Basement Layout: Possible Themes

In the interest of keeping an open mind about things, I thought it would be worthwhile to do a little brainstorming about possible themes for the layout.  Ultimately, the "vision" picture I posted previously could apply to any theme.  I know for certain I'm going to have 2 main towns, 1 small down, and 2 online industries at least.  Where they're located and what they do are really flexible.

In any case, here were some possible themes I came up with...

Theme	Prototype Influences
Southern, Backwoods: Imagine a slow, country vibe while steamers pull short trains through winding trails into small-time towns. Lots of green trees with an occasional granite rock outcropping or cliff. Equipment is old and rusty. It's 1947 and the war has passed but the frugality imposed by wartime rationing has left people keeping old items and fixing them when they break instead of buying the latest and greatest -- that and the only freight source into town is the train, and it don't bring no new cars with it.	East Tennessee & Western North Carolina ("Tweetsie"), Argent Lumber
Snowy, Rugged: Imagine a working the trains in 10 degrees below while tall mountains tower above and the threat of a snow drift is around every corner. It's snow so much you had to build snow covers over several key railroad features. Back in town cargo comes in from a huge 3-mast schooner, then it slowly pulled up a steep grade into the mountains. Survival is just as much a priority as delivering the freight.	White Pass & Yukon
Mountains to Desert Transition: Imagine a dry, dusty, flat terrain at a lower elevation that pulls several frameless tank cars uphill towards a lush mountain town then turns around to bring down a handful of different minerals being mined all over the mountain. Somehow this little steam line has escaped being diesel-ized. It doens't make enough money to replace the diesel but it's the only train that comes 'round these parts so we gotta keep it. Traffic interchanges in the desert with a standard gauge via a shared freight house.	Nevada County Narrow Gauge, Southern Pacific Narrow Gauge (Carson & Colorado)
Dusty, "Rattlesnake", Desert: It's hot. Really hot. 115º hot. Just keeping the rails from curling up in the noon sun is a challenge enough, yet we've got to haul this freight across the desert to the po-dunk towns of mineral booms gone by. The train travels for miles looking at nothing but dust and tumble weeds before pulling into a small town every now and then. Water is a must and 2 water cars are packed on each train, just in case the local water tower has dried up.	Death Valley Railroad, Baby Gauge Railroad, Southern Pacific Narrow Gauge (Carson & Colorado)
Coastal Pacific: That cool ocean breeze hits the sea-going passengers smoothly in the face as they step off of the passenger car parked on the railroad's 500-foot long wharf. When the line isn't towing passengers to and fro hotels and ships, seafood freight is the name of the game. Each small town is packed with docks, lobster traps, clamming operations, and fishing boats supplying a constant stream of packed seafood waiting to be shipped out to a larger consumer base.	Ilwaco Railway
Coastal Atlantic: Same as the above, but with more light houses.	Wiscasset, Waterville & Farmington

Those are all the typical ones, but stretching things a bit (which usually means introducing some fun-factor), here are some really out-there themes which could be turned into somewhat believable prototypes:

Theme	Prototype Influences
Mexican: South of the border and quite lawless. This train is doing good to make 1 round trip without getting robbed. It's been built on all recycled material which has come down from the United States. It's mixed/matched fleet of equipment barely keeps the line alive as it pulls from shanty town to shanty town.	Ferrocarril de Rio Mantanas (by Malcom Furlow)
Cuban: Same as the above, but with a huge scoop of french architecture thrown in.	???
South Pacific: I had this idea quite a while back for a railroad that was set in Palau in the South Pacific. The idea is that Palau was used as a WW2 staging point and when the war was over the military literally just left, leaving a tropical island with WW2 artifacts wasting away in the jungle and ocean (see here for examples). This fictitious line would be set against the backdrop of tropical Palau, however the twist would be the era is the late 1950's to the early 1960's and the railroad is run by mostly abandoned-then-converted military equipment. Because of the strong connection with military equipment, this theme would be ideal to build in 1:35n2. Why? Because most of the military plastic models out there are offered in 1:35 scale, giving this railroad a lot of options for kitbashing things together. This is probably my most unique idea and, at least I feel, the most original to myself because I've never seen anything quite like it. It's tempting to do for the sole factor of it being "mine" and pioneering this concept. The difficult part will be coming up with industries that make it believable (ie. something other than sugar cane).	???
Chinese Mining: Lots of lush, bamboo forests penetrated by towering tall stone bridges just wide enough to carry the train. It's the late 1980's but we're still running on steam power. Open markets and bicycles about.	???
Japanese: Similar to above, but set in an earlier time period, perhaps with the more stylized japanese roof designs. I'm not sure what the purpose of this line would be, but it could likely be something interesting.	???

After taking the time to write all that out, the 2 stand-outs to me are the Snowy, Rugged and South Pacific.  I feel both are very interesting themes that haven't been overdone a million times -- Sidenote: notice the lack of "Colorado" themes in my list?  Nothing wrong with it, I just want to see something new.  Both will need some research to measure feasibility.  The 1:35n2 South Pacific is the most tempting however, because it seems the most freelanced, the most open to new things, and the most unique to me (as in, I didn't come up with that idea by seeing someone else's layout I liked).  Hmmm... lots to think about.