How many times did you / have you said …
“This is my final revision of my track plan!” before it ACTUALLY was?
And then the obvious follow up question…
How much did it change from that as you built it?
Myself, 22 or 23 revisions, and then it became an ever evolving project as construction forged ahead. I had time for planning though, since the room it was going to be in was a year from being built when I started planning.
So how about you?
If you take a look at my blog (link in signature below), you will see that I am starting the benchwork before I have roughed in anything other than the mainline on the track plan. Needless to say, I am planning on the track plan evolving quite a bit as I move forward (of course I will need to pretty much stay within the physical confines of any benchwork that I build). Jamie
My SCHEME is set in stone, and has been for 40 years.
My TRACK PLAN is set in un-hardened Jell-o. It gets finalized when I bend flex track, establish specialwork geometry and hand-lay the accepted design.
The final revision will be established when I toss my spiking pliers and three point gauges into the trash can and say, “That’s it. Tracklaying is DONE!”
Or, more likely, when they cart my cold, stiff carcass to the morgue.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
There is a saying among writers…
Written works are never finished, they are merely abandoned.
I’ve learned that this applies also to track plans.
I’ve never said that. And judging by the pile of used pencil erasers on my drawing board, its a good thing I didn’t! [(-D]
George
I’m with Jamie. I built the benchwork and said “OK. I need a yard here.” Then I needed a yard lead. Then I needed some street running, and oh, I need the mainline and passing siding here…
In other words, it just kinda grew. maybe someday I’ll get the track plan (or a reasonable facsimile thereof) drawn up in Xtrac
Tom
To me, those are the layouts that are the most fun.
Best!
I drew up the trackplan for the Yuba River Sub full-scale on butcher paper, laid it out on the garage floor, then built the benchwork.
Any resemblance to the finished layout and the original trackplan turned out to be PURELY co-incidental, LOL!
Tom [:P]
pc:
Track planning was one of many areas where I got bogged down in the overthinking pit, so after making a bunch of plans I just threw them all over the fence and made a very simple plan, entered it in one of Chip’s contests, and laid it with loose snap track, then used that as an analog trackplan computer. I ran trains a while, rearranged stuff, ran trains a bit more, etc. I still haven’t done the final revision. I still want to rearrange the spurs in one town a little. But at least I got to the point where I could nail it down.
So, yes, I made lots and lots of changes.