yard design

[Rick Bradley]

Hi there, i was wondering if anyone could help me in making up my mind on how to design my yard? I have drawn it, re-drawn and re-designed and re-drawn, but cannot seem to decide on how to place my track. I have torn down my layout three time now. It is getting fustrating. Could someone provide me some samples of their yards to give my some fresh ideas? I have just about all i need to make a good yard area, roundhouse, turntable, coaling tower, sanding tower and whatever else is needed, i even have the book on yards. I think my problem is that my space that is available is too limited, 2 feet by about 12 feet. Thanks for the help in advance.[:D]

[Anonymous]

Are you any good at analysis? (I don't mean the lay-back-on-a-couch kind).
We can give you more ideas but you already have experience and the book.
What was wrong for you with the previous yards and plans?
Can you list the pros and cons of each? (Not necessarily for us... just to give yourself an idea).
What were you trying to achieve? What did you achieve? What problems occured?
Can you see ways of using this information?
Not seeing what you've had and considered it's difficult to contribute.
The space isn't to bad - you don't say what scale you are in though.
Is that the total space or can you add "off scene" staging tracks?
It would also be useful to know era, location,traffic and any specifics you want to build in.
This itself won't help much but your answers will help us to make useful suggestions

Have fun[:P]

[TBat55]

Don't know if you've seen this, but it helped me:

The "10 Commandments" of yard design - http://www.housatonicrr.com/yard_des.html

Engine servicing facilities can be small or large.

[Rick Bradley]

thas my problem i cannot decide what era, i am modeling HO, if i can figure out how to put the link on here i have acouple pic of my layout on photobucket. thankyou for the link to the site on the ten commandments, that may help with my issues

[SpaceMouse]

No offense, but until you decide things like what era, road name, what part of the country, if you are modeling a branch line, short line, mainline, passenger operations, a coal mine, an interchange, etc. you can't design a yard to fit your layout

If you don't know these things designing a layout is like painting a room before you hang the drywall.

[Rick Bradley]

I am starting to think raising my daughter's and planning their life is going to be eaiser than planning this rairoad [:D]
I thought a railroad was to be flexible, be able to accomadate all the above?
Excuse my daughter just found the baby powder [}:)]

[Rick Bradley]

Ok here what i've got, Steam probaly late like 45-50, road name, NYC and CN, thats what i got the most of. I have a new river coal mine, gravel mine, 6 stall roundhouse, round table, I don't really understand the difference between short and mainline other than the size, i can still have passenger on shortline right? All i know is that i really want to be able to switch things, i have 4 switchers itching to move things around, but i don't have the ability to design a proper functioning switching yard, that looks like i could do something with

[pcarrell]

This site has several pages about yard design that might help.

http://www.vetmed.auburn.edu/~smithbf/BFSpages/LDSIGprimer/TOC.html

Also, in my signature is a photobuket account. Click on it and then go to the track plans link. There's some in there that might help. A word of caution though; Not everything in there is a great plan. Some of them are stillborn designs. I use them more for "brain food". If you like one in there, you're welcome to copy it, post it, and get ideas on how to tweek it to make it better. All of the plans are done with the Atlas RTS 7.0 program, and I save most of them, so if you want one I can probably Email you the .ral file so you can just plug it in to the Atlas program on your computer and start goofing with it right away. Also, be advised that most of the plans are in N scale, so you'll have to make a few adjustments for HO.

[jeffrey-wimberly]

Tips about yard design.
1. Don't try to cram a lot of tracks into a small space. Why? If the tracks are close together and a car derails and goes over, ever heard of the domino effect?
2. Give yourself at least one staging track and have it connected to the main at both ends. Two would be better. This gives you plenty of area to make up and break up trains.
3. Don't make spur tracks that are going to trap your locomotive behind a line of cars. Always have an escape route.
4. And most important, Don't try to make a complex design. The more complex a design, the more things can go wrong because of a simple mistake.

Simplicity of design is simplicity of operation. I'm in the hobby to have fun running trains, not trying to find my way out of a rubics cube switchyard.

[Anonymous]

Well you've sort of helped yourself to an era. You have coaling tower ,roundhouse,etc, so you're doing steam,so figure if you want pre-war,war, postwar,or transition era. 2x 12, although not small, limits you to a smaller yard considering the space turntables and service area take up. Is the yard on an end of layout or in the middle so it has thru traffic, also is it going to be a division point or just an area to drop cars for local freights? Your best bet is to layout yard on floor or if area's already built, on layout board and do several variations to see which looks best before you actually make it permanent.

[cuyama]

Three excellent printed references:

The Layout Design SIG Journal Special Issue on Yards -- LDJ#7, June 1992 ... back issue information
This is a very good publication and includes the article that was the inspiration for the "10 Commandments" posted earlier

Andy Sperandeo's book The Model Railroader's Guide to Freight Yards

Or you could do what many have done with good results and simply copy one of the yard designs suggested in John Armstrong's book Track Planning for Realistic Operation.

Armstrong's book is a must-read if you are doing your own tack planning, IMHO. Then you'll know not only how, but why the yards are designed in the fashion they are.

Regards,

Byron

[markpierce]

A shortline rarely had specialized switchers unless it was an industrial shortline. If you are planning on having both road and switching locomotives, I'd model a mainline railroad, but that covers a lot of territory. I'd make a list of the possible types of equipment I intended to have and then check out NMRA's recommended practices for minimum radius and turnout number. Since yard's should be pretty straight, the turnouts are the most critical.

[Texas Zepher]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Rick Bradley
I have a new river coal mine, gravel mine, 6 stall roundhouse

Well, any one of those things could consume your entire 2x12 space.

QUOTE: I don't really understand the difference between short and mainline other than the size. I can still have passenger on shortline right?

Depending on the short line there might not be much. Generally a shortline has a very limited purpose so it has less variety of equipment, much simpler track arragements (especially in yards), and less support structure. But there are always exceptions. Happy is the short-line that connects two or more class 1 railroads and gets all that transfer traffic.

QUOTE: All I know is that I really want to be able to switch things, I have 4 switchers itching to move things around, but I don't have the ability to design a proper functioning switching yard

Ok back up a bit here. What are you calling switching and what are you calling a yard. In earlier posts you indicated a mine and gravel company as industries. So "switching" is spotting cars onto their appropriate places and picking up cars leaving those same industries. Sort of a puzzle. In the above statement it sounds like your definition of "switching" is sorting cars into new trains to send to a destination. These are very different things. The catch is that on a 2x12, in HO scale, there isn't any place to send trains made up in a yard.

I don't think you really want a yard at all, but a loco servicing facility or an industrial area. Something more like:




Hmmmm don't know how to make those larger?!

[jimrice4449]

I'm going to assume that your yard is adjacent to a main line that curves at each end. If you go w/ a stub yard (dead end at the end opposite the switching lead) you've got room for 9 or ten tracks on about 2 1/2" centers which allows you to rerail cars w/o interference from car on adjacent tracks. You will need a drill track (a single track extension of your lead, which is the track w/ all the switches leading into the yard), as long as your longest yard track. The best way to accompli***his is to run it parallel to the main around the curve at the end of your 12 ft dimension. It can stub off as a dead end or connect to the main w/ a switch.
Assuming the above layout for your yard, you now have an unused corner for your roundhouse, the best way to use an otherwise hard to fill triangular area.
Since space is at a premium you might want to consider a compound lead. This is a arrangement where, instead of one switch off of the lead for each yard track, the first switch off of the lead, for example, instread of leading to track 1 leads to a switch for track 1 and 2. I have a psgr yard w/ Peco medium radius switches (36" R) that goes from 1 track to 10 in 5 1/2 feet of linear distance. Since this is a psgr yard I'm limited in the sharpness of the curves the cars will handle. Given your era, the longest frt cars you'll likely have to worry about would be 50' which means you could probably go w/ #4 switches and use even less linear space.