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[quote]QUOTE: Originally posted by leighant Now your plan has got LOTS of crossovers...three pairs I believe. I notice all of the crossovers are in the middle of tangents (stretches of straight track). Sometimes it helps to put crossovers at the beginning of a curve, letting the curved of the crossover turnouts form part of the curve. I wrote a little article about this in last years Model Railroad Planning 2005 Here is a rough drawing.[/quote] Leighant, Sir, first let me take the time to thank you for your much appreciated input. I have found your advice and comments to be both thought provoking and challenging. I acquired a copy of 2005’s Model Railroad Planning yesterday and look forward to reading your article; it looks like it will help me a lot and may save me a great deal of space. [quote]QUOTE: Runarounds are important. I notice your plan shows runarounds on two of the spurs in what looks like a small yard on the right side of the drawing. The runarounds are only long enough for one or two cars, and they take away greatly from the otherwise useable length of those spurs. A yard this small probably needs only one runaround, and if your mainline is not too busy, the right and left hand crossovers could be moved far enough apart to allow a locomotive to run around three or four cars. Another possibility is a yard lead that comes off the main several car lengths back from the yard ladder and connects back to the main further down. That way the lead can be used both as a lead and as a runaround, with a switcher leaving cars on the lead while it quickly goes out on the main to get around to the other end of the cars. Your yard on the left side seems somewhat small. Yards do NOT have to be all straight. Letting a lead into the yard begin on the bottom part of the drawing would add more useable length. It does not look like you can cut a switch for the yard into the top of the plan because of the width of layout taken up by the base of the wye. However, the stub ends of the yard spurs could curve around a bit on the inside of the mainline curve at upper left, to add 2 or 3 car lengths. I am trying to squeeze in a way to have yard tracks that can handle a 6, 8 or 9 car train.[/quote] I must admit, to my embarrassment, that I completely forgot to put a decent lead track into (what I hope will be Winslow) yard. But a quick run back to my copy of Frank Ellison on Model Railroads helped me see where I had messed up. I would rather not use the main as part of the Lead’s runaround but I simply may have no choice with my space limitation; I shy away from it only because I had “don’t foul the main” driven into my head as first advice when I got into the hobby. Also I may simply be operating too far above the bar here. I have a scant years worth of experience in the hobby; most of which has been spent reading the grand old men, Armstrong and Ellison and getting fine advice here from good guys such as TZ and Space Mouse and so many others I could possibly name them all. The end result of this is that I often receive good advice that I have no understanding of *chuckles* and so off I go to study and puzzle my puzzler till I get it. [quote]QUOTE: By the way, I have been doing some prototype research on the Santa Fe in the area you plan to model. There was an article in Trains magaine January 2003 on operations and signaling on this particular segment of the ATSF. Even if prototype signalling is too complicated to consider, it has some useable information with schematic track diagrams of EACH TOWN and yard in the area you are modeling.[/quote] What fantastic news! I went to Kalmbach’s back issue page and sent off for this issue as well as the December 1997 issue or Trains that has an article on ‘Hot spot” Holbrook, Arizona’ and the 2000 issue of Railfan & Railroad with an article on ‘Route 66: Main Street of the Southwest’ – like a silly fool I never even thought to check back issues of Trains. Thank you so much this has been a great boon and I’ve sent off any further redesign until I can get a look at the schematics track diagrams you’ve mentioned; something I have been looking for several months now [quote]QUOTE: The article mentions that Santa Fe double track ran left-hand through this part of Arizona, with each track signaled one-way. Trains could not cross-over by signal indication to allow one train to overtake another, so wrong-hand running was rare, except for short local distances to access switching an industrial siding or part of a yard. Sidings off to the side were provided every ten miles or so to allow slower trains to move out of the way of higher-priority trains. Don't know how strictly you would want to adhere to that....[/quote] Here my ignorance shows. I am afraid I don’t understand the meaning of “Santa Fe double track ran left-hand”. Left-hand running- Right-hand running? Could you possibly educate me on this, it would be greatly appreciated. As to the sidings every ten miles; if I had more space it would be nice, I think, to put at least a suggestion or tip of the hat into the layout of this. I do happen to have a pretty good Super Chief set and would like to run it someday and such sidings would add to possible operations enjoyment of doing that I think. [quote]QUOTE: Some other info from looking at the Trains Jan03 article, WW2 era employee timetable and other sources-- railroad-served industries in this part of Arizona: ice plant for making ice and servicing through trains of refrigerator cars (reefer loads did not originate in your modeled area but in southern California, central California and Phoenix line and ran THROUGH your scene)... bulk petroleum dealer which receives tankcar loads of oil and gas and supplies nearby service stations by tanker truck... stockyard for loading cattle and other livestock... feed dealers for above livestock and related farm supplies... lumber and forest products interchanged at Holbrook from Apache Railroad, and lumber in the forested area around Falstaff. a power plant (coal burning?) near Joseph City but I do not know whether this existed in the 1950s. I could not find evidence for a lot of lineside industries in this area-- primarily the servicing of through trains.[/quote] Again Fantastic! This is the sort of info I have been scraping to find. I do know of the Ralston Purina plant in the area and from what I have been able to find the Power Plant near Joseph City should have been there in the 1953-54 time period (my info on this may be wrong however). [quote]QUOTE: Yards- diagram in Trains shows Holbrook yard 6 tracks wide, Winslow 10 tracks wide, Flagstaff- oops, I forgot to note. Wyes- Winslow, with 340 foot tail (about 4 feet in HO) Angell, with 550 foot tail (7 feet in HO) Flagstaff, with 170 foot tail (about 2 feet in HO, just long enough for a locomotive and tender and maybe one car) I am used to seeing wyes where a mainline railroad connects with a branch, OR where there is a wye or near a passenger station where a full-length passenger train can be turned. None of the real-life wyes in this part of Arizona fit that situation, and the Apache Railroad does not seem to have been connected to ATSF with a wye connection.[/quote] Wonderful information, again none of which I’ve ever encountered until now. You’ve helped turn on a light in the dark room I was just fumbling around in *chuckles*. No the Apache Railroad doesn’t connect with a wye from what I have been able to find out either, I’d love to have a connection to it but again that old bugaboo of space, ah well. Thank you again so much for this great lead and information it will be put to good use. Peace. Coyote P.S. My apologies for rambling on so, but this information has gotten me excited about all this again. [;)]
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