I was not at York this year to ask...

How many sets of 2R wheels would have to be ordered to get WBB interested in making insulated 2R wheelsets for their 44 tonner? 

I think if WBB offered the wheelsets, but left the kadee coupler and electrical wiring as DIY, you'd sell more of these to 2Rer's now that MTH's model is not going to be released in 2R and will have an ugly floating pilot.

Also, the catalog art shows the Southern unit with the proper headlight markers...are these on the actual WBB model?

For DCC? They do.

NCE DCC has the D408SR decoder that does motor/lights only.  I used to team those up with a soundtraxx decoder and use the soundtraxx for sound.

I have moved onto using QSI Titan decoders.  Even the HO form factor can be handle the current drawn by most modern day models.  They make a large-scale version as well, but that's more than likely overkill and may not fit into certain locomotives.

There are other brands as well, but I don't know much about them and prefer the brands I mentioned above.