This is just for fun, please be nice to each other!
How many people honestly feel they have the layout they envisioned?
Or, if you’re in-between layouts at the moment, do you think you will be able to honestly achieve the layout of your vision?
Or, if you want, talk about somebody else’s layout-- compare it to your own vision-- just be nice about it.
But I’m mostly interested in your opinions about your own layouts. The answer is largely subjective of course, if you envisioned a circle of track and a cardboard box for a tunnel and have built a basement empire, I’d say you exceeded your vision by quite a large margin! [:)]
But what was your original vision-- the impetus that started you on your journey? The layout in your head? Compared to what you built-- did you achieve your vision? Was it better than what you envisioned? Not quite? What compromises did you have to make? What compromises did you find you made unwittingly? Perhaps you achieved some of your vision brilliantly and other aspects not so much…?
Are your colors “right”? Did you get that “scenic bend in the tracks” just right? What about that “interesting rock outcropping”? Do all your industries switch just the way you had in mind? Does your backdrop “take you there”?
What about it-- is your layout the one you envisioned in your head?
I am currently rebuilding a layout that did not get to the scenery stage. It is being rebuilt into transportable modules to allow for a move in a few years.
Having been doing this model train thing for 40 years, and having been very happy with my previous efforts, I am sure the newest version of the layout will be exactly as I invision it.
I am a planner/designer by my nature and trade, as well as a reasonably accomplished craftsman. So, I know exactly what I want (and what I don’t want/need) and am building it.
I’ve completed Phase 1 of my layout, a 5x12 foot HO table. I’ve started Phase 2, a 19x2 1/2 foot extension, with a balloon on one end for turning.
The original layout came out pretty much as planned. I think I got the subways right, my water areas came out better than I’d hoped for, and I’ve had a lot of fun building and detailing structures.
It took a lot longer than I expected - about 5 years, where I’d naively assumed it would be more like one. On the other hand, I got more into it than I’d thought I would, and I spent a lot more time on scenery. The modeling has come to be the most important aspect of the hobby for me.
That may be a result of the layout design. While it’s not a bad rail-fanning layout, it leaves much to be desired for running and operations. No staging and limited industries leaves me running trains around with little for them to really do. But, this wasn’t in the original “vision,” because I just didn’t know any better back then. The goal of Phase 2 is to provide both staging and more industry, so we’ll see how well I’ve learned these lessons.
So far, I’d have to say that the Hudson Highlands RR looks in reality almost exactly as I had envisioned it in my mind before starting out on its construction. E-shaped in design, I’m currently in developing a Stage II, an extension of one leg of the E, which will create an additional urban center, plus facilities for a Hudson River-crossing carfloat operation. Having already gathered together many of the structures and associated material for this expansion, I anticipate that it too should evolve pretty much as I see it in my mind’s eye.
As to colors, I spent a considerable amount of time adjusting and re-adjusting the various hues on the existing portion of the layout to match local autumnal photographs, not quiting until I obtained what I feel was an exact match to local appearance. Regarding “interesting rock outcroppings”, I have one small scene that includes an exposed hillside of shale…constructed partially of small shards of actual local shale! Of my industrial sidings, all function well except one, where the track radius is a bit too tight and will eventually have to be reworked slightly. As to my backdrop “taking you there”, you decide from the image below.
Yeah, but you cheated-- you just cut out a chunk of the real thing, shrunk it down and stuck it on a board. And now you keep trying to pass it off as a model! [(-D] [bow] [(-D] [bow] [:D]
Have you given much thought as to how you’ll go about implementing your staging? And how do you think you might reconfigure your industries? Do you need more industries (quantity) or larger, better designed industries (improving what you have) ?
I am a lucky guy, my layout is still in the planning stage. I have just finished the track plan and I am now starting to make 3-D sketches for the various LDE´s on my layout.
This will be my last layout to build, so I try my best not to leave the result to chance, but to careful planning and execution.
My layout vision has changed as my interests have changed while it was still under construction.
My design philosophy: To be able to run big trains fast in DC mode. Single track mainline, folded dogbone along the wall layout gives the appearance of double track for part of the layout. Low maintenance (Kato Unitrack), few turnouts to minimize derailments. As many mainline turnouts placed in the trailing point position as possible–again, to minimize derailments. All turnouts #6 power routing (no blocks).
Since I don’t have room for massive amounts of trackage and I prefer the Southwestern US with its many miles of open country, the philosophy was thatless track would be more–and that hopefully the scenery as it gets completed slowly over the years (will not be cheap–not using inexpensive trees or shrubs, but the best looking I can get) will make up for the minimalist track plan. (I’m not at all a fan of the spaghetti bowl track design of years past).
I’m attempting to have scenes that just kinda blend into each other as regions of the Southwest and seasons change–but without having partitions. One side of one mountain will be a winter scene, the other Autumn in Utah in/near Echo Canyon, and the third scene (and roughly half the layout) desert, including an area of Saguaro Desert as in southern Arizona.
Having been to some of the neat red rock canyons and also the desert, I wanted to incorporate a little of both. I do have one neat orange rock formation with eroded lower sandy sides that for me captures the look I was shooting for. Maybe a professional artist could have done better (my wife thinks the orange is a bit bright–but in my opinion not too bright for late day or early morning sunlight) but I think it works and even the delivery guys from Sears were impressed with the l
One thing that’s worked out well for me is that, even after 22 years in HO, I still tend to think in O scale (having been an O scaler for the previous 15 years or so). A problem many folks have when doing sketches of their future layouts, planning trackwork etc. is that they tend to find they’ve crammed more track, buildings and scenery into an area than can possibly fit in the space. As an old O-scaler I tend to overestimate how big a building will be, how much room I need for say a double-track mainline etc., so when I actually start laying out everything I often find I have more room than I thought, so I can add things that I at first hadn’t thought of adding because I didn’t think I’d have the room.
I think in general I’ve been in the hobby long enough that my ideas tend to work out OK on the layout…plus I tend to do a lot of thinking and sketching before actually building anything. I find now it’s often not a matter of trying something and finding out it doesn’t work, as it is more “ya this works, but if I move this to here, it would work better”.
My layout is getting there. In fact, I’ve got a couple of mugs coming over tomorrow to start on the next big push, which will add some much needed staging, and some length to the main line run.
My original vision was to build an operations-based layout that showed the two primary traffic patterns of the Western Maryland Railway: The bridge route traffic of the Alphabet Route, and coal and ore movements. The layout itself would be a mainline with continuous run capabilities for the Alphabet Route, and a long branch line representing the Thomas Sub in West Virginia to be the source of the coal.
Alpha Jet westbound at North Junction
Coal loader at Shaw, West Virginia
I wanted to include Maryland Junction where the two lines converge, a good size division point yard, and plenty of staging, too, all of which I’ve got. The next project is to make improvements that will allow for longer train lengths, and more logical staging.
I’ve designed a long, 4-track double-ended staging yard. It’s set up so that I can use one of the tracks as a “through track” in a long loop. The addition also has a reverse loop. With the existing loop on the original layout, I can have continuous running either with “circular” or “out and turn around” looping. The staging yard will be visible, and with light scenery, so I can also use it as an operational yard. One track will be a long passenger station, something I also didn’t have room for in Phase 1.
I carefully measured the track paths, and added a long passing siding at a point directly opposite the existing passing siding on the original layout. This will give me the opportunity to run two trains in opposite directions with meets at the passing siding. Should be exciting.
I’ve planned a few more small, one-siding industries in the new section. I may move the reefer icing dock, or I may leave it where it is. The one big, complex new industry will be a car float terminal, which can serve both as a switching puzzle in itself and also as “casette staging” for introducing new rolling stock. Some buildings in the area will also serve as stand-alone industries when the car float is not in port.
My Santa Fe in Oklahoma was designed and construction started in 1983. It was designed to be two decks with a helix, ended up three decks with the additional deck underneath for staging and connected to the middle deck by a long hidden grade.
The layout is still generally the way I designed it today, with minor modifications, etc. mainly for operational and scenic changes. Otherwise, except for the conversion to Dynatrol from DC in the 80’s followed by NCE DCC in 1999-2000 it is unchanged. I had one critical switch, which was hidden, go bad which eliminated a 4 track staging yard that I deemed as not critical to operation, some track rearrangement in the Oklahoma City on the top deck and Enid on the middle deck. I still enjoy the layout as much as when I built it, and at my age, no plans to replace it. In short, I was very lucky, and I am enjoying the layout as much as ever.
For the most part, I can say that very definitely, what I have built so far is very much like what I had in mind from the beginning. My layout is about 3/4 scenicked and what I have looks very much like I envisioned when I first conceived it about 20 years ago. At the time, I had become disillusioned with the layout in my old home. It had a poor concept and the track plan evolved into what it was rather than the result of a good plan. While I had it up and running for a while, I lost interest in it and it pretty much sat idle for the last 10 years I was in my old house. During that time, I got the idea for the current layout, developed a track plan first in my head, then on paper with the idea of building it when I moved into my retirement home. When I made the decision to build that home rather than buy an existing one, I had the luxury of building a basement to fit the layout I had in mind rather than building the layout to fit the available space.
Now there have been minor changes to the original track plan. Some things just didn’t fit like they seemed to on paper. In other cases, I got better ideas. But the track plan and placement of industries is for the most part is what I originally had in mind. Some scenic features are modified from the original plan as well, again sometimes because something didn’t work or I got a better idea. The other modification is to the theme of the railroad. Originally I conceived an entirely freelanced railroad that would interchange with prototype railroads. After seeing some of the outstanding new locos that have come on the market in the last ten years and realizing I could never custom paint locos that would look anywhere near as good as the off the shelf stuff, I modified the story of my railroad to make it a subsidiary of the NYC which has trackage rights over the line. I’ve also invented reasons for running an occasional Pennsy or Erie train over the road. I would say I have moved to protolancing rather than a completely f
I decided to start over about a year ago and dissemble my 5’ x 9’ layout and build a layout around the wall. I have been reviewing track plans and have tried to piece together something that would make me happy. After getting the track laid out and running some trains I find it isn’t quite what I expected. It would be pretty boring to operate and with no real purpose.
I am amazed at how you guys come up with your ideas and are able to implement them to a working operation. I have spent a lot of time reading articles and looking at some great layout pictures but I just can’t seem to come up with the vision to complete an interesting layout.
CNJ821, what a great picture, would like to see more of your layout.
Sheldon, do you have any pictures of the layout you are planning? Would love to see what you are up to.
As I have recounted in past postings I am currently without a layout and, because of factors which I have also related, the only apparent solution to space limitation appeared to be for a portable layout of some fashion; I finally settled on a design utilizing a couple of platforms which would swing from vertical to horizontal alignmentl suspended in an A-frame.
This changed when my wife of five and a half years now evicted the tenant from her mobile home on the adjacent lot; I lay claim to the living-kitchen-middle bedroom area of this home and began fantasizing on a layout for this space. The wall between the bedroom and the living room was going to have to be removed giving me an area about 30 feet long and I have been designing a T-shaped layout to fit in this area. These plans have since come to naught; at about five hundred fifty per for rent/utilities this unit is just a little bit expensive for storage–which is all that it is being used for at this time. I can rent a storage locker for considerably less than that.
Like many others I have always fantasized about a Superdome-sized layout–well, not quite that big but you know what I mean . . . . . . . . . . something completely unworkable for anything other than a club layout. My current–and much more practical–fantasy is to build a 14 X 20 foot extension onto the front of my mobile home and appropriate about 11 X 20 feet of that area for my train room. I once built an N-Scale version of Westcott’s HO Railroad That Grows and I am giving serious thought to returning to that design; admittedly the track plan for that layout is not the most awe-inspiring in the world but it works, it lends itself readily to one’s individuality as far as scenery goes, and it provides for combination routing operation. The base of the railroad will be a 4.5 X 15 foot platform with a 4 X 4.5 foot and a 1.5 X 13 foot extension hanging off one end.
As I have recounted in past postings I am currently without a layout and, because of factors which I have also related, the only apparent solution to space limitation appeared to be for a portable layout of some fashion; I finally settled on a design utilizing a couple of platforms which would swing from vertical to horizontal alignmentl suspended in an A-frame.
This changed when my wife of five and a half years now evicted the tenant from her mobile home on the adjacent lot; I lay claim to the living-kitchen-middle bedroom area of this home and began fantasizing on a layout for this space. The wall between the bedroom and the living room was going to have to be removed giving me an area about 30 feet long and I have been designing a T-shaped layout to fit in this area. These plans have since come to naught; at about five hundred fifty per for rent/utilities this unit is just a little bit expensive for storage–which is all that it is being used for at this time. I can rent a storage locker for considerably less than that.
Like many others I have always fantasized about a Superdome-sized layout–well, not quite that big but you know what I mean . . . . . . . . . . something completely unworkable for anything other than a club layout. My current–and much more practical–fantasy is to build a 14 X 20 foot extension onto the front of my mobile home and appropriate about 11 X 20 feet of that area for my train room. I once built an N-Scale version of Westcott’s HO Railroad That Grows and I am giving serious thought to returning to that design; admittedly the track plan for that layout is not the most awe-inspiring in the world but it works, it lends itself readily to one’s individuality as far as scenery goes, and it provides for combination routing operation. The base of the railroad will be a 4.5 X 15 foot platform with a 4 X 4.5 foot and a 1.5 X 13 foot extension hanging off one end.
