DESIGNING LAYOUT

[Anonymous]

I am currently designing a layout and I have a main line already designed on paper. I am wanting to put in industry but I am having a hard time because I am unsure on what buildings will look like because I plan to scratch building some and others I may not want to use Walther cornerstone buildings. How do plan sidings for operation if you do not know what the foot print of a building is when it has not been created. Does anyone have an idea?

[Anonymous]

Go to www.trainboard.com and join (free) and then go the layout design forum, and do a copy and paste of your question there. I will give you a hand there. Its just an easier forum to work with people's request on layout design help. Also you will have some very skilled people answer your question. I am rsn48 there.

[GerFust]

Just a thought from someone that is by no means an expert or even experienced. Selective compression allows you to make larger industries fit in smaller places. Besides that, though, why model the whole building? Other than backdrop building faces there are plenty of examples in MR of where only part of the building was created. Leaving a open view into a building that falls off the edge of the layout may allow for some interesting modeling of the interior of buildings for visitors to view.

[Anonymous]

Having spent a 23 year professional career designing and building chemical plants, trust me that it is not really possible to design something when you don't have a decent vision of what you hope to do. My suggestion is to look at what industries you want to model and what their car needs and track needs typically look like. Design around cars/tracks and fit the buildings around them. Building flats (earlier response) are a good idea to free more space for track, and my club is doing that in our new major industrial area. Model RR Planning 2003 has some good suggestions about how to model industries off-scene. I suggest you get that and look at it as well. A bulk unloading terminal of some sort would work well in a modern era setting. I am thinking about a design for a new home layout, and I am seriously considering methods to model the bulk of the industries as flats or off scene foreground to allow more space for the trains themselves. Good luck.