I have finally reached the point of adding a street to my layout. I was planning on using the Woodland Scenics method for laying out the roads.
I was just about to draw it out and I realized that I don’t have a clue as to how wide an average two lane road would be in HO scale. Is there a formula for this?
It’s just a simple two lane asphalt road that passes a couple of industries. I’m guessing that it should be about 20 feet wide, but I’m not sure. Does anybody know how wide it shoudl be?
they vary in the real world however 24’ is common in my area, or about 3" in ho scale wide
The modern US “standard” public road lane width is 12 feet. Many roads have narrower lanes but if there is a centerline stripe, 9 foot lanes would be the minimum. Modern roads should have edgelines and 1 foot to 8 foot wide paved shoulders. There should also be gravel shoulders 1 foot wide would be a minimal gravel shoulder.
Prior to the mid 1960’s the lanes would be in the same width range, there would be no edge lines and paved shoulders at the narrow end of the range were more common than today… There are still many roads with 20-24 foot pavement
Guesstimate the width of an average car, then add on 2 foot either side. Times by two for one lane in each direction, then scale down to scale you model in.
Ian
Here is an article in the ‘Tips and How To’ pages of the Central Indiana Division, NMRA that may help.
Try putting a couple cars down on the road leave some for the shhoulder
Thanks for the info!
The layout is in the early sixties so this really helps a lot. The industries will have gravel parking lots so I just wanted an asphalt road that would allow trucks to enter and leave the parking lots easily.
The 20-24 inch road gave me more space than I expected once I drew it out.
Thanks for responding guys!
Roads are the next subject on Joe Fugate’s scenery clinic in the MR Forum’s general discussion section.