Highland Branch of the Florida Central Railroad

[Chris Gilbert]

As the railway shed is only two weeks away its time to get the railroad track plan sorted,

 

 

Background notes

 

Abandoned in the late 90's by the CSX and taken over by the FCEN 

 

The Highland Branch follows route 27 from Davenport to Old Lake Davenport to the south west of Orlando Fl.

 

FCEN keeps two locos based at Davenport yard to service the branch and the three track yard receives inbound cars from the CSX overnight   

 

The first customer along the line is Prestwick Bakery which is switched daily 

inbound cars include tank cars, covered hoppers and 50' boxcars

Trailing turnout

 

Next customer is Troon Lumber which receives Central Beams, Bulkhead flats and Hi-cube boxcars, usually once a week.

this is a facing point

 

Highland Citrus sends it's produce out in modern reefers,

This is another trailing point.

Dornoch Recycling ships out loaded gondolas of scrap metal.

Empty cars are left outside of the company gates and are pulled in as required by the work's trackmobile.

Dornoch Recycling has two facing points and is serviced 3-4 times a week.

 

After passing over a plate girder bridge spanning Old Lake the branch line finished at Blackheath Cement plant. 100 ton cement hoppers are unloaded every two to three weeks depending on requirements 

 

[roundhouse]

Interesting track plan of an area I have not visited for many years but got me into American modelling

 

Look forward to seeing this as it develops.

 

Ian

[John B]

I like the look of this. Simple, uncluttered and interesting - plus an area I know well. Look forward to seeing how this develops.

[F-UnitMad]

I would be very very tempted to make it a roundy-roundy - even if it was a removable, non-scenic section you took out for 'serious' operations.

The two ends of the layout are so close it's a shame not to, and there are times when an oval is useful, for running in locos, running a train when you don't particularly want to think too hard about it, & also you can have something running whilst doing something else - time doesn't have to be divided between modelling or operating....

Go on, you know it makes sense....

[PhilH]

Ignorant question - how can cars be switched into different direction sidings with no run round? Do trains have to always have two locos which can be split, or is there another way which my brain can't comprehend without much more tea?

[Chris Gilbert]

Phil

I was planning on using two locos, which is something the FCEN does on its Winter Garden branch

I must point out that there is NO real Highland Branch, it's a figment of my imagination

 

Jordan

I would like a continuous loop and it look easy enough to add in.

I just wanted to get the main plan down first.

[PhilH]

Thanks for the reply Chris, it did get my grey matter going!

[298]

Ignorant question - how can cars be switched into different direction sidings with no run round? Do trains have to always have two locos which can be split, or is there another way which my brain can't comprehend without much more tea?

There is the "Dutch Drop" move, a bit like fly shunting but with the loco on the front of cars. I'm not sure whether it is still permitted...

[roundhouse]

Phil

I was planning on using two locos, which is something the FCEN does on its Winter Garden branch

I must point out that there is NO real Highland Branch, it's a figment of my imagination

 

Jordan

I would like a continuous loop and it look easy enough to add in.

I just wanted to get the main plan down first.

Your description does give a very good feel of some of the lines in the area such as the Florida Midland Florida South Central and other similar lines in the visitinty of Orlando, lake Wales  and lake Okeechobee etc

 

Ian

[Tove]

That is fly-shunting. However, a rope could be used, or maybe there are favourable gradients, and gravity can be employed?

There is a video on you tube showing the Seminole Gulf making such a move,but i can`t remember what the vid`s call at the moment.

 

I like plan Chris plan.as it`s been said nice and simple.

I know it`s a matter of personel taste,but i`m not a fan of roundy,roundy plans.But concerning your plan i think it would compromise the look of your cement plant too much.

And having a lift/drop out section on a curve could present it`s own problem`s.Me,i like it the way it is!.

 

Brian.

[dave1905]

If there are two engines then they would use two engines, one for facing point and one for trailing point moves.

 

Short lines tend to do that because its cheaper in the short term, requires no capital investment and gives them redundancy in engines.

 

Class ones tend to put in a runaround because its cheaper long term and they have more opportunites to supply engines.

[dave1905]

OBTW, how do you switch the cement plant?  So I shove a cut of cement cars out to the cement plant.  How do I pull the empties and spot the loads without using somebody else's spurs?  Or do yo plan to run out to the cement plant and pull the empties, run all the way back to the yard, then shove the loads all the way out to the end of the line and run back light?

[Chris Gilbert]

The cement plant will be worked like this

Light engine to the works

Pull empties back to yard

Loads pushed back to plant

Light engine back to yard

 

A bit like this

 

This is one job I'm looking forward to operating.

[shortliner]

My guess is that with the frequency of unloading it'd be a pull empty one day - push load in the next, or leave train on main before the citrus/wood/recycling spurs, push load in and pick up empty, pull both to Dornoch, drop empty on end of Dornoch spur and push load into cement, back to Dornoch to collect empty and rejoin train.

 

Question = if another name for a Lady of the Night is a "brass", does that make one who plies her trade in Dornoch a Brass Dornocher? Coat on for hasty exit!

 

EDIT - Chris types faster than me!

[dave1905]

Setting the cars out on another industry track works as long as the track isn't blue flagged or have an industry controlled derail (to prevent the railroad from shoving into the car mover or loading ramps) or have a gate.  Down side to all the modern detail emphasis.

 

Making the trip to the yard and back could be a magical mystery tour.  If the lead was 3-4 miles long, at 5-7 mph that's a 30-45 minute trip in each direction shoving (somebody has to ride the point, somebody has to flag every crossing).  Pulling one car and spotting one car at the cement plant could take 2-4 hours on the prototype.  plus the industry is "down" on the rack time while your crew is doing windshield time.

 

I would not be as concerned with the spotting frequencies.  If you stick with the stated frequencies about half the time you will only be switching one industry.  I would concentrate on having differentiated spots to maximize the switching.  For example, I would keep a couple varieties of gons in the yard (some 52-6 or 65 ft mill and a couple ex rotary dump) and spot a specific car type for a outbound load of graded scrap.  Adding a track to an abandoned industry near the cement plant can increased the switching.  For example requiring inbound aggregates to always be behind the cement cars, will require that once the switcher gets out there they have to shuffle the cars around to pull the empty rock cars, spot net rock cars and pull the empty cement.  It could also be used to handle a few "off spot" cars or to stuff a couple empty gons or overflow inbound loads for the srap yard.

[shortliner]

Using Dave H's idea, you could have a short spur leading off (perhaps towards the back-scene) to a washed-out bridge, (or even just into the trees to act as a "hidden siding"), which would be long enough to hold a couple of cars - an abandoned customer being the other side of the wash-out

[Chris Gilbert]

A couple of changes to the plan

 

First with a run around loop at the yard

 

 

Second plan as a roundy roundy 

 

 

 

 

 

[shortliner]

Not keen on the roundy-roundy, and your yard space is shrinking - I'd be tempted to use the "no-run-round and two locos" solution, personally

[dave1905]

If you pushed the left end of the runaround to the tangent by the bakery, and put the right end on the tangent jusf before the swingbridge, it would get you back to one track on the swing bridge.  Then you just add a 4th yard track that is the engine tie up track.

 

If you move the river closer to the scrap yard, and keep the "loop" switch right off the end of the bridge, that give you more space to run it parllel to the lead for a foot or two then it can go on the loop connection.  Make the last 6" removeable, with the default piece the abandoned track stub track (put a tie across the rails and "stop sign" to keep cars from rolling off) and then remove it and hook up the loop connection for the loop.

 

By doing that it gives you a little stub track that can be used to set over off spot cars or switch around the concrete plant.  (technically what you would have there is a "concrete" plant that recieves inbound cars of cement and aggregate and then  makes concrete.)  

[Steve Williams]

Another benefit of moving the river/lake a bit further NORTH SO IT BISECTS PART OF THE CURVE, IS THAT IT WOULD BREAK THE CURVE UP, PROBABLY MAKING IT LESS OBVIOUS, RESULTING IN A LONGER RUN FROM THE BRIDGE TO THE (s****! I hit the 'Caps lock') cement/concrete plant, giving the illusion of a longer distance travelled.

[dave_long]

Even the large companies have ways around no run around loops. CSX/NS/Conrail shared assets use a splat! An old open car with brakeman on for a train shove!

http://kaback9.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1533106

 

Or you can top and tail, they do that too.

[Chris Gilbert]

Another benefit of moving the river/lake a bit further NORTH SO IT BISECTS PART OF THE CURVE, IS THAT IT WOULD BREAK THE CURVE UP, PROBABLY MAKING IT LESS OBVIOUS, RESULTING IN A LONGER RUN FROM THE BRIDGE TO THE (s****! I hit the 'Caps lock') cement/concrete plant, giving the illusion of a longer distance travelled.

Steve the only problem there is I have a 72' plate girder bridge I want to use but straight not curved. 

[Chris Gilbert]

This should give you some idea of what I want the loco servicing area to look like.

 

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=652127

 

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=140556

 

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=140554

 

http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=652130

[Steve Williams]

Steve the only problem there is I have a 72' plate girder bridge I want to use but straight not curved. 

 

Chris, would that curve take a straight section in similar vein to the curve on the opposite side? It would probably push the bottom section of the curve nearer the backscene but that would enable a shallow bend to bring the line back out before gently curving back into the cement facility.

[Chris Gilbert]

I think it might make that area too busy.

 

the google map link to the loco service point is https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=29.19869,-82.137338&num=1&t=h&vpsrc=0&gl=uk&ie=UTF8&ll=29.198691,-82.137124&spn=0.000577,0.000656&z=21