Nice start on a nice area. You might read some mags and books and read a track plan book, there are several. With that area you can do a lot, but not everything. It sounds like a stub yard and staging area on the narrow section. You need to decide on the balance between a service area and a storage yard or a clasification yard. Then you can choose between city, industrial or country side. It also makes a difference whether you like to make buildings or scenery like mountains or woods or farm land. My take is that it is most fun when you are building what you like to do. I like scenery, thus I have way more mountains and bridges and waterfalls than track. Most would make other choices. I did try some WS risers on my service area and they vworked quite well.
Tywest, the mirrors really threw me off at first! I am guess the wide side is about the same sizes of my new section which is 5 X 9.5. One thing I would do is run two main lines. It does not take long to get bored watching just one train.
I am sure by now you have read about view blocking, in other words making it so you can see only one side of the bench at a time. It will make the bench seem bigger. My new section is a stand alone bench that will some day be hooked to the big bench. I used a mountain to hide a third of the bench. I added some hidden stagging under the mountain.
On this section I used 2" foam, if I had a do over I would have used 3 to 4 inches. You will like the foam risers, very easy to use. One in the pictures is a 2% grade. Mountains are all so foam and can be taken off the bench, that is a big plus when it comes to rail repairs or sicking the layout. (did I spell that right?)
I do like the plain you listed as well.
Cuda Ken
I hate Rust
I think the access aisle give you an opportunity for a bridge which would give you both scenic and operation interest. At the back of the aisle (as viewed in your first picture way up at the top of the thread) consider a long bridge over the aisle. This could be a duck-under, lift-off, drop-down or even swing gate. I would angle it at about 30 degrees from the back wall, back in from the left side. The bridge would be up 3 or 4 inches above the layout base, so your yard could run underneath the tracks leading up to it. (Think of bridge piers or trestles.) The track would continue along the wall with the mirrors, descending until it reaches the base level somewhere in the near left corner.
I'd build a double-track main all the way around, but make the bridge only single-track. That way it's a lot more interesting, as you'd need to co-ordinate running two trains in opposite directions. A double-track doesn't have to mean parallel tracks, by the way. I'd do that for part of the way around, but then split them apart for a while so each can take a different route through your scenery.
Alternately, build a single-track main line, but put in two long passing sidings, spaced halfway around the loop from each other. With this configuration, you can still run two trains in opposite directions, and the co-ordination required will be at the passing sidings as one train takes each track.
Put industries all around. "Industries," of course, is a generic word for "things with sidings." This will give you operational interest, once again.
Walthers is doing another production run of its car float model, by the way. That's a barge for railroad cars. A car float is an interesting "industry" in itself - it requires switching, and it can carry any kind of rolling stock. It can be used as "mobile staging" to bring cars on and off your layout. A car float facility is pretty large, because it needs storage tracks nearby, but with the blank canvas you've got, it might be something to consider.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Do you plan to leave the mirrors in place? In some ways they would appear to double the size of your layout, but they can also be distracting. I really like some of Cuda Ken's layout ideas of how to keep interest. Otherwise, a single train going around a single loop gets rather boring. A single track duck under (or lift-out between the Benedict and Wexford sections), might involve a "wye" to reverse the train direction on the large side. Perhaps, you might be able to incorporate a mainline overpass, or a lift-out mountain, as suggested.. The enclosed photo shows how my mountain hides the view of the entire large layout from viewing. Note that I attached the mine, (with three loading tracks), to one end of the mountain,( which has a skating & skiing resort, on top). There are five tracks under the mountain, to serve the mine, swing bridge and harbor. I have a large lift-out access port on the side of the mountain. Can the wide section of your layout be extended ? It would allow for, at least, a double loop of track. I really like Mike's ideas.
Mr. Beasley mentioned a "car float" (railroad barge) Enclosed is a photo of my scratch built one, that is squeezed into part of the harbor, next to the swing bridge.
Bob
Do you have access on the far right side between the wall and bench? You could put up a 2-3 foot tall double-sided backdrop dividing the larger, right penninsula. Then you would be left with 3 seperate areas to scenic. You could have the yard on the left as you stated. Then put some country in the middle area and on inside of aisle on right. Then loop around top and come back down far right side of divider. There on the far right could be your town/ industries/ sidings. Go through a tunnel of some sort at bottom of town area and head back towards yard. That way you could seperate yard from town and simulate some distance traveled. Just a few ideas I had.
Mike
On the doubled side back drop, they work but they do lack depth. You could bulid a hill / mountain in the center of the bench, then mount normal back drop's to the walls. If you have walk around thottles you could still run from the 32 inch walk way if it is on the right side. I use a offciess chair so I am closer to eye level.
A view block doesn't have to be a thin vertical divider. That's one method, and it's appropriate on shelf layouts which tend to be narrow themselves. As you can see in Cuda Ken's pictures, a mountain also is a view block, although a much thicker one. Another possibility is urban structures, which can be relatively tall and thin without sacrificing believeability. Depending on the height of your layout, a 3-story warehouse can really hide whatever is going on behind it, and can be used to block the view of a staging yard, or to give the illusion of a different geographical area entirely on the far side.
What I would do with the divider is put low-relief backdrop buildings flats in industrial district along divider. Using some photo scenes on divider behind building flats. You can get a lot of depth with this technique. Paint other side of divider with sky/clouds, and put small trees at "horizon". Using cardboard strips, attach a web of them from backdrop to bench. Cover web with plaster wrap. Paint it brown and cover with light coats of grass. Now cover hill with various tree. Put taller, more detailed trees in front, and smaller less detailed in back. Eventually blending with trees painted on divider. Should look like long expansive horizon of trees when done. This was done a few times in MR, I just don't remember which issue.
Nice start. The absolutely best book on track planning is John Armstrong's "Track Planning for Realistic Operation". I had my copy out on the benchwork all the while I was laying track. I am a believer in drawn plans. If you cannot make it work on paper, it's not going to work in practice. I use nothing more than squared paper, an architect's scale rule, a compass and a sharp pencil. I have tried a couple of freebie CAD programs and found them more trouble than they are worth. Autocad is too expensive for me.
At bottom, a model railroad track plan consists of a main line and industrial spurs. Optional, if you have the room (looks like you do) is a classification yard and/or an engine terminal. Your main line can be double track or single track with passing sidings. I recommend a loop main line to allow continuous running. One of the pleasures of model railroading is simply watching the train[s] run, (and keep on running without derailment). The point-to-point layouts, so often discussed in the MR press only let the train run for a minute or two before getting to the end of the line. A double track main allows two trains to run at the same time which adds to the visual interest of the layout. For a single track main be sure to include passing sidings, as long as possible. The layout will look better if the main line curves gently here and there. If it runs straight along the edge of the benchwork it emphasises the edge and looks like the track was routed to match the edge, rather than to match your terrain.
Try for view blocks to hide the far edge of the table. If you can look down on the layout and see both edges of the table, it looks like model trains running on a table. You want "scenes", miniature stage sets with a convincing backdrop, where the trains enter at one side and leave from the other.
Think about vertical relief. For instance, a river, sunk below the level of the track, crossed by a soaring bridge. Or, a single spur track climbing up a steep grade to service a mine or lumber camp.
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
Thanks for the info. I would agree with the pen and paper idea. I have dabbled with the programs out there for track planning. I find it easier using paper like you said.
I think that i will split the larger part on the right like everyone has suggested. I appreciate all the replies and am hard at work trying to figure this out.