Model Railroader Featured Layout

 It sounds like it will be an intresting layout and fun to switch with.

It looks like it will be a good backdrop for Walthers ads... very little creativity shown in the selection of structures and details.

Just another episode of "Spending Money on our Advertisers = Model Railroading"

I will be interested to read about the operational aspect of it.  David Popp has a good eye for interesting ops. 

But will someone get him a new apron?  That thing's getting pretty ratty! 

Lee 

I, too, am interested in seeing how this new section of layout turns out. However, I wish they had provided a quick review of the existing old Troy & Northern (the only surviving section of the original MR&T) before wiping it away, so that a comparison of ideas and usage of space could have been made by readers. A missed opportunity, in my opinion.

CNJ831

Bdewoody wrote:

I hope the lack of response to this post isn't an indication that most model railroaders don't consider a shelf layout an option when space is limited.

Nope! Just means I live in the middle of nowhere and they are about 2-3 weeks behind the rest of the world in getting the new issues on the shelf.(haven't seen it yet)

I'm looking forward to this new series. I'm in the process of constructing a 2-rail O-scale shelf switching layout around three walls of a spare bedroom. The width of the shelf varies from around 16" - 18" all the way up to a max of 27" and it has approximately 33 linear feet of track. It has a hinged drop down swing leaf for staging where it crosses in front of a closet and a lift out section where it crosses in front of the bedroom door. It's high enough off the floor at 54" that it will be easy to duck under to get in and out of the room during operating sessions.

I had originally designed the benchwork for HO but ended up selling off all the HO and moved up to O-scale. I have no regrets, with the exception that there is just so much more of everything (freight cars, structures, automobiles, trucks, etc) in HO. Given that O takes up more space than HO I settled on a much simpler track plan than what I would have done in HO. It will still provide reasonably challenging switching ops and a chance to do some detailed scenic work. Since I am modeling a protype short-line it will be realistic, too.

Shelf layouts offer everything to a modeler that any sort of loop type layout does with the exception of continuous running. While continuous running is a nice thing to have sometimes, for me, switching is where it's at.

Bdewoody wrote:

I hope the lack of response to this post isn't an indication that most model railroaders don't consider a shelf layout an option when space is limited.

 Hard to find something to disagree with or comment on in your post. I guess I could add a "me too" - I looked at the Wisconsin & Southern Troy track plan on model railroader website, and I am also looking forward to getting the magazine.

 Shelf layouts are fun. And there are quite a few interesting ones out there. Here is a handful of shelf layouts from the net that I like (of the ones I know about - I am sure there are a lot of other ones out there) :

• Peter White's Tenderfoot Industrial Railroad
• Scot Osterweil's Highland Terminal  
• Rolf Knipper's Metusa Junction 
• Byron Henderson's Hoboken Shore Jr
• Peter Borcherd's Paliz Bay Railway and Navigation Company 
• Andrew Martin's small shelf layouts for operations

 And there of course has been a few great shelf plans published in Model Railroader and Model Railroad Planning. A few ones I liked, in no particular order:

• Howard Scodras Ontabec Central, in Model Railroader Feb 2005
• Jonathan Jones Mid-Atlantic & Western Ry, in Model Railroader May 2001
• Pike City Belt Line, in Model Railroader Sept 1998
• Jerry Strangarity's City Scene from Reading Co, Great Model Railroads 2003
• Linda Sand's "Industrial Switching in N and H0", Model Railroad Planning 1998
• Linda Sand's "Big-city Railroads don't require big spaces", Model Railroad Planning 1999
• Linda Sand's "Sherman Paper Co", Model Railroad Planning 2006
• Bernie Kempinskis "New York Cross Harbor", Model Railroad Planning 2003
• Dave Husman's "Two Plans for a dorm room"

 Other sources:

• Ian Rice has quite a few interesting shelf designs in his "Small, Smart and Practical Layouts"

• Carl Arendt also has a web site with a lot of small layouts http://www.carendt.com/

 I am sure there are other shelf layouts that deserve a mention. David Barrow's sectional "Cat Mountain and Santa Fe" for sure. Probably a lot more I have forgotten in this list.

 A last one - this one is not a classic - but it is mine  
 Stein Rypern's Progressive Rail 

 Grin,
 Stein

Stein,

What a great list!

By all means, please visit:

www.lancemindheim.com

His HO layout was feature in GMR 2008.

I am very interested in the newest MR project layout, and enjoyed the first article.  This is the first time I recall since possibly David Barrow's South Plains District that a long-term, several-issue project layout has been a shelf layout.

Ideally, I'd have continuous running on my next layout, but whenever I see these shelf switching layouts, even in small spaces like the space I have, they just shout "realistic" at me - extremely tempting. 

Ya know what?  It's not a 4x8 on a grass mat with Unitrack, so it's already head and shoulders above last years'.

Of course it's HO...

I'd love to see MR do an N scale project layout again.  I think the last I can remember was Lionel Strang's 2-parter on the Appalachian Central 7 years ago.

I'd like to see something in N on a small footprint (but bigger than a door) using Atlas' Code 55.  Really show how far N scale has come.

Dave Vollmer wrote:

Ya know what?  It's not a 4x8 on a grass mat with Unitrack, so it's already head and shoulders above last years'. Of course it's HO... I'd love to see MR do an N scale project layout again.  I think the last I can remember was Lionel Strang's 2-parter on the Appalachian Central 7 years ago. I'd like to see something in N on a small footprint (but bigger than a door) using Atlas' Code 55.  Really show how far N scale has come.

Although I'm not an N-scaler, I think that would be a great idea.  Perhaps have some pictures comparing the new layout with some pics from the Clinchfield and the N scale project layout they did before that one - heck if I can remember the name something with "Enfield" in it I think . 

Dave Vollmer wrote:

Ya know what?  It's not a 4x8 on a grass mat with Unitrack, so it's already head and shoulders above last years'. Of course it's HO... I'd love to see MR do an N scale project layout again.  I think the last I can remember was Lionel Strang's 2-parter on the Appalachian Central 7 years ago. I'd like to see something in N on a small footprint (but bigger than a door) using Atlas' Code 55.  Really show how far N scale has come.

Although I'm a narrow gauge Large Scale modeler (indoors), I'd also like to see a layout done in N scale, perhaps on a 4x6 using code 55 or even code 40 track with lower flanged wheels. Steam would be ideal but diesels would be better than nothing. This would perhaps show the progress that has been made in N scale. Note: I have always been interested in and tend to gravitate toward minority scales and gauges. I'd even like to see a layout in TT scale.

davekelly wrote:

Perhaps have some pictures comparing the new layout with some pics from the Clinchfield and the N scale project layout they did before that one - heck if I can remember the name something with "Enfield" in it I think .

Gordon Odegard's Enfield & Ohio.  But that goes back to Dec 1966 into early 1967, and while it was a neat layout I bet today's N scalers would laugh to see what passed for N scale cars and locomotives back then. 

Dvae Nelson

dknelson wrote:

davekelly wrote: Perhaps have some pictures comparing the new layout with some pics from the Clinchfield and the N scale project layout they did before that one - heck if I can remember the name something with "Enfield" in it I think .  Gordon Odegard's Enfield & Ohio.  But that goes back to Dec 1966 into early 1967, and while it was a neat layout I bet today's N scalers would laugh to see what passed for N scale cars and locomotives back then.  Dvae Nelson

I think I've got that in a Kalmbach book from the seventies on project railroads from MR. Seems to me the N layout used like code 100 track or something!! That one was a little before my time but I remember the Kinnickinick Ry and Dock Co. or whatever it was called from the early seventies, that was kind of a shelf layout as I recall.