CLW originally began operation in mid 2001, soon after the release of Microsoft Train Simulator. Unfortunately, the organization's popularity, the determination to offer products at no cost, and the rising cost of internet bandwidth caused the organization to cease operations in late 2001.

Cameron Lashley, the lead developer of CLW, soon joined forces with TrainArtisan, where he worked on additional products for MSTS with other leading developers from the MSTS community. TrainArtisan was fortunate to be involved with Microsoft in the development of additional products for MSTS, including the MSTS 1.2 update to the simulator. TrainArtisan was also heavily involved in the development of the original (and ultimately ill-fated) MSTS 2 project.

The development of MSTS-Bin has greatly extended the life of MSTS. CLW feels it is more important than ever to produce high quality products for MSTS, and make certain that users of MSTS have access to the finest add-on products available. The CLW website was re-launched in late 2004 to continue work on MSTS products.

For news updates, please make sure to check back often, or visit the CLW Discussion and Support forums.

CLW's re-texturing policies

It is anticipated that many users may desire to re-texture CLW's products to their own preferences. This concern has been weighed against the need to protect the historic and artistic integrity of CLW's products, and technical considerations (i.e., download size). As such, the following policies has been instated:

• To reduce installation file sizes, source texture files will not be distributed with any CLW product.
• Source texture files will be released for some CLW products as downloadable support options, available for free download from the CLW website. Use of these source texture files will be strictly governed by a unique Terms and Conditions of Use Agreement.
• Source texture files for some CLW products will not be released. This is to help ensure that the product maintains its integrity. In most of these cases, CLW will offer interchangeable "skins" for these products as downloadable support options, available for free download from the CLW website.
• Specific retexturing policies are determined for individual CLW products. For information about the retexturing policy of a specific CLW product, see that product's Terms and Conditions of Use Agreement in the included README.DOC.
• The creator(s) of each CLW product retains all the rights to their creation(s).

Steps are taken during the design of CLW's products to help enforce the above policies.