hey all, its me again. I’ve got what i think is a pretty good layout plan, here it is: 
this time my main question is about the yard. so first some background, I’m modeling a freelance branch of the, well i haven’t actually decided yet. i do think it will be in the northeast. i’m thinking of the NH. So, the junction with the rest of the RR is in staging, from there the branch runs through two towns. there is a classification yard at the end of the branch, my idea is that there is no yard anywhere near on the mainline so all trains with deliveries for the branch or the branch off of the branch (represented by the continuous run connection). the leftmost yard track is the A/D track and the track next to it is an engine escape track that can hold about 3/4 cars above the x-over. the rest are just normal yard tracks. thyere is also an engine house. my questions are: 1. will the layout of the yard work well? I’ve gone through ops in my head and it seems to work, but is there any way to improve it? 2. is there a better way to put in some engine storage? i dont really like how its put together now but i cant think of anything else to do it. 3. and last. do you see any major problems with the layout? any at all? thanks, Kyle
Howdy, Kyle,
Just a few ideas you might consider:
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Move the crossover from your front tracks (top left end of yard) to the rear tracks, with the farthest track being the engine escape (with company service cars on the short spur.) That way road locos can reach the engine house and service facilities without having to switch back, and the entire length of the front track is available for classification
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Connect that rearmost track to the diverging curve to form a true wye. The engine escape track becomes a reversing section for electrical purposes. Now you can operate locomotives front-end forward, and pull trains out of staging and switch ends without using the 0-5-0 or running a lap around the loop to get loco and caboose on the correct ends of each train.
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Add a short spur to the engine service area for fuel delivery - behind the coaling station for solid fuel, or just about anywhere if your motive power burns oil. The coal spur can also service a sand house and ash pit.
And a suggestion. To visibly separate the curved connector from the staging entrance - functionally - model a boarded-up industry as a flat behind the staging entrance, with a suggestion of there having been a now-removed spur to service it. That way the curve looks like the main line, even if not operated as such.
The only other thing I see is a need for passenger facilities if modeling the transition era - even if the passenger train is only a single RDC. In the more recent decades the station buildings would have gone from boarded up to demolished or recycled as restaurants or antique shops.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
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Not really, the one on the left is staging and the other is the terminus for the branch. by the way there will be a backdrop between the two yards and down the center (longways) of the loop. and can you explain more what you mean? i dont get it
the right yard is staging it represents the rest of the world so i think iget more out of it this way. I could switch the railroad around so that the active yard is on the right and staging is on the left, then i could have enough room to make the lead a bit longer. Another option i thoight of is just use cassette staging, the only problem with that that i can think ofr is that in order to hold a full train it would have to be around 3 1/2 feet long. i think something this long would be too hard too handle. What do you guys think is the better option?
I have both fixed and cassette staging. The cassettes are lengths of steel stud, closed at one end, with flex track laid inside (rain gutter fashion) and secured with latex caulk. The ‘standard’ length is 56.5 inches (and if that dimension sounds familiar, it should!) with a few longer and a few more shorter. I store them on shelf brackets on the wall closest to the cassette dock.
The cassettes only originate about 5% of my total schedule, maybe four trains a ‘day’ (which may take a month of brief sessions to operate.) Everything else operates from fixed staging. Everything backs in, so there’s no turning anything end-for-end in either stub staging or cassettes - but my layout is designed to make that possible.
I have also been operating a detached ‘end of the railroad’ module with (shorter) cassettes for every arrival and departure. It’s never operated for much more at a time than one train in - one train out even though it has a published schedule of a dozen trains each way each ‘day.’ Operating EVERYTHING to and from cassettes is a royal pain in the rudderpost!
You did one thing VERY right! You provided staging from the start as, “The rest of the world.” (Well, the rest of North America.) Like yours, my planning from the beginning involved providing places in, “The rest of Japan,” for National Railways trains to come from and go to. Without staging, you end up with something like the CNJ Bronx Terminal - even then, it was connected to the rest of North America by 1:1 scale cassettes, aka car floats.
Chuck (Modeling Central
Either coincidentally or purposefully, you’ve copied much of David Popp’s original New Haven Naugatuck Valley layout from Model Railroader January 2003. (For some reason, this layout isn’t in the on-line track plan database).
He was planning this to be part of his larger layout later and that had an effect on the way he designed his layout. It’s probably not the ideal use of the space if the layout isn’t going to be expanded upon.
If you have access on three sides or all sides of the layout, there could be better track plan choices to provide more engaging operation.
One thing his original layout has that creates more flexibility is two staging yards, one for each direction, where you have only one. In place of the visible yard you chose, he has an industrial area.
The operating pattern you describe, where every branchline train runs to the yard, wouldn’t necessarily be typical of real life, unless that was an interchange yard with another railroad (which would be a nice enhancement).
In any case, if you are interested in operation, there is possibly more that can be achieved in the same space. But as with so many designs that are posted here, it is difficult to know without knowing the dimensions of the rest of the room to understand alternatives.
If you happen to be copying David Popp’s layout, which is fine, just be aware that he always intended it to be part of a larger plan and made some choices because of that are not necessarily optimal for this space as a standalone layout.
If you came up with the design yourself, there may be other choices in the same space (after considering aisles) that would yield more operating interest.
If you decide to keep the configuration as drawn, give some thought to making the visible yard an interchange yard with another railroad. That would create a valid justification for most branch trains to work there (as well as adding interest on its own).
Best of luck.
Byron
A classification yard at the “end” of the branch is incongruous. Typically, branchline terminals serve industries. The “yard” there isn’t to classify trains: to break-up trains only to resort them into new trains. It is to receive cars to be distributed to local industries and then reassemble cars into a train to return to the “rest of the world.” While some cars may have been picked up or are yet to be delivered along the branchline, there is little need to “classify” since everything is destined to be shipped back to the mainline. You’d be better off with industrial spurs rather than the several classification tracks. Industries are essential, a run-around track is convenient, and engine terminal is optional because engine servicing is mostly done “back home” somewhere on the mainline.
Mark
I trust there will be an aisle at the bottom of the plan. If not, a three-foot reach is a bit too much for an industrial/switching area.
Plan he is posting now is based on a David Popp plan.
Room plan (layout is oriented with staging along left wall, stub end of staging at lower left hand corner):
He has gotten a few suggestions for alternate plans before, both here and at the trainboard forums.
Here is a link to the kid’s previous thread from a while back here (back in Feb 2010), where the room is described: http://cs.trains.com/trccs/forums/t/168641.aspx?PageIndex=1
Here is a link to one of the threads he did at trainboard (in March 2010): http://www.trainboard.com/grapevine/showthread.php?t=119066
Smile
Stein
yeah i did base my layout on his. i guess you shouldn’t copy an idea without understanding it fully. the layout is that shape and size because i based it on 2 HCD’s, i thought it would be easier to construct. now i think i can get a better layout shape for my money. my problem is that i just cant think that way. i am nearly incapable of thinking abstract thoughts like that, so i guess i am asking for help again. any ideas for a basic layout shape? i only need a basic benchwork shape and rough idea of mainline location and shape. My layout room is 13x13 but also serves as my bedroom. Here is a scale diagram of the room: the furniture can be rearranged, one of the dressers may be removed and the closet may be used. the features i would like are, single track mainline, two staging yards (one for each end of RR), one classification yard, 2 or more towns, 15 inch minimum mainline radius (other can go smaller, 12 inch absolute minimum), i would like to model the new haven rr in the mid 1950’s, any more info i should have added? will all this even fit in my space? thanks for any and all help
yeah ive gone through a lot of ideas and plans, the reason is that they seem good at first but as i give them closer and closer examinations and the new plan smell wears off and i find that i like it a lot less. i dont know if it is just me or if it is like this for every one but no plan or part of a plan has jumped out at me so i hope that if we get rid of all the unneeded limitations that i may see something i will like in the long run. by the way if you do decide to help you dont have to follow all of my druthers i gave. i will just try to fit what i can into the plans.
If that is HO scale the 15 inch curves will cause a lot of problems for you. I would suggest using a larger curve so that you will not be limited to very short cars and very small locos. Some equipment can be run on really tight curves but it all looks better on larger curves.
I would suggest looking at some plans in the model railroader data base for some ways to put in the tracks and operational goals you want. Even if you can only increase the space for your turn back curves and then pinch the layout down in the middle you might be happier with what you build. I am in the planning stage of my layout and I am looking at 36 R min for the main line by comparison. This is going to cause me to make trade offs with regard to what will fit trackwise but the 2-10-4s and 2-6-6-6s will look a lot better going around curves that are not near their minimums.
If your space limits you to something with less than the ideal space you may consider a switching layout with out the continuous run feature, several of them have been built over the years and you may get to incorporate this layout into a larger one when space becomes more available.
What ever you decide to build you will need to build to your wants and tastes. Good luck with your layout.
oh, i forgot to say, its N scale. and ive looked all over this site and the rest of the internet but havent found anything that inspires me either.
Be aware that it’s likely that you’ll find this happening with any plan you find or come up with. This is why its important to write down the features and scenes that you want in the layout most, and keep going back to that list to remind yourself of what’s important when you find yourself in the weeds.
You probably did this in your other threads, but I don’t have the time to review them now.
Just don’t get discouraged, and don’t expect to find or come up with a plan that’s perfect in every way - otherwise you’ll be waiting for a long time. If you want something more concrete, maybe make sure that your top 3 or 5 or 7 druthers are covered by a plan, and that will probably be good enough to get started.
Mmmm - would it be fair to say that you are probably wanting to follow along with your train as it moves from junction to town A to town B to yard, and maybe down the branchline?
Rather than visualizing being in a spot where a train arrives from somewhere else, does something more or less interesting, maybe interacts with other trains arriving from somewhere else in some way (interchange, taking a siding, a block swap, whatever), and then departs for somewhere else again?
The latter type of layout is a lot easier to model in little space. In principle it consists of modeling one place on e.g. 75% of a 4x8 foot table, using the last 25% narrow stripe of the table behind the backdrop to allow a few trains to arrive from somewhere else or depart for somewhere else.
Say something like Marty McGuirk’s Androscogging Central (from his starting in N scale book). I googled, and found an early version of his plan (then named “Pine Tree Central” - in honor of the pioneering Carolina Central) over on railroad-line forums, in this thread: http://www.railroad-line.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=22305&whichpage=1
Looks like this:
Just one town. But room for running trains from two railroads, interchanging cars between the two, local s
yeah modelling just one town is definitely an option but i like being able to follow my train around a lot. another idea that i just had would be to do a HOG type of layout with staging on a Wye going into the closet. does that sound workable? ill post a preliminary plan in a bit.
Sure. But if your main goal is to maximize the run length for a single train, you can get even more run length by simply dropping the continuous run requirement, and do a layout on narrow shelves up along the left wall, right out on a peninsula, down along the peninsula towards the window, back on the outside of the peninsula (the side towards your bed), and finally back along the upper end of the table and along the top of your left wall up towards your closet.
Get you say four or five fairly big scenes (along left wall), down along inside of peninsula, along outside of peninsula, top of peninsula, last wall.
No staging, no big classification yard. You have a small yard (just a few double ended tracks which ends in a small piece of track long enough for an engine and a caboose) at one of the ends, where cars has been dropped off for your branch line.
At the last destination (or perhaps second to last) you have a runaround, so you can get your engine on the other end of the cars for heading back.
You go pick up your engine at an engine house, sort inbound cars according to how you plan to spot them at industries, and then trundle on down the line to serve four or five small communities that visually are separated from each other.
Smile,
Stein
i don’t really get what you’re picturing, could you make a sketch? that does sound interesting. to get my round ‘n’ round fix i could also just get a 3x4 sheet of plywood or something and put a loop of track on it. but for now i think ill keep moving forward with the HOG style layout. i think i have an idea for a small yard : 
this would go against the wall with the high window, the closet is to the left and the bed is below. the yard would be a small junction yard with the main line (in staging). the traffic on the branch would be light. there would only be a couple of through trains every day. at the opposite end of the branch from the yard is a connection to another rr with trackage rights agreements so this route could be used for fast freights and passengers. there will be some occasional through trains because the main is old and is reaching its max. traffic density (plans are being formed to fix that). so does this look like it would work?