So like a lot of totally hopeless nerds, I am kind of mildly obsessed with trains. I always thought that it would make a good theme, the ball could represent a train and you could visit different Amtrak or Acela stations/destinations as modes. You could collect passengers. Like 'warp' progression in Star Trek, maybe ramp up to the Acela's max speed of 140 mph?

My retheme idea would center around a unique take on the DMD, replacing it with a Flipdots display
http://www.flipdots.com/custom-made-flip-dot-wall.html#projects
The flipdots are similar to what you see at train stations; the displays that announce arriving/departing trains. They make a satisfying 'click' when they refresh. I'm not sure what pin platforms are out there, haven't done research, but I'd prefer to do something high-level with a standard PC. I'd like to program the whole thing in C#/.NET if possible as its the language I am most versed in.

Spitballing on features/toys: Perhaps a z-scale or n-scale train that runs in the game/backbox? Diverters would be a cool feature like track switches.

Obviously, I am pretty far away from taking on a project like this, mostly because I am knee deep in my Taxi restore, but also because I lack a lot of the skills that would be important to a project like this. (I do not really have woodworking skills or graphic design skills) But maybe this winter or next year, who knows. So what does Pinside think? Cool idea? Totally lame?

If you live in the Northeast and have taken Amtrak, you might feel differently. I can go from Boston to New York in 3 1/2 hours, while having a beer, getting work done on my laptop, etc. There are lots of model railroaders, railfans in general that would disagree.

Besides, it wouldn't be a tax dollar sinkhole if the government hadn't spent billions of dollars building highways that basically put the railroads out of business. Imagine the major infrastructure to power your business (roads) was built basically for free as a public works project to put GIs to work after the war. Not like the railroads got their right-of-ways built for free. Trucks won because of politics.