable with your body and your sexuality to project the right feelings.

Plus size catalog photo shoots for clothing are very different than plus size lingerie modeling. Most companies are looking for plus size models that are from sizes 10 to 18 with well proportioned bodies, pretty faces and positive, professional attitudes. Since plus size clothing is designed to flatter fuller figures, you may not have to worry about being as toned as for plus size lingerie. In many cases, these shoots are more about smiling, laughing, and being active. If you are modeling plus size swimwear or active-wear, you may need to have a more toned physique.

Plus size fashion shoots will always favor the prepared. Although you may or may not be showing a lot of skin, couture plus size fashion will fit better and look better if you are well toned and filling out the clothes in all the right places. Additionally, high fashion is frequently made of higher end silks and satins which are less forgiving than cottons and knits. With strong abs and smooth lines that show off your gorgeous curves, a fashion house or magazine will be far more likely to book you again.

Finally, different geographic markets call for different sized plus size models. For instance, the UK market favors sizes 12 and 14, American client's book specific sizes anywhere from 10 to 18 while the Italian market targets sizes 12 to 16. Markets like South America are just introducing plus models while the German market still favors sizes 8 to 12.

One unifying factor is certainly attitude. If you are a go getter who arrives at every shoot upbeat and prepared to work, you are more likely to be a successful plus size model. The plus size models that realty stand out are always well groomed and ready to slip into whatever role they are called on to perform. Whether portraying a confident business woman or a sexy siren the most successful plus size models glow with inner confidence. The best plus models know that they are sexy and beautiful because of their curves, not in spite of them.

Successful people have followed certain strategies or models to achieve successes. Whether they are athletes, who always perform at the highest level, or businessmen who own titan companies, or salesmen who always exceed their sales targets every month, what make them achieve all these successes?

For every outcome that is produced, it is a result of an action. To achieve success, one may need to take a lot of different actions so as to find out what is the best action that will produce the best outcome.

Everyone can achieve what they want if they find out what are the exact strategies or actions that successful role models of their desired industry did. By finding out what they did, and applying the same action, you will be able to produce similar results. It will save you the most precious asset of your life, which is time.

You will not need to spend the time on trial and error to find out the right action to take, if you model somebody who has already found it.

We have been subconsciously modeling people since we were young. When we are babies, we tend to model how our parents walked, and we transformed ourselves from the days of crawling to walking. If a child finds that his or her father is very righteous and responsible, the child will most probably adopt the same characteristics of his father when he or she grows up.

If you're a writer, and even if you've yet to sell a word, you know you're a writer. Many writers know who they are from a young age, as soon as they realize that someone writes the stories they love to read. With other writers, the love of writing, and the knowledge that they're a writer, sneaks up on them.

So here you are, a newly minted freelance writer, and of course you write, but now you want to sell your writing. As we discussed in Part One of the this article, the fundamental of freelance writing is that people make money from your words. For those people to make money from your words, the words you hope to sell must be in a certain form - a novel, a screenplay, a white paper, a Yellow Pages advertisement, a Web site - your buyers buy a bunch of words in some form or other.

The Key To Form: Audience And Response

The key to any form, is AUDIENCE and RESPONSE. As with most of the fundamentals of freelance writing, most writers write for years without becoming aware of this bedrock requirement. I managed to write successfully for at least a decade without having a clue about what I was doing. Had I learned audience/ response earlier, I'm sure I would have had an easier time of both writing and selling my writing.

Always keep audience/ response in the back of your mind. It applies to everything you write, and ensuring that your writing is laser-targeted to audience/ response ensures that any piece of writing sells.

When a piece of writing isn't working, the clue is often in audience/ response. For example, let's say you've written a mystery novel. You try to sell it, but it's rejected. You remember audience/ response. OK, the audience is people who love mysteries - they love working out puzzles. The response required is for them to read to the end of the novel by continually finding clues and solutions. Understanding this, you revise your novel. You discover how to create characters with secrets and a great mystery puzzle by modeling six mystery novels, then you create another outline for your own. When you've finished, each character in the novel has a secret for the reader to discover, and a greatly enhanced primary puzzle. Your novel sells.

Tip: Write It Down - Who's The Audience? What's The Required Response?

Don't try to keep audience/ response in your head. It doesn't work. Write it down. Stick audience/ response on your computer monitor where you can see it.

You can write in any form by modeling examples of the form. You model by: collecting examples, outlining those examples, and writing practice outlines of those models.

Modeling A Form: Collect Examples, Outline Them, And Create Practice Outlines

A "model" is defined as a "system or thing, used as an example to follow or imitate".

Modeling a form works for everything you want to write. It works for novels, articles, advertisements, nonfiction books: whatever the form, find examples, and outline them. Then create your own practice outlines for your current project in that particular form.

Yes, this is a lot of work. However, it's work that you must do. Nowadays, editors don't edit - they don't have time. They expect that your article or book will be pretty much in its final form. If you're writing copy, it's also vital that you model what works (copywriters keep "swipe" files of models so they can copy forms), because your clients are counting on you.

Modeling isn't copying, per se. You're not copying words. You're copying form, structure, and voice.

I know many writers who baulk at this kind of analysis. If this is you, you can shorten the process. For example, let's say you want to write an article for a magazine. Collect six issues of the magazine. Read all the articles. Then find six example articles of the kind of article you want to write. Read those examples several times each, with close attention. Make some notes for yourself, thinking about why certain headlines were used (write this down - writing something down fixes it in your mind). Count the number of words in each article. Count the anecdotes, and count the number of people quoted. Now write your own article.

Strategy is futuristic business thinking about present business challenges and future opportunities. The strategic technique effective for this is a "model" of how one's company now operates but should change to operate in the future-a "strategic business model." A strategic model of a business of a corporation summarizes the future policies of the business that will prepare it to perform in the future. Six different kinds of generic business models that can be used in strategy are summarized.

A business model is an abstraction of a business identifying how that business profitably makes money. Business models are abstracts about how inputs to an organization are transformed to value-adding outputs. All models of organizations are models of a kind of"open system" (Betz, 1968); one important version of this is the now famous "value-added" model of Michael Porter (1981). As summarized in Exhibit 1, a value-adding open-system model of an organization is described as taking resources from its environment and transforming these to value-added outputs sold back into its market environment. The transformation of input resources into output products/services is performed by the processes and operations of the business. The Porter model is only one of several kinds of business models one can use in strategic planning.

Strategic thinking about how a business now makes money and how it must change to continue making money is the bottomline for strategic management. For example, in thinking about the future capabilities of an organization, Clayton Christensen and Michael Overdorf (2000) emphasized the need to consider resources, processes, and values in an existing organization-- compared to the challenge of needed change. The resources of a business consist of tangible resources (such as its personnel, equipment, facilities, cash flows, location, etc.) and intangible resources (such as design capability, brand names, relationships to customers and suppliers, etc.). The processes of a business consist of the activities and procedures with which a business procures resources, adds value, and produces and sells products and services. Thus, issues about change also require asking questions such as, "What changes in processes and procedures are necessary to produce new kinds of value and/or address the needs of new kinds of customers?" The value dimension of an organization (sometimes called "corporate values") is the standard by which management and other employees set priorities and judge the importance of activities and results. A strategic business model is a systematic list of the policies that will guide the future specification of inputs, outputs, processes, and values of the complete operations of the business of the corporation.

The importance of conceiving a good business model was emphasized by the experience of the many new companies (dot.coms) begun in the Internet growth years of 1996-2000. Hundreds of dot.coms were begun with extensive venture capital funding, and many without having a viable business model. Then in the year 2000, over 125 of these companies folded as they ran out of capital and had not yet become profitable (and found new financing difficult to achieve). The often-repeated moral then was that a good business model is necessary for profitability and survival.

Traditionally, many strategy texts have used a variety of strategy analysis techniques for formulating strategy alternatives (i.e., David, 2001). Some examples of these are: Threats-- Opportunities-Weaknesses-Strengths (TOWS) matrix, Strategic Position andAction Evaluation (SPACE) matrix, Boston Consulting Group (BCG) matrix, Internal-External (IE) matrix, Grand Strategy (GS) matrix. While these techniques are useful for emphasizing different views on strategic choice, they do not provide the bottomline of strategy-a specific model of how the business should operate in the future-the strategic business model. Accordingly, for a modern strategy process, the concept of the strategic business model should be used as the analytical baseline of the strategy process.

Business Models

As shown in Exhibit 2, a generic business model can be constructed with inputs and outputs to the business. There are four major kinds of inputs and outputs useful to construct a business model, and these are resources, sales, profits, and capital. Resources and sales provide the issues for the direct production transformations of a business operation. For example, in manufacturing operations, material resources are manufactured into physical products for sale. In service operations, requests for services are transacted into service sales. Profits and capital measure the value of the business operations. Profit is a measure of business efficiency-the difference between prices and costs of sold products/services. Capital is a measure of the asset value of the business-the difference between equity and liabilities.

In this paper, an overview of different analytic queueing models for traffic on road networks is presented. In the literature, it has been shown that queueing models can be used to adequately model uninterrupted traffic flows. This paper gives a broad review on this literature. Moreover, it is shown that the developed published methodologies (which are mainly single node oriented) can be extended towards queueing networks. First, an extension towards queueing networks with infinite buffer sizes is evaluated. Secondly, the assumption of infinite buffer sizes is dropped leading to queueing networks with finite buffer sizes. The impact of the buffer size when comparing the different queueing network methodologies is studied in detail. The paper ends with an analytical application tool to facilitate the optimal positioning of the counting points on a highway.

1. Introduction and Motivation

Congestion is a function of the number of vehicles on the road, showing the need for well-performing traffic models that capture this specific relationship. Traffic Hows are usually modelled empirically: speed and How data are collected for a Sj)(1CiHc road and econometrically fitted into curves, i.e.. the spoed-How-donsity diagrams (Daganzo, 1997). Alternatively, (mainly supported by the increasing computer performance), one may use simulation to model traffic Hows [e.g., leading to the wellknown car-following models, see Transportation Research Board (1996); Zhang and Kim (2005)]. Th(1Se approaches are however limited in terms of predictive power and sensitivity analysis. Moreover, these techniques are highly data-dependent and (computer) time-dependent and as such, not directly applicable in the decision process of various policy makers (Jain and MacGregor Smith, 1997).

As an alternative to these methodologies, analytical models based on queueing theory could be used to model traffic flows. This review paper intends to give an overview of the different efforts in the relevant traffic flow literature where queueing models are used. The contributions of this paper are twofold:

First, the methodology to model road networks using analytical queueing models is reviewed in detail. The current methodology is however mostly limited to single node analysis, i.e., single stage queueing models. As in practice traffic passes through a multitude of nodes, the extension towards network models is necessary. In this paper, it is proposed that a road network can be represented as a queueing network where vehicles spend time. This time spent is dependent upon the occupation of the road network, i.e., a high occupation or traffic intensity will lead to more time en route. Consequently, the performance indicators of the queueing networks will be used to determine the time on the road. Note that the term congestion will be used here in a strictly queueing theory sense meaning more than one customer in the system leading to traffic intensity strictly larger than zero. When considering getting stuck in traffic (stand still), the term traffic jam will be used.

Secondly, in the late 1990s, more and more vehicle detectors have been installed throughout the world to record the passing of vehicles (Newell, 2002; Ehlert et ai, 2005). Mostly, the decision concerning the location of the detector is arbitrarily (e.g., near an off-ramp or on-ramp). Based on the insights obtained from the literature on finite versus infinite queueing networks applied to traffic environments, a policy tool is developed to determine the optimal positions of the vehicle detectors on highways. The tool i)roi)osed in this paper determines, based on the expected traffic intensity, the optimal number and the best, locations for the different detectors to adequately monitor traffic.

This paper is organized as follows. First, in Sec. 2, a broad literature review on queueing models applied to traffic flows is presented. Based on the latter, an extension in the direction of queueing network analysis for traffic networks is presented. It is split up into two major paths depending upon the buffer size: nodes having an infiniti! buffer size (Sec. 3.1) or nodes having a finite buffer size (Sec. 3.2). The developed models (networks with infinite and finite buffer size) are compared with each other and differences are evaluated (Sec. 4). In Sec. 5. a tool (based on the elaborated queueing analysis) to determine the optimal places of the different counting points on the road is presented. Then, future research opportunities are discussed (Sec. 6). The last section concludes this review.

2. Literature Overview

In this paper, traffic How models based on queueing theory are considered. The following subsections explain the basic concepts in detail and give relevant references. The interested reader on the history of traffic flow theory in general, is referred to, e.g., Newell (2002) or Daganzo (1997).

It started in 1950 when a next-door neighbor, who was a technical representative for LTV, gave John Heyde's wife a blue-colored model of the Regulus I missile. A 1957 graduate of the Naval Academy who earned his wings a year later, Heyde was naturally inclined to admire things that fly. Although he didn't realize it at the time, the acquisition of the Regulus ignited in Heyde what became a life-long avocation collecting aircraft models, most of military planes. These were not the kit type, but the already assembled desk-top versions favored by defense contractors. The collection grew steadily over the years, propelled by Heyde's unending enthusiasm and quest for models.

"I was not a dealer," said Heyde, "I would trade model for model now and then but primarily I was a collector. I had a number of duty tours in the Washington D.C. area and in my visits to various offices I would see a display model on someone's desk or shelf and simply ask for it with the intent to display the collection for others to enjoy."

CDR Heyde retired in 1977 after logging over 3,400 hours, mostly in P2V Neptunes. While on active duty he became an aeronautical engineering duty officer, earned an MS in astronautics from the Air Force institute of Technology, an MBA from the Harvard Business School, served in the Bureau of Weapons (NAVAIRSYSCOM) and was a DoD staff member for the National Aeronautics and Space Council at the White House. His final tour was as Deputy to the Director of Defense Research & Engineering (DDR@ In the course of these assignments, he had the opportunity to visit many aviation-oriented offices where more often than not people were willing to turn over models to him. Moreover, after retiring from the Navy he worked a full second career as Executive Vice President in charge of all Washington D.C. operations for the Astro-Tech company, an aeronautical type organization. He retired for good in August.

"The collection expanded and in time I had gathered models representing just about every aircraft, American and foreign, which had flown in the last several decades. I asked various foreign embassies to assist and they supplied models. The Japanese and Swedes were particularly helpful. Mostly, I acquired the models through direct personal contact in the various offices I visited or worked in as part of my regular duties."

Importantly, as the collection expanded, Heyde held exhibits of the models at the Army Navy Club in Washington D.C. which were exceptionally well received. The acquisitions steadily increased.

"I was honored by the son of Walter Diehl, who gave me his personal collection," said Heyde. "His father was a legendary BuAer engineer and figured importantly in the development of early Naval aircraft. George Spangenberg and Hal Andrews, NAVAIRSYSCOM stalwarts and Honorary Naval Aviators 12 and 22, also assisted as did so many others. Indeed, I spent my last two active duty years in the Pentagon and averaged collecting a model a day in that time."

Here's the shocker. The John Heyde collection reached an astounding 2,400 aircraft, and virtually every model was and remains in mint condition!

So vast was his aerial armada that virtually every nook and cranny of the Heyde's Northern Virginia home was used to accommodate the models. The attic, garage and closets functioned as homespun hangars. The benign ultimatum from his patient spouse was inevitable and came in 1984 when Cynnie said. "One more model and I'm out of here!"

Heyde contacted Tim Wooldridge, a retired Navy captain working at the National Air and Space Museum, and asked if NASM would be interested in taking over the collection. Officials examined the models and were delighted with the offer. Consequently, the 2,400 were carefully measured and logged - a laborious but happy chore - and officially transferred to museum custody.

At this writing, the majority of the models are in storage at the museum's Paul Garber Restoration (Silver Hill) Facility in Maryland. A large glass case enclosing over a 100 of them is on display there but the rest are protected by plastic covering and are carefully arranged on sturdy metal racks over eight feet high in a warehouse at Silver Hill. Others are packaged in huge boxes bearing the Heyde name, awaiting ultimate shipment to the Dulles extension of the Museum (see photo of VADM Engen and the facility elsewhere in this issue). Another group resides in the National Air and Space Museum itself and can be viewed by appointment as they are not on the museum floor.

John Heyde is a lifetime member and avid supporter of ANA and the Navy - one of his two daughters is a commander in the Nurse Corps and carrying on the Heyde military tradition. He remains close to the collection in mind and spirit. Last August he contributed a model of the C130J Hercules and examined the Silver Hill portion of the collection for the first time in years.

"I am immensely pleased the models have found a caring home at the National Air and Space Museum. When I visited them recently, I was thrilled to see they are being maintained like rare gems. Of course, to me, they are.

The Texas Water Development Board on October 26 announced the completion of its project, mandated by the 77th Legislature (2001), to develop or obtain groundwater availability models (GAM's) for all of the major aquifers of Texas. All of the models, reports, and support data are available at the TWDB website - www.twdb.state.tx.us/gam - or by request from the Board.

The Legislature funded the GAM program to develop numerical groundwater flow models to help groundwater conservation districts, regional water planning groups, and others assess current groundwater availability and the effect of pumping and drought on the state's groundwater resources. New models developed via the GAM process also had substantial stakeholder involvement. Some of the GAM's represent the first water modeling of any kind in the area.

TWDB staff developed five of the models - the Hill Country segment of the Trinity Aquifer; the northern and San Antonio segments of the Edwards Aquifer; the southern part of the Gulf Coast Aquifer; and the Edwards-Trinity (Plateau) and Cenozoic Pecos Alluvium Aquifers.

TWDB contractors developed eight of the models - the northern and southern parts of the Ogallala Aquifer; the northern, central, and southern parts of the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer; the Seymour Aquifer; the northern segment of the Trinity Aquifer; and the Barton Springs segment of the Edwards Aquifer. TWDB staff and a contractor jointly developed a model of the central Gulf Coast Aquifer.


The Board and Harris-Galveston Coastal Subsidence District funded a project for the U.S. Geological Survey to develop a model of the northern part of the Gulf Coast Aquifer. El Paso Water Utilities and the U.S. Geological Survey supported development of models for the Mesilla and Hueco Bolson Aquifers. The Edwards Aquifer Authority is developing a new model for the San Angonio segment of the Edwards Aquifer that will be available by the end of 2004.

Lets start with some definitions first :

Business : The occupation, work, or trade in which a person is engaged: e.g. the wholesale food business.

Process : A series of actions, changes, or functions bringing about a result: e.g. the process of digestion; the process of obtaining a driver’s license.

Model : A schematic description of a system, theory, or phenomenon that accounts for its known or inferred properties and may be used for further study of its characteristics: e.g. a model of generative grammar;

“cited from : process. (n.d.). The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Retrieved April 30, 2007, from Dictionary.com website”

So Business Process Modelling can be defined as a schematic representation of activities and functions performed by an organization to achieve success in their trade and services offered to the market and customers.

I am sure that there would be a lot of gaps in above definition, if we attempt to make it complete but one thing can be inferred clearly : For a Business to go about doing its business and provide the right services and products to its customer, its understanding and control on how they perform and operate is essential and infact in current age, a competitive edge.

Hence, Business Process Modeling can be viewed as a very critical activity both from a business and technology perspective. The reasons for doing process modelling can be many, but we can outline the same into following:

Process Documentation : Need for organization to document their business processes Process Improvement Exercise: Organizations looking for performing an analysis of current processes and how the same can be improved. Process modeling here would be just a part of the approach in this case. Typically a BPI activity would involve analysis of current as-is process, refinement of processes based on six sigma, lean etc. and coming out with a revise To-BE process. Enterprise Systems Implementation : Though some might call it a myopic view to process modeling, however traditionally and even today many organizations have carry out process modeling work before implementation of major IT system for e.g. ERP, CRM, Order Management systems etc. This definetely is a wise choice considering that most of the enterprise systems being deployed has an impact on how you perform your business going forward. Again details of best practices in this space can be a separate discussion itself. Especially the discussion around need for doing process modeling/analysis first or choosing the systems and then pursuing process modeling. I had a discussion with one of my clients once in which it was latter and my fundamental question was now will you change your process for the system or vice versa and whether the whole choice of the system would have been different if they already had an idea of their processes which needed automation help. Anyways there are pitfalls both sides.

Enterprise Architecture : Many organizations have a separate Enterprise Architecture practices and one area of EA is Process/Business Architecture. So organizations do carry out process modeling work as a standalone aspect to achieve a decent view. However in this case process modeling could be a very abstract representation of processes due to the high level view typically required from EA viewpoint. Organizations could go into details, but in my experience its not easy to get funding for doing Process modeling work just as a project without linking it to some specific business related project/budget. Thats a pity, sometimes as EA teams can add real value given the resources to do detailed analysis of Enterprise’s architecture. Infact with SOA becoming essential approach within many EA teams, I think process modeling in detail provide greater value and help in identifying the correct service mapping.

BPM : Process modeling is also the starting point for a Business Process Management projects. Typically BPM tools will provide their own modeling tools, so care must be taken to identify the need for process modeling. Whether it should be only for the particular BPM projects or its maintained in some bigger/central process repository. I prefer a central Process repository for all process models for e.g. in tools like Telelogic system architect, aris, case wise etc. and picking out process for BPM implementations from central repository or better still create BPEL from the process models directly. However this aspect of product integration is not the most mature and care is needed before use.

Ok, I am sure there are many more benefits of process modeling and I would get time later to elaborate in other articles/blogs. Lets move into some aspects of how to build better process models. Some of the pre-requisites for process modeling are as follows:

1) People: You need to have good skills within the team from various perspectives, you need good business analysts to undertand what needs to be modeled and engage with business users accordingly. You also need a good scribe or modeler who understands how to map the requirements into models. As we are limiting it to modeling space, you may not require people with six sigma, lean,simulation skills though they would take part at appropriate phase in analysis.

2) Tools : you would need appropriate tools to model the business processes. It could start with basic word processing tools like word, move into graphic tools like visio to sophisticated tools like aris, system architect. Choice of tools would depend on requirements and objectives for modeling and obviously other factors like cost, skill sets etc. I personally feel that modeling efforts in tools like word and visio is a myopic view to modeling and processes are assets of any organizations and should be available centrally to be updated constantly. You should consider a repository based tool which supports standard modeling and reporting techniques to provide long term benefits.

3) Standards : Its very essential for an organization to choose and follow a common methodology for process modelling. We have over the years used multiple methods for process modeling like flow charts, petri-nets, Event based process charts and now with new standards like Business Process Modeling notations ( http://www.bpmn.org ), the choice is much simpler. A standard based approach allows a common ground for process understanding and discussion which can be a nightmare otherwise. In my experience I have seen companies using a pot-pouri of process techniques, some which are home grown with different symbols and color combinations meaning different things to different departments in the same company. The issues become manifold when you try to come out with cross-functional process maps based on proprietary notations. So in my opinion organizations should consider formalizing on a process modeling standard before starting any major modeling exercise.

So as we can see its process modeling is an important step in providing a clearer picture to a business regarding the activities they perform and also through analysis the impact it has on its business and underlying infrastructure. The business has to play an important role in sponsoring initiatives supporting process modeling and architecture especially when embarking on a BPM/SOA journey.

Kapil Pant has 8+ years of experience in pre-sales, business analyst, solution architect, and EA consulting role.

Core experience in Consulting on Enterprise Architecture and BPM with a strong understanding of leading EA frameworks viz. Zachman, TOGAF, eTOM & SID etc. Kapil is currently engaged in BPM consulting wrt Business Process Management workshops, BPMS tools study and recommendations, BPM Architecture, implementation and governance consulting.

A Case for Simulation

Companies practicing Lean Six Sigma without process modeling and simulation techniques need to consider what these practices can provide in terms of risk-analysis and decision-making (such as cost estimating, scheduling, resource allocation, engineering design, etc.) by modeling the probabilistic behavior of a system, process or service.

Specifically process modeling and simulation can accomplish the following:

• Predict performance of current processes against effectiveness, readiness and cost to determine areas of significant improvement potential

• Enable rapid analysis in situations with either extensive data or no data

• Provide an understanding of why key factors have the highest impact on results and where to focus efforts

• Meet quality objectives by determining optimal specifications and tolerances

• Communicate findings in a simple, highly visual manner

Why companies don't practice Process Modeling:

The most common reasons companies restrict the use of process modeling and simulations involve cost, timing, safety concerns, lack of simulation/modeling experienced resources, and/or unavailable or lack of skills in using modeling and simulation tools.

One of the greatest complaints we hear from senior managers is "projects are successfully completed, but I'm not seeing a significant change to the bottom line." That's because in the Define stage of (DMAIC), Lean Six Sigma experts don't have enough information to quantify the benefits. They are predicting a bottom line financial benefit without truly understanding how the process behaves, let alone how it would behave after the change. Without seeing the big picture you may complete a successful Lean Six Sigma project and see no impact in dollars for your organization. There is a better way. With process modeling you create a simple simulated model of the process. You will visually see which projects will affect the total output, and which will sub-optimize the system.

For example, Figure 1 shows that "Judy," as secretary, has a job that is currently taking 20 minutes and requires 20 additional minutes of transportation. The Value Stream map process captures the variation in the time it takes her to complete a task, ranging from 15 to 120 minutes, with an average of 60 minutes. It also shows that Judy has the longest queue time of 240 minutes.

Why Practice Process Modeling:

Process modeling and simulation can be invaluable in situations where the construction of a real world model is infeasible. Process modeling helps to visualize a proposed system, facility layout, or other process change. It can help answer "what if" questions and scenarios within a given confidence level. Process Modeling and simulation can often demonstrate the effectiveness (or lack of) of a new design or process through the exploring the implications of operational changes and the investigation of the impact of changes in the marketplace.

Key advantages of integrating Lean Six Sigma phases (DMAIC) with process modeling:

• Overall interdependencies in process. The standard Lean Six Sigma toolbox has no way of showing the interdependencies between one area of the process and another. In complex change initiatives where there are interdependencies between processes, when incidents happen that cause delays, bottlenecks, variability, etc., if you can't show the interdependencies, understanding the system and resolving issues is very difficult. If you can't understand the system and pinpoint the waste and bottlenecks, changing the system could be risky and typically does not provide the desired results. A simulated model shows those interdependencies, which allows for the uncovering of changes that will affect the overall system

• Risk free experimentation. It is proven that real-time experiments are costly and can have an enormous negative impact on the system. If you are experimenting with a simulated model of the system, the only cost is setting up the experiment and reviewing the results. There are no negative impacts to system output or to the morale of the workforce in trying new process experiments. You can change the parameters, run various scenarios and if the desired outcome is not achieved, you can pinpoint the root causes, all the while gathering more information about system behavior - without any disruption to the real system.

• Reduced experimentation time. You can run hundreds of experiments a day rather than hundreds of days per experiment. Many processes have a cycle time of weeks or even months. Running enough replications of an experiment to validate the results can be overwhelming. With a simulated model, you can run as many computer simulations as you want and develop plans based upon the review of results.

• Impact of change on the existing process. Processes that achieve the goal of Lean Six Sigma (or a high sigma quality level) fall out of specification if the volumes change. For example, a 50% change to incoming calls to a call center may cripple a customer-oriented sales process. Planning for change in your system by using a simulated model to understand the effects of volume change, product stream substitution, staffing policy or other changes can significantly reduce project risks and the associated costs.