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Yard Pictures

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  • Member since
    February 2001
  • From: Wyoming, where men are men, and sheep are nervous!
  • 3,392 posts
Posted by Pruitt on Sunday, December 10, 2017 8:04 AM

Merchantville, right next to Pennsauken and Cherry Hill. Fifteen minutes from Philly at 5:00 am.

  • Member since
    July 2002
  • From: Jersey City
  • 1,925 posts
Posted by steemtrayn on Sunday, December 10, 2017 1:55 AM

Where in Jersey?

 

  • Member since
    January 2014
  • 1,500 posts
Posted by ROBERT PETRICK on Saturday, December 9, 2017 10:05 AM

Brunton

Here's a track plan of my new Casper yard on the layout I plan to start when I retire and move back to New Jersey in a few months (yes, that's right. I'm a retiree who's actually moving to New Jersey. There may be a mental defect of some sort happening here... Smile).

Yeah, but you are modeling Wyoming, so there's still hope.

Robert

LINK to SNSR Blog


  • Member since
    February 2001
  • From: Wyoming, where men are men, and sheep are nervous!
  • 3,392 posts
Posted by Pruitt on Saturday, December 9, 2017 6:11 AM

Here's a track plan of my new Casper yard on the layout I plan to start when I retire and move back to New Jersey in a few months (yes, that's right. I'm a retiree who's actually moving to New Jersey. There may be a mental defect of some sort happening here... Smile).

  • Member since
    February 2008
  • 2,360 posts
Posted by kasskaboose on Saturday, December 9, 2017 12:08 AM

No pics yet, but keep up the great work on the yards.  What fantastic ideas you provide.  Pics help greatly for myself and other visual people.

  • Member since
    September 2003
  • 10,582 posts
Posted by mlehman on Wednesday, December 6, 2017 2:27 AM

Theory shouldn't be ignored, but we rarely have space to place everything that should be there in theory.

One thing that's important to me is to representing some variation in track elevations as this adds realism IMO.

Durango Yard,

Keep in mind that your train length tends to be restricted by your longest Departure track. Durango is a major point on the Four Corners Division. The yard tracks themselves are relatively short compared  to what I use for Arrival & Departure tracks. This is further complicated by throwing dual-gauge and a loop into the mix. Another view.

Silverton is less complicated, but still much more than they had to work with on the prototype.

Mike Lehman

Urbana, IL

  • Member since
    February 2003
  • From: Morristown, NJ
  • 808 posts
Posted by nealknows on Tuesday, December 5, 2017 2:50 PM

https://i.imgur.com/weBSEtW.jpg

 My freight yard looking south. Still need to do ballast work and more...

  • Member since
    December 2004
  • From: Bedford, MA, USA
  • 21,483 posts
Posted by MisterBeasley on Monday, December 4, 2017 12:26 PM

This looks in from the end of my yard.

It is 6 stub-end tracks.  The yard lead at the far end uses two snap-switches branching off the main, with 2 Peco 3-way turnouts branching off of those to make 5 tracks.

It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse. 

  • Member since
    February 2005
  • From: Vancouver Island, BC
  • 23,330 posts
Posted by selector on Sunday, December 3, 2017 5:01 PM

I have never had the room for a properly configured yard, either, but it didn't stop me from trying and creating something approximating a yard. I mean, it sort of looked like a yard.  A railroader would have looked at it and thought, "Buddy here must have done this as a challenge add-on without having a plan from the inception." He'd have been perfectly correct.

The problem is the length.  At least, that's my opinion.  I can always make the depth work, say for four or five classification tracks in a ladder, but the ladder looks goofy in the short length I can squeeze it into.  It has to be stub tracks, not that elegant llloooooonnng diamond you see on the larger layouts and in the prototype.  For me, having a real, workable, A/D track almost makes the yard all by itself.  But then you need a lead, and a locomotive breakaway to servicing.  It's just too much, with a caboose track, and a runaround on the lead, to get it all in with decent angles and lengths.

This was the best I could do, two layouts ago, inside of 8 feet.  A divisional yard, almost:

 

  • Member since
    July 2006
  • From: 4610 Metre's North of the Fortyninth on the left coast of Canada
  • 9,352 posts
Posted by BATMAN on Sunday, December 3, 2017 12:33 PM

doctorwayne
For me, that's more interesting than a yard, and a better use of the available real estate.  If I had more space, I still wouldn't have a modelled yard, but would extend the distances between towns.

This is my way of thinking. I don't have a massive space to accommodate a yard, so eventually, all my trains will be staged under the layout. I also prefer more distance between man made structures as Canada has more wide open natural beauty to gawk at than buildings and industry. What you see in the photo is what will be a Rockey Mountain pusher station. Enough of a yard to hold all the loco's I want to collect with service facilities. Trains will be passing through and stopping on the two A/D tracks to get the help added.

It has a balloon track around the roundhouse to turn engines too large for the turntable and I use it to turn passenger trains as well. The balloon track also functions as a yard lead and the two A/D tracks is where I will build and take apart trains. Not textbook that's for sure but then MR is often full of compromises and it is you that decides what ones will be made.

Balloon track around the roundhouse to turn passenger consist. 

  

 

Brent

"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."

  • Member since
    January 2004
  • From: Canada, eh?
  • 13,375 posts
Posted by doctorwayne on Sunday, December 3, 2017 11:55 AM

I deliberately have no modelled yards on my layout - they take up too much real estate for my tastes.
Instead, I have staging yards, that serve to originate or terminate trains.  Locomotives stay on the layout, while rolling stock cycles on or off the layout, with car storage, in their specific boxes, immediately below the staging area. 

In the photo below, there are three staging areas on the lower level, the lowest having two eastbound tracks representing an interchange.  Just above, and slightly behind those, are two northbound tracks representing unmodelled industries - as many as I care to add.
Above that is the main lower staging yard, with five tracks long enough to hold mostly complete trains - the layout has lots of grades, so train length is generally short.  If I wish to run a longer train, it's split-up to include other tracks.  This yard originates northbound trains and receives southbounds.

Above that is the north staging yard, counterpart to the latter two listed above.  It has 7 stub-end tracks.

There is another two track staging yard running off the upper level, representing an interchange with another railroad.  It's in my workshop, with train access through a hole in the wall.

If I wanted to make-up or break-down trains, as would be done in a conventional yard, it's probably do-able in any of these staging areas, but my preference is to have most trains do switching chores at the industries in the towns through which they pass. 
For me, that's more interesting than a yard, and a better use of the available real estate.  If I had more space, I still wouldn't have a modelled yard, but would extend the distances between towns.

Wayne

  • Member since
    October 2017
  • 43 posts
Posted by Future4oo0 on Sunday, December 3, 2017 11:45 AM

Thanks! Looks great! 

  • Member since
    February 2001
  • From: Wyoming, where men are men, and sheep are nervous!
  • 3,392 posts
Posted by Pruitt on Sunday, December 3, 2017 11:32 AM

This was one end of my large yard on my under construction layout in South arolina. This was to represent the NP yard at Laurel MT.

  • Member since
    October 2017
  • 43 posts
Yard Pictures
Posted by Future4oo0 on Sunday, December 3, 2017 10:27 AM

Active members on this forum are you able to share pictures of your yard on your layout? I am designing mine but would love to see some examples of others. I have John Armstrongs book as it is always recommended on here but would love to see some real life examples. Scale for me is HO but all scales are welcome to show off.

Thanks!

- Andrew

Tags: layout , yard , Yard layout

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