Whilst our initial goal is to have a layout ready for Hull Show, we also want to have the layout usable at home. This means it needs to be fairly small and tidy when not in use as a railway.

Croft Depot suited both requirements, also the way it was operated from the front with plenty of opportunity for interaction with show visitors fitted our view of railway modeling as a social activitY.

We decided to build something similar.

We were looking at a small shunting layout built into a four foot x two foot cabinet subdivided like a rabbit hutch between a scenic area and a storage/fiddle area.

Access and operation would be from the front using a controller on a wander lead.

We wanted to use as much of the equipment from the Hornby train-set as practical.

It would be based on a what-if Holderness / South Riding railway rather than a real location.

We wanted to include realistic scenery for our location.

Jenn is particularly hot on scenic and social detail in model railways.

The scenic area would be about three foot long with a fiddle/storage area big enough to take a Peco loco-lifter for cassette operation in the remaining space.

I thought we might have mouse-hole doors in each end of the cabinet for through running on occasion.

Another station I have an interest in is North Grimston on the Malton Driffield Railway.

I had made plans for this in N-Gauge, but reckoned I would need at least six foot just for the station area.

It occurred to me while we were planning that North Grimston had all the features we were looking for and I could fit most of them into our three foot scenic area!

One of the influences on our layout is a photo from the Malton Dodger showing a farmer loading a southern railway open wagon with hay form his horse drawn farm cart.

The railway wagon must have taken several cart loads as it looked like a haystack on wheels.

They must have sheeted the load before moving but I don't know how they got it through the loading gauge!

Any way, Jenn wanted a scene like that on our layout.

I have a loading dock, I still need to find and build the hay cart.

I dug out my plans book and started making sketches...

These plans were derived from North Grimston, compacted to fit, except the third plan down which was Croft Depot for comparison.

It gave us a single track through line with platform and passenger halt at the back and a small goods yard in front.

We were looking at the fiddle yard on the left with the through line exiting on the right under a road bridge.

The first two used a sector plate for transfer between sidings. I soon dropped this idea for simplicity and room needed.

When I started to layout set-track I realised we were not going to get the fine angles envisioned.

So I tried a couple of different arrangements to give us the through line and three sidings we wanted.

The smaller plan at bottom right is the one we've gone for with modification...