Well here it is.
That towns of Grass Valley and Nevada City actually fit and in their proper orientation.
I have duplicated all tracks save one. All the buildings on the plans I have are on the layout with the exception of the Kidder Mansion. The engine house in Grass Valley is a single on my plan and a double on the plans in the book I have.
I am completely baffled as to the use of the sidings. Obviously industries are missing or the tracks are used to sort freight for towns and industries not show.
That's a roundabout way of saying I don't have an operation plan. If I go this route, I'm going to need more research to find out exactly what moved and how.
Chip
Building the Rock Ridge Railroad with the slowest construction crew west of the Pecos.
NevinWAre you using Best's book as the source for the maps of Grass Valley and Nevada City?
I wish I was. Best's book is out of my budget for a week or so. The map I got came from Narrow Guage Nostalgia by George Turner. There's a chapter on the NCNG. they just have the basic stuff--maps, a history, a few pictures, and diagrams of specialized rail equipment.
SpaceMouse
Wow, Chip! I am moved to latin: "per ardua ad astra!" - "through struggles to the stars". It *is* annoying to throw away stuff we have grown attached to and start over, but this design really looks clean and very promising as the basis for an 1890 layout!
You can reuse your bench work, you have staging, two realistic looking towns without reach issues, tracks meandering along river, trestle, no turnouts or hard to maintain track in the hard to reach center of layout.
Point to point layout this time ? Or will you add an option for continuous display running between the north end of Nevada City and the track from staging to Grass Valley ?
Grin, Stein
steinjr Wow, Chip! I am moved to latin: "per ardua ad astra!" - "through struggles to the stars". It *is* annoying to throw away stuff we have grown attached to and start over, but this design really looks clean and very promising as the basis for an 1890 layout! You can reuse your bench work, you have staging, two realistic looking towns without reach issues, tracks meandering along river, trestle, no turnouts or hard to maintain track in the hard to reach center of layout. Point to point layout this time ? Or will you add an option for continuous display running between the north end of Nevada City and the track from staging to Grass Valley ? Grin, Stein
I'm not settled on this as I have a few issues to work through. As I mentioned I have no operational plan. I know that the three major products exported from this area are timber, produce, and gold bullion. But from this sparse map, I have no idea how this is accomplished. I have equipment and structures for both logging and mining operations, but I have no idea how to place them.
I will probably connect Nevada City to the staging/GV line as you suggested.
There is also a matter of future expansion. This line was 28 miles long and you see all of it. Where do I go from here? I could go back to the SP main and go on up the line to Truckee, but then I have the same issues as my last layout design.
As a native Californian who's spent many a moon in Grass Valley and the Sierra Nevada, it's been fun watching the development of your layout! Seeing picts of yr earlier work (was that "Mungo" in yr Rock Ridge? ), I think yr 1. going to do a fabulous job, worthly of the Golden State & 2. find that the Sierra Nevada has myriad scenic elements that you'll enjoy modeling, from craggy rock "castles" to waving yellow grass rolling over hills and around bigbig oaks that have more personality than Mark Twain (who also spent time up in the area).
I like that you've scaled it down to Navada City / Grass Valley for now. Connect the continuous loop and then the trip between the two can take as long as you want.
As far as operations, if my manditory 4th grade lessons on California history were true, then you don't have to worry about modeling mines. Yes there were some, but most of the mines were started as gold mines but then found silver and copper. Much gold mining was done by 2-3 man troughs (pour riverrock/sludge in and let the running water of the river separate the sludge from the gold flakes), which would involve "camps" at river / creek sides, as well as individuals panning for gold.
That means that in the main elements you need in Nevada City include: a bank that would weigh & pay the miners, a foundry for melting the gold flakes / nuggets right there so they could be transported in solid bar form, a saloon, hotel, blacksmith, stables (horses and donkeys), mining / panning outfitting store, etc. There would also be a camp / "chinatown" that would involve labor & laundry, since the Foreign Miner's Tax of the 1860s effectively banned Chinese from mining for gold, and there still were many living in the Sierra Nevada well into the early 1900s.
So you'd need all sorts of supplies coming into Grass Valley (which was the collection point for many different industries in the area), some of which would stay there, be emptied then filled for back down to Sacto, while other cars would need to be sorted for delivery up to Nevada City. Specialty mining equipment, cash for the bank to pay the miners, mail, kerosene and all the normal living stuff would need to make it up to NC, and priorities varied. Ice houses were a must: NC would have access to much ice during the winter, so I wouldn't be surprised if reefers didn't originate in NC, trip down to GV (or all the way to Sacto), and then come back up. NC didn't have much large livestock, while GV had more suitible grass ranges (hence the name). Fires were / are also a big danger in the summer and snow in the winter, so specialty cars for those as well.
Don't forget people! Miners, bankers, architects, surveyors, entertainers (NC still has a groovy & old theater!), speculators, writers and travellers moved between SF, Sacto & GV/NC quite a bit. There's got to be some pretty regular passenger service.
The main thing is that you don't have to model every industry or aspect of gold mining right there trackside: the hills & mountains went on & on, and much can be hinted at.
Don't know if that helps at all: I look at yr layout plan and can envision many different operations (and they can evolve through time, if you want as well: ie, get into the 1930s and quite a few WPA projects happened up there). I'd love to see what yr thinking for the rest "above" this section. Up to Truckee & Donner's Pass would be fun! but so would "down" into Sacto or even to Oakland / Alameda.
Cheers & keep up the great work!--Mark
M.C. Fujiwara
My YouTube Channel (How-to's, Layout progress videos)
Silicon Valley Free-moN
Chip,
I like your plan, but you are missing the Town Talk Tunnel between GV & NC, which you could put where your track cross at bear rriver bridge.
You are right on the verge of excellence there, Chip...really good progress, I think. Lots of improvements and...well...it just works!
Are you going to close the loop at upper right as it curls towards your staging lead? It it won't mean a compromise on min radius, you may even be able to have an interchange or a passing siding, if short, to keep it unencumbered there.
Also, if you wish to turn trains, as the main starts its curve toward the bridge, leading out from the staging, you could place a turnout there running through the woods (or tunneling if a hill), to emerge at the curve at lower right and joining the main there, maybe on the industrial track...whatever...it's a possibility for you.
In the view that opens for me, the heavy black "box's" lower end falls outside the confines of the drawing. I hope that is just an artefact and not a real problem in terms of your aisle-width if you have to bring it back up and into the drawing.
-Crandell
Chip:
Neat. By concentrating between Grass Valley and Nevada City, you've got a lot of room for some interesting features. Your "Bear River Bridge" can now become the Gold Flat trestle, just outside of Nevada City, and I'd put a short tunnel out of Grass Valley to represent ;the Town Talk tunnel between the two towns.
I like it.
Tom
Tom View my layout photos! http://s299.photobucket.com/albums/mm310/TWhite-014/Rio%20Grande%20Yuba%20River%20Sub One can NEVER have too many Articulateds!
The two turntables were wooden, A-frame, armstrong types.
The spur to the left of the Grass Valley turntable served a railroad store house and oil tanks. The structure on the left side of the yard was a combination freight and passenger depot. The structure with the track running through it was a machine shop, with a blacksmith shop located near the beginning of the upper part of that track. The Kidder mansion was located just below the opposite end, adjacent to the tracks. The long spur across the mainline from the turntable was an elevated track serving an oil spout used to fuel the locomotives.
At Nevada City, the structure adjacent to the yard was another combination depot. There was no icing spur. On the spur there were three adjacent on-line businesses: the Alpha Hardware and Nevada City Hardware warehouses and the Valley Feed and Grain Co. warehouses, leastwise circa 1910.
While the NCNG had no refrigerator cars, undoubtedly a standard-gauge version would have refrigerator cars on the line for the seasonal fruit shipments. Otherwise, you're talking about general freight shipped in box cars, machinery and such on flat cars, and tank cars.
My gut feeling was that the bulk of freight traffic came/went via team and house tracks.
The center of operations, maintenance, and management was at Grass Valley.
An 1890 timetable shows a daily round-trip freight between Grass Valley and Colfax, and two round-trip mixed trains between Nevada City and Colfax. A 1927 timetable shows a daily round-trip passenger train between Nevada City and Colfax as well as the two mixed-trains. Trains toward Colfax were superior to trains of the same class found from Colfax.
There was a spur to the fair grounds on the Grass Valley side of the Town Talk tunnel you may want to model. There was also a Standard Oil Company of California petroleum distributer in the same general area, undoubtedly served by the railroad but the industry may be after the time period you're modeling.
I wonder how the Nevada County Narrow Gauge Railroad would have renamed itself after being standard-gauged.
Mark
Forgot to mention: I can imagine there being a siding and fruit warehouses at Peardale, located four miles south of Grass Valley.
Okay, everyone seems to like this plan better, but I'm not sure. First of all, where are the industries? If 52% of the traffic on the line is lumber, where are the sawmills. Did they ship directly to Colfax or did they ship to one of the towns. Did the towns run a local turn to the mills? If so where is the track?
The other major exports are produce are gold bullion. As mentioned above you would need a foundry and mines. The mines would ship to he foundry or have one on site. Where was this handled?
Produce would be handled either through the freight house or produce distributors. In Colfax, there were 5 distinct produce companies with buildings on the Southern Pacific that received produce from the NCNG. Where are they on the NCNG end? Where are the icing platforms.
The freight station in Colfax is massive. Where did they ship all those products. The sucker was easily a block long.
These are questions I don't even know how to begin to answer.
Operationally, as the two layouts stand, the Rocklin and Colfax vs the NCNG, are as follows.
Rocklin and ColfaxMax number cars on layout: 179Number of Cars moved per session: 133Trains: 18 10-car trains per sessionNevada County Narrow GaugeMax number of cars on layout: 82Number of cars moved per session: 74Trains: 5 14-car trains per session
Granted if I figure out how the railroad actually served the industries, I could increase the operations on the NCNG.
With the simple, stub-ended staging at Colfax, the layout is set up as if the NCNG is a branchline of the Southern Pacific: trains originate and end at Colfax. If modeling an independent shortline, the trains would originate/terminate in Grass Valley or Nevada City. If modeling a shortline, I suggest you modify the staging area to allow turning of trains, or facilities to turn the locomotives and rearrange the order of trains (coaches/combination cars located at rear of train).
SpaceMouse Okay, everyone seems to like this plan better, but I'm not sure. First of all, where are the industries? If 52% of the traffic on the line is lumber, where are the sawmills. Did they ship directly to Colfax or did they ship to one of the towns. Did the towns run a local turn to the mills? If so where is the track?
Hopefully, you sent this message before reading my earlier one.
Don't have information about the sawmills. I'm sure there were local ones, but my bet is lumber was consumed locally for general construction and especially for use in the mines. Undoubtedly, the NCNG would have shipped lumber on flat cars if lumber was exported, but I haven't seen any pictures of that happening. There is a late-period photo of a train ready to leave Colfax with an import-load of lumber..
markpierce Don't have information about the sawmills.
Don't have information about the sawmills.
Just read pages 53 and 54 of Best's book. Lumber was hauled from a nearby sawmill to You Bet for loading on the NCNG. The sawmill operation had a narrow gauge railroad, but it never connected with the NCNG. Operations ended in the 1890s when the supply of timber became exhausted.
markpierce Forgot to mention: I can imagine there being a siding and fruit warehouses at Peardale, located four miles south of Grass Valley.
Peaches were shipped from Chicago Park where there was a dead-end spur. Photos show no evidence of any special loading or warehousing facilities. Probably, fruit was loaded into NCNG box cars directly from farmers' wagons to be hauled to Colfax for transfer to SP refrigerator cars. But as I said before, if modeling a standard-gauge NCNG, the fruit would be loaded directly into standard gauge refrigerator cars.
SpaceMouse The other major exports are produce are gold bullion. As mentioned above you would need a foundry and mines. The mines would ship to he foundry or have one on site. Where was this handled?
Going through Best's book I found no evidence the NCNG directly served any mines, stamp mills, or smelters. I didn't see it mentioned nor saw evidence of NCNG tracks in the photos. While the NCNG served mining communities, it was not a mining railroad.
SpaceMouse Okay, everyone seems to like this plan better, but I'm not sure. First of all, where are the industries?
Okay, everyone seems to like this plan better, but I'm not sure. First of all, where are the industries?
The NCNG plan is cleaner and has a more definitive purpose. I would build it and operate it standard gauge as shortline or branchline.
Where are the industries? Now you know how bankrupt and abandoned railroads get bankrupt and abandoned.
If 52% of the traffic on the line is lumber, where are the sawmills.
Did they ship directly to Colfax or did they ship to one of the towns. Did the towns run a local turn to the mills? If so where is the track?
The other major exports are produce are gold bullion. As mentioned above you would need a foundry and mines. The mines would ship to the foundry or have one on site. Where was this handled?
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
dehusman SpaceMouse If 52% of the traffic on the line is lumber, where are the sawmills. Maybe up in near the trees. Did they ship directly to Colfax or did they ship to one of the towns. Did the towns run a local turn to the mills? If so where is the track? I cannot concieve of the town the size they were of consuming a huge amount of timber on an ongoing basis. My guess would be that after the initial construction, probably 90% of the lumber would go off line. The lumber might have been cariied down from the mill by wagon and loaded at the railhead....Probably more board wood was moved in boxcars than flatcars.
SpaceMouse If 52% of the traffic on the line is lumber, where are the sawmills.
I've seen no evidence that the NCNG was a major hauler of lumber. (See my earlier post.) And what is the source of the 52% figure? I think it bogus....I'd think the NCNG would ship lumber via flat cars for easier loading and unloading compared to a box car, and since the distance of its hauls was extremely short, wouldn't need the protection of one. And I see the mining communities and their mines to be huge consumers of lumber. Structures were mostly made of wood, and mines used timber for lining tunnels and many probably used tree cuttings for fuel. If anything, you see lumber being imported to mining districts once the immediate timber supply is exhuasted, and not ever exported.
Like your plan. It appears to me that the NCNG, like my TTT, handles most freight at freight houses and team tracks. Most of the shippers and receivers didn't generate enough traffic to need their own spurs, or only generated it on a seasonal basis.
About gold. The Empire Mine, which operated for more than a century (finally closed in 1957 - now a CA state park,) was a BIG, RICH hard rock mine (not three men sluicing river gravel.) Its entire production for that period was a cube 7 feet on a side - or about 20% of the cubic capacity of a DM&IR ore jimmy. Since it was concentrated on-site, there wasn't much outbound tonnage. OTOH, the mine needed a lot of rail (300+ MILES of underground passageways,) mine timber (inbound from Colfax after 1890) and assorted machinery. Regular shipments inbound would include (but not be limited to) cable, lubricants, pipe (for water and compressed air) cloth products, soap and cyanide.
When trying to generate traffic, don't just think of what's immediately adjacent to the rails. Think about the needs of people and businesses located miles from the right-of-way. The fancy European furniture and the marble for the fireplaces in the mine manager's mansion at the Empire probably traveled part of the way from producer to consumer on the NCNG.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - with mines for coal, not gold)
dehusman I would think that the mining would be rather transparent to the railroad. Any gold bullion if carried by rail would require a couple cubic feet on the safe of an express car on a train. If they used an acid process to leach the gold out of the ore, then they might carry acid in tank cars or jars in boxcars. If they used hydraulic mining then the major commodity hauled would be water pipe and pipe fittings. In most case the only evidence of the mining would be a wagon that pulled up to the station where the gold was tranferred to the safe in the depot until the train arrived. May not be any (icing platforms). The produce may be shipped in ventilated cars, not iced. What makes you think they (freight houses) are SHIPPING everything, I would bet that as much or more was INBOUND to the communities. Since probably every bolt of cloth, every nail and every piece of paper came inbound through the freight house and was distributed by wagon to the various stores.
I would think that the mining would be rather transparent to the railroad. Any gold bullion if carried by rail would require a couple cubic feet on the safe of an express car on a train. If they used an acid process to leach the gold out of the ore, then they might carry acid in tank cars or jars in boxcars. If they used hydraulic mining then the major commodity hauled would be water pipe and pipe fittings. In most case the only evidence of the mining would be a wagon that pulled up to the station where the gold was tranferred to the safe in the depot until the train arrived.
May not be any (icing platforms). The produce may be shipped in ventilated cars, not iced.
What makes you think they (freight houses) are SHIPPING everything, I would bet that as much or more was INBOUND to the communities. Since probably every bolt of cloth, every nail and every piece of paper came inbound through the freight house and was distributed by wagon to the various stores.
I agree with this portion of Dave's response except I've seen no evidence of icing platforms on the NCNG, and the RR didn't have any refrigerator cars or ventilated cars. It only had box cars, flat cars, gondolas (flat cars with wooden sides), tank cars and various MOW cars. (It had no cabooses until one near the end of operations.) It had coaches and combines, a couple ex-cable cars used as caboose-coaches, and near the end of operations, a baggage car. It also had several home-made excursion cars which were essentially flat cars with roofs and seats added (take a trip to the fairgrounds!).
Regarding tank cars, some were lettered and were the property of Shell Oil Co., Standard Oil Co., and Associated Oil Co. Presumably these companies had petroleum distributers served directly by the NCNG, most likely in the Grass Valley -- Nevada City area.
Hi guys,
The NCNG is beginning to look more and more dismal. While it may be cleaner, it is failing to come close to my givens and druthers.
Given what Mark said about traffic originating on the NCNG (duh!) staging serves no real purpose. It is more realistic to build in the fruit and freight transfers, the oil transfers and the turntable at Colfax and model the whole railroad. There is no outside world here.
I don't think the Dr. Roy Dohn's Formula was intended for closed short lines. But if it was, my new operational stats would be:
Max # cars on layout 44.Number of cars moved per session: 12Number of trains 1 x 12 cars per session.
This is about 1/15th operating capacity of the Rocklin and Colfax plan as fraudulent as it was.
In my mind, the NCNG has 3 major strikes against it.
1) I was looking to build a railroad that a crew of 4 to 5 would run on a regular basis. The NCNG does not seem to support more than 1 person, maybe me and my son type operations.
2) This is Phase One of a three phase basement layout plan. There is nowhere to expand. No lumber branch, no mining branch, no outside connection, nada, zip.
3) I have hundreds, if not thousands of $$ in structures, locos, rolling stock not supported by NCNG operations.
Don't get me wrong, I like the plan. It just doesn't meet my needs I'm afraid.
I think I'm still searching. What I really want is a combination of small steam and tall trees. Maybe it's time to revisit, the NWP and California Western 1917. The only problem is the use of 2-6-2 T's by the CW as primary power.
tomikawaTT About gold. The Empire Mine, which operated for more than a century (finally closed in 1957 - now a CA state park,) was a BIG, RICH hard rock mine (not three men sluicing river gravel.) Its entire production for that period was a cube 7 feet on a side - or about 20% of the cubic capacity of a DM&IR ore jimmy. Since it was concentrated on-site, there wasn't much outbound tonnage.
About gold. The Empire Mine, which operated for more than a century (finally closed in 1957 - now a CA state park,) was a BIG, RICH hard rock mine (not three men sluicing river gravel.) Its entire production for that period was a cube 7 feet on a side - or about 20% of the cubic capacity of a DM&IR ore jimmy. Since it was concentrated on-site, there wasn't much outbound tonnage.
The long-productive Empire Mine made its owner very wealthy. He built a mansion on extensive acreage in the San Francisco peninsula. The home and its grounds, including extensive gardens are now government-owned and open to the public.
Bringing the layout to a conclusion, here's my rendition of NCNG Colfax. It is mirror image and highly compressed, but the major components are there: Freight Transfer, produce transfer, passenger station, cattle pens, and oil transfer.
What difference does it make what industries were on the NCNG? Use the same track plan, connect it to staging just like you were and call it the SP. Its not like you are building an exact model of a prototype railroad.
List what trains you want to run, what industries you want serve and then design a railroad to support that level of operation (or as close to it in the space you have). Unless you just happen to like a particular prototype operation, you probably won't find one prototype operation that serves the part of the country you want, serves the industries you want, in the era you want with the number of trains you want.
So you either have to decide up front to take the hit and make the compromises to conform your vision to the prototype or you have to make the compromises to conform the prototype/s to your vision. Pick which way you want to go, then realize which ever direction you pick, both have to fit within the confines of your physical space. Then its a matter of designing a trackplan that allows you to accomplish the most of the goals you have set in the space you have set.
You have had several plans and a collection of trains and industries, but I'm not sure you have a purpose to the trains or the industries, do the industries drive the trains?
SpaceMouse Hi guys, The NCNG is beginning to look more and more dismal. While it may be cleaner, it is failing to come close to my givens and druthers. Given what Mark said about traffic originating on the NCNG (duh!) staging serves no real purpose. It is more realistic to build in the fruit and freight transfers, the oil transfers and the turntable at Colfax and model the whole railroad. There is no outside world here. I don't think the Dr. Roy Dohn's Formula was intended for closed short lines. But if it was, my new operational stats would be: Max # cars on layout 44.Number of cars moved per session: 12Number of trains 1 x 12 cars per session. This is about 1/15th operating capacity of the Rocklin and Colfax plan as fraudulent as it was.
How many trains per session are you expecting? How long is a session? And how long is each train supposed to take for its run? The key question for which the math should be obvious is how many trains must the visible trackage support simultaneously? And how well does this tie in with your proposed number of operators?
In my mind, the NCNG has 3 major strikes against it. 1) I was looking to build a railroad that a crew of 4 to 5 would run on a regular basis. The NCNG does not seem to support more than 1 person, maybe me and my son type operations.
Do you really have the space for a layout that supports a crew of 4-5? Including aisle space for them to perform their jobs without interfering with each other? Are the aisles wide enough to get around each other?
2) This is Phase One of a three phase basement layout plan. There is nowhere to expand. No lumber branch, no mining branch, no outside connection, nada, zip. 3) I have hundreds, if not thousands of $$ in structures, locos, rolling stock not supported by NCNG operations.
OK, the NCNG is not for you. And no prototype short line supported the density of traffic you are looking for. 8 trains a day seems like a pretty realistic maximum for timetable ops on a short line railroad whose length keeps it all in one division or subdivision.
Don't get me wrong, I like the plan. It just doesn't meet my needs I'm afraid. I think I'm still searching. What I really want is a combination of small steam and tall trees. Maybe it's time to revisit, the NWP and California Western 1917. The only problem is the use of 2-6-2 T's by the CW as primary power.
Again, I would be very surprised if either the NWP or CW saw more than 8 trains/day between 2 adjacent towns.
What I'm driving towards is that you are chasing 2 conflicting ideals - short lines with Class 1 traffic density. Which has priority for you - traffic density or choice of prototype?
I would also throw out the idea of my version of plausible free-lancing - free-lancing in a region of my choice, and using the practices of comparable prototypes in the region as possible guides to how my free-lance line might have done things. With this guide, I only have to have rational explanations as to why my free-lance line didn't do things the same way as the actual prototypes in the area.
just my thoughts, yours may differ
Fred W
Dave,
Thanks for that.
The Rocklin and Colfax Fraudulance meets all my needs. I have no problem stretching reality. but there is part of me that wants to get it close to plausible as I can get. In many ways I really like the simplicity of the NCNG. But for me operations is a team sport. I currently drive an hour each direction to be part of a regular crew. It would be nice to get some of the people to come to me for ops for a change.
You ask if I have an ops plan / train schedule. and frankly, I don't for the Rocklin Colfax, although I did for the Rock Ridge and Train City. With the exchange going to the NCNG, I have to add at least one more train. I'm confident that I am at least close with my aguestimation of what I will need. I've been running TO/TT car cards and waybills for almost 3 years now on various layouts--but no, I really don't have it worked out completely.
And yes, it will be industry driven as opposed to train driven.
Fred,
This is the space I have.
There will be a couple tight places, but mostly there is 30-36" of aisle space. I have one place that does not have that (27") but there doesn't need to be more more than one person at a time at that location. I'm sure that I'll want for more.
The CW was quite busy, but not always with trains through to Willis. there would have been probably two-three trains per day each direction as well as passenger service. But the bulk of the operation would be the traffic to and from the 3-4 logging camps the Union Lumber Company ran. The Union Lumber Saw Mill could be measured in hundreds or acres if not square mile.
The layout I was planning was a T shape with the CW joining the NWP at WiIlits.
Here is a photo of the Union Lumber Co in 1911.
My suggestion would be to roughly sketch out what you want for Phases 2 and 3.
Then arrange the trackage on Phase 1 so there is a "natural" break where you can run the "main line" into phases 2 and 3. Maybe for now you want to replace phases 2 and 3 with staging.
You also have to keep the whole in mind. For example what part do you want the yard at Rocklin/Train City to play? You were only atlking about helpers to Colfax, maybe they should eventually go further? Is Rocklin your "division point"?
For example, I would make the tail of the wye (mid point between Phase 1 and Phase 2 in the picture above) two parallel tracks, connected by a regular switch. Then when you expand you remove the switch and the left track continues under the logging camp to Phase 3 and the right track continues to Sacremento. The wye is there only until Phase 3 is completed, then it goes away and each leg of the wye becomes a different route.
I still would do the crossing right before the bridge thing.
I might also put a mine tipple on the track along the river. When you were just running in circles its a continuous connection, when you are operating its a "branch" with a mine tipple on it.
You also need to figure out some sequential industries. Not necessarily paired (coal mine-power plant), but sequential (ore mine-stamp mill) to give your on line industries and TRAINS a purpose. you could have several log loading camps or mines serving the same sawmill/stamp mill/reduction mill.