Well Darrell; This is strickly personal on my part, but I really like the flow of traffic through the yards in the upper left corner in the second one rather than all the stub end sidings in the first. My home layout "The Last Mountain & Eastern" has lower level staging and classification yards on both sides that cannot be anything else than stub ends. It truly makes for more realistic operating when you can run through the yards in both directions. When you have that opportunity I would definately go for it. Also like the two routes into the roundhouse as well as other subtle items.
The LM&E is a fictiscious Division of the Western Pacific Railroad. We run mainly WP equipment along with their subsiduaries TS. & SN and some of other roads in the northwest. Burlington, BN, SP&S, NP. D&RGW
Looking forward to how you proceed.
Johnboy out.........................
from Saskatchewan, in the Great White North..
We have met the enemy, and he is us............ (Pogo)
BTW, Johnboy, what is it about the second plan that you prefer over the first plan? I'm always interested to learn how others view my trackplans. I can't be impartial enough on my own! LOL
Darrell, quiet...for now
Hi, Johnboy. Thanks for the comment.
The will be an aisle along the bottom of either layout plan, about 24-30". The door into the room and a closet are on the wall. The door swings into the room, hence the angled section in the lower left corner. I'll have access to the staging from that aisle.
I thought about a peninsula for the roundhouse but haven't tried to draw one in yet. The bottom of the layout will be at least 45" high to give clearance for my desk and computer on the left wall. Bookcases will be along the top and right side walls under the layout. With those things in the room, I'm not sure I can use a peninsula. I'll pull up one of the plans and give it a try and see how it works out. Great comment!
Hi Darrell,
You have studied well and executed this planning stage very well. It is NOT my favorite part of the hobby.
I like your second version the best for a number of reasons, but I only have one concern and that is the distance (reach) required over your roundhouse to those five tracks behind it. This could be problematic.
If this is all the room you have you might have to go with it, however do take a look at bringing the roundhouse out on to a penninsula in the middle and then you would gain great access to that Loco servicing area as well as those five other tracks. By the looks of it I think it would woork fine. If you can end up with 24" to 30" aisles it would work for you as there isn't going to be a lot of operators on a pike that size.
In my humble opinion, this is only a suggestion for you to ponder. Keep us posted on your progress.
Johnboy out...............................
The “Quest” continues………..in this new thread.
Here are two re-designed track plans that are variations of the plans I have been working on for several weeks. (Please see my other “Great Dream Layout Quest” thread elsewhere.)
For those of you who haven’t seen my previous plans, the layout will be in a 12’ x 10.5’ spare bedroom. There is access all along the bottom of the layout plan.
Here’s the Version 8 track plan:
Here is another, similar plan that is labeled 6-25 Layout because that’s the date I started it. (I have SO many different plans, it’s getting hard to keep track of them!)
I devised a method of comparing layouts by estimating how close a design element meets one of my 8 most important druthers. Each ‘druther’ is valued at 100 points and up to 100 points are awarded depending on how close the design element meets my druthers. The Version 8 plan rated 90% (720/800)! The 6-25 Layout plan rated 88% (700/800).
Although all the earlier plans included a roundhouse, none of them could be modified to allow enough room for my large roundhouse.
I’m not married to either plan. There are features I like and dislike about both of them. Although I don’t favor the yard design on Version 8, I think it’s possible to add a river feature in the upper right corner, which would slightly increase the 90% rating with the addition of more bridges. I also like the short siding off the main line at the top.
The 6-25 Layout plan has a better yard and might allow for a narrow river/creek in the upper right corner. It also has a better design in the lower left corner where the swing gate/lift out section will go. On both layouts, the staging in the lower right corner will be under the main town on the layout. There are sidings located in the town that is reached from the mainline on the left.
Also on both layouts, the staging area can be built about 3/4” lower than the rest of the layout. Grades into and out of staging will be about 1%. Unfortunately on the 6-25 Layout, to get enough clearance for the town sidings above the staging tracks, the grade will exceed 4%. Version 8, with a longer siding to the town, has a grade slightly over 3%. Since trains going into town will be short, I can probably live with either grade.
Comments, suggestions and criticisms are VERY welcome!
Darrell, quiet…for now