Track plan comments

[T-Sax]

Hi guys,

I've recently moved to a new home and now have a four car garage available for my layout. I've taken my old layout with me as it was sectional and was easy to move. I've played around with a bit of planning on how best to use the space and this is what I've come up with: Track color code:

• Black - Mainline
• Light Green - Passing siding
• Dark Green - Yard
• Pink - Industry tracks
• Blue - Alternate track arrangement for yard (to reduce the switch ladder, this may need to be moved right to make way for the lift up section for the door)

I'm kind of freelancing but have a fondness for Santa Fe. At the moment I haven't named any where on the layout so I'm also looking for suggestions for place names that might be appropriate for the Santa Fe.

The space I have available is 24' wide by 19.5'

At the bottom of the layout diagram is a door to another room that is fixed, while at the top I intend to build a wall across the garage which I'll be putting a door in as well, although the location of the door in the top wall has not been fixed yet so I can move the door. (There is one on the diagram, but it's more there for indicating and reminding me that I should put a door in that wall).

On the right wall, towards the bottom of the plan is a window, I plan on having flattish scenery here and building a dropin backdrop for photos and operating sessions.

About a third of the way up on the left are three modules jutting out from the wall - fairly well defined in terms of buildings are the sections salvaged from a previous layout so I'm not really intending to do much more with them, but the rest of the layout is not set in stone so I can change it.

I'm looking at a minimum mainline radius of 24" - I know this should be larger but to fit the two turnback blobs in that's what would fit in my space. - The large red circles are where I imagine an operator could be positioned so I tried to leave enough space in the isle.

a bit of a description of what I had in mind might be in order:

• From the large visible staging yard on the top left travelling anti-clockwise the black mainline will pass an engine servicing facility (not planned out yet) before turning left,
• the mainline will then pass a container yard (pink industry track) before turning back at the end of the blob,
• the end of the blob will contain a city scape with a industrial yard (dark green). In the trip back towards the wall there is passing track (light green) and plenty of industrial switching,
• the mainline then exits the city, and turns to the left, passing over a small bridge over a river before turning left again (at the bottom of the picture),
• the mainline then passes through a small agricultural area with a grain elevator (at the back) and a Feed & seed agent (at the front),
• before passing in front of the (fixed) door. This scene will be a long bridge over a wide river basin with a river through the center. I invisage the whole bridge/river basin to be on a lift up section.
• Once past the bridge there will be a long passing track leading to an interchange track with another railroad crossing my mainline in the bottom right corner,
• from here the moves into a mountianous district where the mainline passes a (coal)mine (Walthers New River Mining kit). I'll be taking a page from the John Armstrong and passing the mine tracks through the backdrop to have an empties in/loads out with a complementy industry on the other side of the backdrop.
• The mainline will continue on the left turn to pass into a small town/city with a depo (behind the mainline) and an industry (if front of the mainline), before heading round the end of the blob.
• Once round the blob, I will have another industry/town, before the mainline heads back to the wall and loops round passing the coal fired power plant (complementry to the mine), and looping back (across another lift up section) into the visible staging yard at the top of the diagram.

The top to represent both east and west directions so I can stage trains here for travelling the layout either clockwise or anti-clockwise. I'd like to run some passsanger equipement, both mostly freight.

In the diagram most of the track has been drawn as straight lines and circles - mostly for getting the plan down and not worring about curve easments, I do plan on having the track meander a bit where appropriate and building scenery that would cause the track to curve.

So comments, suggestions, and critque welcome.

Russell
PS. Happy Easter

PPS. Below are some shots of the layout at the previous address:

[T-Sax]

Forgot to mention - it's HO.

[wmshay06]

Russell

A few thoughts, starting from the bottom of the plan

The industry spurs left of the door access seem short, can they be extended?

Move the interchange track on the bottom right to the inside of the space, and maybe include another siding or two. These could act as a small interchange yard and make it easier to move cars off the RR.

The passing track on the second blob seems a little short, can it be extended?  Otherwise it might be a problem when a passenger train is at the station and a freight needs to get by.

Make a bit more of the space across the aisle from the staging yard in the second blob - perhaps some sort of mine equipment plant with multiple tracks.

Having that many turnouts on the upper door liftout/access is going to pose a bit of a construction problem.  It might be best to move these off that.  Yes that will shorten some of the staging tracks, but they look generous already as compared to the lenght og most passing sidings.

Charles

[dehusman]

Overall the plan looks OK.  The container yard looks a bit close to the main track. it needs to separated so the straddle crane can bridge over the track or the packers can drive to the other side of the tracks.   Are you sure you want a coal mine?  The ATSF wasn't known as a coal hauling road.  Rock, aggregates, ores or grain would be more typical of the ATSF

[BroadwayLion]

As long as your cat approves, then it is ok.

ROAR

[T-Sax]

Thanks for your comments guys,

@Charlies:
Re the short industry to the left of the door, you are right, they couls be extended, it was more of a case for me to put something there as an indication, rather than an actual length - I'll probably operate a bit once I get that track area built and see if more lenght is required - I suspect that I'll want probably just a couple of cars on the inside siding, but the outside siding might be about 4-5 cars.
I'm not sure what you ment by moving the interchange track to the inside of the main, if you can post some sort of plan I would appreciate it. Re: the extra industries in this area - I might do that, but was sort of thinking that the interchange would happen somewhere out of the way of industries. I'll think about that....
Re: Passing track on second (upper) blob - yes you are right, I'll probably extend that as well - thanks for pointing that out.
Re: Make a bit more of the space across the aisle from the staging yard in the second blob - I hadn't actually thought about what sort of industry would put there - a multi track equipement plant might be appropriate (though I'll probably just put in 1 turnout until I can affort the rest, but I will leave space for more). I was thinking that leaving the isle free for the yard operators might be a good idea.
Re: turnouts on the liftout/door section - yes I had the same thought, that was why I cam up with the blue track that I could then slide to the right. The door position is not fixed yet (no wall built) so I can vary that - I was thinking the less track crossing the door liftout the better - also probably better to not have anywhere where I would be leaving engines/cars on the liftout in case I forgert they are there when I go to lift it. I know I'm going to have some fun with wiring that area as I don't want to have trains crashing to the floor when the section is lifted - but that's a discussion for another thread.
Thanks again for your comments Charles.

@Dave (dehusman)
Yes the container yard does seem a bit close to the tracks - this was the second time I drew them and in the first incarnation I did have the container yard about twice as far from the mainline, and I will probably build it that way - I want to include a fence around the container yard as well so will need to leave space between the yard tracks and the mainline (well spotted).
Re: the coal mine - not sure it has to be coal - I do have some ATSF coal cars, but I guess they could have been filled anywhere, not necessarly at an on line mine. Rock, aggregates or ores could also be sourced from the mine, I'll just need to put a complementary industry on the other side of the backdrop - something to think about.
Thank you for your thoughts Dave.

I do have access to a room that would be below the bottom right of the plan, I might extend the interchange track into this room (which I thought I might make the dispatchers office if I go to that extent) and put a 3-4 track staging area along a wall in here - I'll have to have a look at where the wall studs are, as well as if, and where, any electrics, etc are too. This might be one of those possible extenstions I do once most of the rest of the track work has been put in place.

Russell

[wmshay06]

Russell

Pardon my bad drawing, but this illustrates the suggested revision on the interchange

Hope this helps

Charles

 

 

[Schuylkill and Susquehanna]

T-Sax,

First, off, I like the large staging area around the back of the plan.  I can't tell you how many great plans I've seen online that couldn't be operated because there was not staging.  Stick with compound yard ladders no matter where the ends of the yard are positioned.  The compound ladder will give you more yard space available to store trains.

I love the empties-loads connection between the mine and the power plant.  My main comment is that both industries seem too small for the size of the industry tracks.  The mine would actually be a mine/processing plant, and the power plant looks a bit small unless it only provides power to a single large industry.  I'd recommend kitbashing a mine using 2 or more New River Mining kits, and have a photo backdrop behing the planned power plant.

The upper peninsula looks great, and it's neat because of the long stretch of single track line.  Unfortunately, that single track will be a bottleneck when the layout is operated, and the only passing siding on it (the one on the lower side) looks woefully short.  In addition, you have a small industry (another mine perhaps?) marked on the top of the peninsula as well as the power plant.  The positioning looks great, but there is no sunaround track to allow you to switch the industries.  If I were you, I'd move the compound yard ladder (the plan in blue) to the left to clear the door, and then start the passing siding the the left end of the duckunder, before the curve.  The siding should then continue around the curve and end about where the turnout is for the small industry.  In addition, I would lengthen the siding in the small town to allow trains to pass, and make it a "whistle stop" instead of having a large station.

Personally, I think that the upper peninsula would look great with mountain scenery, and it would fit in great with the small industry, small town, and coal mine.  (The ATSF did haul coal, though it wasn't big-time like the PRR and Reading RRs.  It had multiple mines along its route, and you would see coal trains running.)  The tracks on the paninsula seem unusually straight.  The ATSF would have laid the tracks along the ridge lines, so adding a couple gentle curves would be more astetically pleasing.  A tunnel or two would help as well.

I love your city plan (wish I had room for the same arrangement!), but the intermodal yard tracks seem a bit long.  Consider shortening them so that they end about a foot before the backdrop does to allow space for containers, and still keep the yard from being visible from the other side of the peininsula.  On the other side, the industry (grainery maybe?) sidings look good, but you may need to add a third track there to allow for trains to pass and allow runaround moves when the industry sidings are full.

I can visualize trains leaving the staging yard (with a mountain backdrop) and passing by a power plant situated at the base of tall mountains, winding their way up past a small coal mine, swinging around the end of a ridge (and possibly passing through a tunnel), beofre rolling through a small town.  From there, the train would start downhill, winding through the mountains, until it passes a large coal mine.  From there, the scenery would gradually flatten out until it passed across a juncion with a foreign road - with gentle hills and distant mountains on the backdrop.  At the interchange the grade would ease to a slight slope (1% or less), and the train would continue across small river, and past a couple lone industries (there should probably be a short, 4 foot runaround track here for the industries), before the track finally flattens out and the train rolls into the city.  The train moves through a grimy industrial district (EPA would have a fit) and past stunning cityscapes...  It then rounds a sharp curve, and the scenery changes to flatlands/country.  The train rills past an imposing grain elevator, before passing behind a large diesel engine terminal and returning to staging.

Sorry, kind of got carried away.  It still was the best way to convey what I'm thinking, though.

Ok, back to topic.  The plan looks great, and I like the wide isles for the operators.  I use CADrail to plan too, and you can change the measurements to inches by going to Options: Preferences, and changing the units to feet under the "Current Drawing Setup" tab.

The layout plan looks great, but there are a couple locations where an s-curve is formed by a mainline curve and a turnout's diverging route, such as on the right side near the interchange.  These can be corrected by flipping the turnout.  The mainline could then continue through the diverging route of the turnout.

Once again, the plan looks great.

S&S

[T-Sax]

Thanks again for yor comments guys - please keep them coming.

@Broadway Lion: The cat approves as long as I don't run trains at her (but it is fun to watch her play with the boxcars as the come and go).

@S&S:Your visualisation of the train leaving the yard and travelling clockwise is pretty much what I had in mind. Although at this stage I don't plan on having any elevation changes, I might when I get round to building the upper pensiular (blob).
I've incorporated a lot of the suggestions so far, though I think I'll keep the passing siding for the interchange outside the mainline so I can possibly, in future, go through the wall into the next room for a 2-4 track staging yard for the interchange.
Although the plan at this point calls for a lot of straight lines I do plan on implementing with some gentle curves, it's just easier to put in straight lines.

Looking at the plan, I'm thinking I might make the benchwork wider in a few places (namely at the East end Staging corner turning towards the interchange yard) to allow for more scenery around the tracks.

I've included v2 of the plan incorporating some of the suggestions made so far and I'm very please with it except that I'm not sure where to put passanger platforms for the city without encroching on the isles too much. (I've also converted all measurements to imperial - sorry guys, metric is the rule where I am and other than track spacing and minimum radius, I think better in meters.) Russell

[Schuylkill and Susquehanna]

I like this plan!

The addition of the interchange staging will add a lot to operations.  You might want to consider either double-tracking between the small town and the coal mine (continuous passing siding) or moving the right turnout for the town passing siding to the left a bit and adding a tunnel there.  With current setup, it will feel like trains are running from one town right into the next.  A little more separation or a tunnel will break up the scenes.

There is an s-curve at the left end of the small town, and one at each end of the coal mine area.  These areas will cause problems when running 80 foot cars.

I like the revised yard with dual engine terminals, looks good.

Sorry about the confusion over the intermodal yard.  A passing siding would still help there, though.  The siding could be added to the isle side of the tracks, and the isle decreased to about 26" wide.  This will still be plenty wide enough for operations, and you have the nearby wider spot at the corner if people need to pass.

I like the siding on the upper side of the upper peninsula.  It will allow you to easily switch the small mine and the power plant, though the run to the plant is still a little ways.  You might want to consider moving the siding closer to the plant to make switching even easier.

My final comment is that the yard lead in the city area is a little short.  When switching the yard, it would be helpful if you could pull the cur of cars all the way out to the final crossover before shoving to allow you to make a longer train.  Were this my plan, I would move the end curve over a bit, and extend the lead over the creek and at least partway around the curve.

The revised plan is looking great.  No problem with metric, it's just you don't see much of it in Pennsylvania.  Been a while since I measured in centimeters and meters, so it kind of threw me for a loop.

Once again, the plan is looking good.  You'll have to post pictures of the layout as you build it.  It would be interesting to se how it comes along...

S&S

[Paulus Jas]

Hi,

I am not yet completely sure about the way you envision operating on your layout. Is your staging yard also used for classification? If so dedicated yard leads might be needed.

When however all main line freights are leaving staging and heading for a central subdivision point where blocks of cars for wayfreights and locals are set out and blocks of cars can be picked up a revision of your city yard might be needed. Since wayfreights and locals start their journey here as well, this yard can easily become to busy, when not properly designed. However placement of the engine terminal near the staging tracks suggest trains are not made up in the station at bottom of the upper peninsula.

Other issues are trainlength and the number of trains running at the same time. While all sidings allow running 6 ft long trains most staging tracks are about 15 ft long, some even longer. When more trains are running at the same time, the not evenly spread sidings might create dispatching problems. 

BTW how do you envision your coal mine operation? Like on the Clichfield layout by the Model Railroader staff? Where whole trains with engines were going through the double sided backdrop. Or are only coal hoppers passing through? Then a lot of additional switching will be going on.  

The overall scheme is great, so are the scenic possibilities; though a lot of questions are remaining.

Smile

Paul 

[T-Sax]

Thanks S&S and Paul for your comments - I'm still thinking through some of those suggestions.

For the lower blob I've added passing siding to the end of the curve with the intention that the passing siding could be the start of the A/D tracks for the city yard.

The left three sections (where all the city industry tracks are) have been salvaged from my previous layout - I'm not intending to do too much to the layout of the tracks here. I haven't settled on the lower (left end) curve out of the city yet and may in fact remove the bridge/stream here so that the curve can be brought away from the back further and extend the yard lead track at the left end of the city.

I'm also not entirly happy with the yard tracks on the right of the city either - suggestions for here are welcome.

For the staging yards I'm a long way from getting to building that section (I need to clean out the garage yet and hopefully line the walls first - $$$ pending).

I'm aware of the potentual of S-Curves and when it comes time to actually layout the track I'll be using paper templates first to check all for any S-Curves. I'm still not happe about the track layout at the mine/power plant scene yet. I'm thinking about reducing to two tracks (removing the inside track closest to the mainline), but I'm not particularly happy with the lead to the power plant. I'm thinking about adding an extra lead across the door access lift up section.

Paul
Thanks for your comments - I'm thinking I'll operate the coal mine / power plant by pulling/shoving full/empties only, the engine won't go throught the backdrop.

I'm still thinking about the staging - my thoughts was that if I make them long enought I could stage two trains on each track - not sure about how that would work yet.

At this stage I don't have other people to operate the layout with (the local train people are mostly focused on Australian trains - not American so I haven't joined any clubs - none that I know about in my local area). I think I'd have one other person to call on, but I think I'll mostly be operating solo, so I'm thinking about that, but I don't want to exlude the possibilty that others will operate at some time in the future.

I'm thinking that there are a few trains to run on this layout, the following table is what I had in mind:

Description	Origin	Mid Point	Destination
Industry Switcher	City Yard		City Yard
Interchange Turn	City Yard	Interchange	City Yard
East Intermodal	West End Staging	Intermodal Yard	East End Staging
West Intermodal	East End Staging	Intermodal Yard	West End Staging
East Freight(s)	West End Staging		East End Staging
West Freight(s)	East End Staging		West End Staging
East Passanger(s)	West End Staging		East End Staging
West Passanger(s)	East End Staging		West End Staging
Coal Mine Pickup East	East End Staging	Coal Mine	East End Staging
Coal Mine Pickup West	West End Staging	Coal Mine	West End Staging
Power Station Coal Dropoff East	East End Staging	Power Station	East End Staging
Power Station Coal Dropoff West	West End Staging	Power Station	West End Staging
Grain Unit Train East	West End Staging		East End Staging
Grain Unit Train West	East End Staging		West End Staging

Any suggestions on other trains to run would be welcome.

Russell

[Texas Zepher]

T-Sax

I'm kind of freelancing but have a fondness for Santa Fe. At the moment I haven't named any where on the layout so I'm also looking for suggestions for place names that might be appropriate for the Santa Fe.

Even before merger mania the Santa Fe was a massive railroad.

It covers:

Midwest corn fields of Iowa
Urban Chicago/Kansas City/Dallas/Denver
Wheat fields of Kansas
Red dirt of Oklahoma
Ranches, oil fields, and Gulf docks of Texas
desolate eastern Colorado/Oklahoma scrub plains
the mountains of the Raton
the mountains of Central Arizona (Flagstaff)
the mountains of California (Teapachii, Cajon)
the deserts of New Mexico, Arizona, & eastern California
California Produce
The Pacific Coast

Route 66
Hollywood
Grand Canyon
Dodge City

Choose a general area or theme and I can find help you find some place on the Santa Fe that fits.

[Paulus Jas]

T-sax,

here is a schematic of your main yard with a few remarks

BTW David Barrow's urban Texas layout (Cat Mountain & Sante Fe) is very well known.

Paul

[gpa]

I see you've extended some passing sidings, but I'd make them al as long as my yard tracks, or longest train.

[dehusman]

T-Sax

Re: the coal mine - not sure it has to be coal - I do have some ATSF coal cars, but I guess they could have been filled anywhere, not necessarly at an on line mine. Rock, aggregates or ores could also be sourced from the mine, I'll just need to put a complementary industry on the other side of the backdrop - something to think about.

You have Santa Fe HOPPER cars.   They are only coal cars if you load them with coal.  If you load them with rock they are rock cars.  <G>

[T-Sax]

Well it's been a while since I posted to this thread and I've been thinking about what to do with the upper right blob. I haven't been entirly happy with my design so far.

So after a bit of thought, this is pretty much what I've come up with as an alternative: Legend:

Color:	Track Type:
Black	Main Line
Light Green	Passing Siding
Dark Green	Yard Tracks
Pink	Industry
Purple	Branch Line
Blue	Hidden Staging

I loose the complementary coal mine / power station loads in / empties out, but I gain a couple of other things I was missing on the previous design. This way I gain:

• West End Yard Lead
• A branch line
• Elevation change - the Purple track climbs to +4" where it crosses over the mainline at a max 2% grade
• Hidden staging - under the upper right blob - dropping down to -4" under the mainline

I know that there are a lot of tracks parallel to the edge of the baseboard, I just haven't spent the time to have them meander on the drawing.

---

dehusman

You have Santa Fe HOPPER cars.   They are only coal cars if you load them with coal.  If you load them with rock they are rock cars.  <G>

I realise that I can load the hoppers with whatever is necessary, but these cars already have coal in them - so by default they are coal cars.

---

Paulus Jas

here is a schematic of your main yard with a few remarks

BTW David Barrow's urban Texas layout (Cat Mountain & Sante Fe) is very well known.

Hi Paul, thanks for your comments and posting the city schematic. I actually modelled the way I built my first 5 modules on David Barrow's Cat Mountain modules.
I'm thinking that I'll probably modify the city yard blob on the following schematic. So that it looks like this...

---

As always folks, I'm interested in your comments and insights.

Russell

[stilson4283]

Looking at the branch, I would extend the run-around, otherwise when you come up with coal cars for all three tracks in the mine there is no way to run-around your train.  If you move the left switch to be in line with the rest of the switches for the mine you should be close.  

Chris

[Schuylkill and Susquehanna]

I agree with STILSON, the runaround should be longer.  Can you imagine trying to run around a 15 car train 3 cars at a time?  I've done it.  It's very time consuming.

My one friend makes and sells coal loads for hoppers.

 

RDGRail Custom Coal Loads

https://www.facebook.com/Rdgrail?ref=stream

http://www.ebay.com/itm/281086114484?ssPageName=STRK%3AMESELX%3AIT&_trksid=p3984.m1586.l2649

 

 

The track plan is looking good!

S&S

[raptorengineer]

hi

ok i got to say neat layout plan. what program did you use for that track plan?

[SpaceMouse]

T-Sax

I haven't been entirly happy with my design so far.

Right now I get the feeling that this plan has the motivation, "I've got this space and I want to see how I can fill it."

I think the reason you are not happy with what you have come up with is that it lacks a driving vision. You like Santa Fe. Great place to start. But you have an intermodal yard, that suggest BNSF. You know you like operations. You know the value of staging. 

So you've got a great space. My suggestion is to dig a little--first of all into yourself as to what you need to have a great layout. Then maybe read a few books, look at Google Earth, find a time and place that really strikes your fancy, maybe challenges you. Get inspired to build the layout of your dreams.

What you don't want is drop a couple grand and then find your inspiration.  

[T-Sax]

Hi Guys,
I've been thinking about what you've said (and ticking some stuff off the "Honey do" list).

Chris (Stilson4283) and S&S - I've redesigned the branch line so that it now looks like this:
(As ususal, Mainline is black, Passing sidings light green, Yard is dark green, Branch line is purple, Industries are pink, and Hidden staging under the layout is blue.)

Raptorengineer - I'm using CadRail to produce my track plans.

SpaceMouse - Thanks for your insight - you're probably right in that I'm trying to "fill the space I have" but at the same time I do like intermodal traffic and I did start out railroading with Santa Fe, but also liked BN. So I could model both, or BNSF, or because I can, imagine that SF just swallowed BN or another line and continued to today with the intermodal traffic.

At this stage, my most pressing tasks are to line the walls and ceiling of the garage, and get some power points put in, and lower the height of the legs I've salvaged from the previous layout so that it will fit under the window.

After that I'll set up the salvaged modules, lay a bit of extra track and run some trains until I've got some more money and time for more building. Meantime I can dream and do a bit of research.

Russell

[Paulus Jas]

Hi Russel,

you might widen the stem of the peninsula, quite possible both at the bottom and the top.

This way you would gain a bit more space for scenery and for the branch.

Smile

Paul