Hello from the UK.
I am fascinated by the fact that many North American layouts are built on two levels. Can I be enlightened as to what is the attraction, other than to pack even more into the space available. I have visited one split level HO layout at a club in the UK and found the whole thing very distracting. It was difficult to get an overview and the whole arrangement just seemed over complicated and claustrophobic. I have never seem a similar split level layout based on UK railways. Maybe big is beautiful in North America.
Certainly wanting to pack more layout into the fixed space is one reason for multi-deck layouts (and I recall an article in Model Railroad Planning about an around-the-walls 6 or 7 deck layout that a guy built in the dining room of his house!). Years ago layout planners would double or even triple back against themselves so the trains would run back and forth across the same scene in a very unrealistic manner. If you want a long mainline run (and many of us do), your choices are the old fashioned spaghetti bowl track plan (or as one MR article called it "a pail of snakes") or multi deck.
But a major reason has more to do with how many layouts in the US are operated versus what I have seen and read about UK layouts. The goal of many layouts in the US is to replicate the complexity of operating opposing trains on a single track railroad, using passing sidings, and controlled using the same timetables and train order operations that the prototype railroads used to use. In order for timetable and train order ("T&TO") operation to make sense you need fairly extensive runs that take up real time to do, even if you have a fast clock. Unless it is very large, or unless you are content with just a "flavor" of T&TO operation, a single deck layout just doesn't give you enough of a railroad to have the system make any sense or be any fun. You want both the origination and the destination to be part of the layout in other words, plus everything in between (origination and destination might one or both be staging yards and not truly modeled).
A "mere" scale mile of track (60 feet in HO) while more than ample for a layout which looks at a single locale, say, a compex junction, or an important station, and watches the trains go to and fro, just is not enough to make sense of meets and passes, governed not by signals but by timetables and train orders laboriously dictated by the dispatcher to operators. Dictating and copying a train order takes as long on a model railroad as it does on the prototype, and in that period even a slow moving train will have moved most of if not all of that 60 feet of track.
There are also differences in American railroading that account for the difference. Lengths of locomotives, of freight and passenger cars, and of most trains, and the frequency of trains, are very different between the two. And our track plans reflect this.
Most UK layouts I have seen emphasize passenger trains. American layouts tend to emphasize freight trains. Our prototype freights are very long trains, and in order not to look absurd, you need (scale) miles of track for them to look their best.
I can say that personally I do not care much for the physical discomfort of trying to run trains on a double deck layout. I am 6'8" and that lower level is torture for me. So my layout is single deck (and very high) BUT I am also adjusting the type of railroading I do to suit that single deck. And that means giving up types of trains and operations that I really enjoy. But I can also say that looking at a photo or video of a multi deck layout looks like an absurd unreality, but once you actually get to operating you concentrate on your train and on your level. It is hardly the only example of things we tend not to see - or pretend we do see. Like a real sky.
Dave Nelson
I suspect a double-deck layout is a bit like getting your first pair of bifocals - it's takes a little while to get used to, but once you do, it's not a problem. Also, from what I understand, viewing a double-deck layout is different than operating on one. Once you are running a train, your mind tends to focus in on that level only; you don't really notice the other level.
Also, many UK layouts are built to be operated at train shows, rather than as a permanent home layout. Fewer UK folks have access to a large home space like a basement to build a layout in. I would not expect anyone to build a portable double-deck layout, though I suppose it's technically possible.
I wouldn't say many either. I'd wager there's very very few of them.
I don't know how many people in the US actually have built double-deck home layouts, but I suspect it's much lower than the percentage of such layouts featured in the magazines. It seems to me that large, double-deck home layouts designed to be operated by multiple people tend to be the layouts featured in MR and RMC.
NittanyLionI wouldn't say many either. I'd wager there's very very few of them.
Five of the HOME layouts I operate on are double decked.
Hornblower
I have a two level "home" layout.
https://kaleyyard.files.wordpress.com/2019/08/img_0292.jpgI
This is a photo from a few years ago when the layout was in development. My reason for taking the two level route was two fold;
The two deck approach with helix allows me to do this.
Trevor
hornblower NittanyLion I wouldn't say many either. I'd wager there's very very few of them. Five of the HOME layouts I operate on are double decked.
NittanyLion I wouldn't say many either. I'd wager there's very very few of them.
Yes, and? There's a guy not far from me that owns a Ford GT40 and has a friend that owns another. I've seen both parked in his driveway. This doesn't make GT40s common. That pair represents 2 percent of all the GT40s in the world.
It doesn't appeal to all of us.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
Well, there are "two deck" layouts and then there are "two deck layouts". To clarify, I've built two 2 deckers but the lower level was simply for staging. The max clearance was 14-15 inches, and just enough to get to the 6 tracks of staging.
Having two scenicked decks is certainly doable, but I believe I would find it hard to fully enjoy the lower deck due to access (manually & visually) and perhaps difficult to enjoy the upper deck due to its height.
But that is just my take on the subject, and we all are fully entitled to have our own of course.
ENJOY !
Mobilman44
Living in southeast Texas, formerly modeling the "postwar" Santa Fe and Illinois Central
We have three levels at the club. It certainly allows for more simultaneous operations/operators. Two levels would have been sufficient.
Simon
I had a minimal lower level for my subways, barely a few inches below the main layout. It was basically a loop with a couple of sidings. It ran independently of the tracks above. It was fun to build, but it really couldn't be "operated."
I wouldn't build a multi-level layout again.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
Technically I have a double deck, but only for branch line and staging connect to the upper level by a helix.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
NittanyLionNittanyLion wrote the following post 22 hours ago: hornblower NittanyLion I wouldn't say many either. I'd wager there's very very few of them. Five of the HOME layouts I operate on are double decked. Yes, and? There's a guy not far from me that owns a Ford GT40 and has a friend that owns another. I've seen both parked in his driveway. This doesn't make GT40s common. That pair represents 2 percent of all the GT40s in the world.
I was simply saying that two deck layouts are NOT uncommon in Southern California. I used to operate with the Los Angeles Model Railroad Society until they lost their lease. They have secured a new location and are currently building a two deck layout. Hopefully, I'll get to operate on that layout soon.
Car shows around here always have huge corrals for Cobra's, GT40's, Daytona Coupe's and other Shelby inspired cars. So just because something is uncommon in your area doesn't necessarily mean it is equally uncommon somewhere else.