I’m at the point in my layout where I’m ready to build a few 2 lane roads. It’s a modern (Diesel ) layout and the roads are asphalt and was wondering what is the scale size of the roadway.Thanks
The simple answer is 8-12 feet, depending on what you’re modeling. It’ll depend on the kind of roadway you want. Is it a country road, just paved but with soft shoulders? An urban street with sidewalks? An undivided freeway with shoulders?
Some of it will be an urban street with sidewalks also a paved section with shoulders and a bit of old dirt roads.
per lane.
Modern street lanes are 11 to 12 feet wide rural or urban. A 10 foot lane is a minimum width for a traffic lane in an urban (low speed) setting. Less than 10 feet and it is considered a parking lane, and not suitable for through traffic.
Where trucking is involved a 12 foot lane is standard, while 11 foot lanes would be used for areas where right of way is tight, and even then only as a last resort. In a rural area all lanes would be 12 feet wide. Shouler widths vary with the design speed , but one can use a 6 foot minimum and a 10 foot max for the shoulders. In a divided rural highway the above shoulder widths would be for the outside. The inside (side onthe median) would be about 6 feet. I design highways for a living and these are what we use in our highway department. This is sandard throughout the country. If you are modeling in the 1830’s lanes were 9 feet wide.
You may notice that when you lay this out on our layout it takes up alot of space. I use selective comporession on the road widths on my layout. If you dropped a scale on my roads you would find the lanes about 8 feet wide, and the shoulders about 2 feet wide. I find that as long as I don’t place vehicles side by side in opposite directions, it isn’t that noticeable, and anyone who is unfamiliar with highway design would not notice at all.