As I have had nothing but time to think about how I want my layout to look, whilst my mother-in-law has occupied the spare room over the festive period (and hence hindered access to the layout), I have moved my goal posts.  In fact I have move the whole layout just outside of the scope of the widened lines and started to focus on Holborn Viaduct and Blackfriars goods, moving out of joint LNER/LMS (or BR Eastern and Midland regions dependant on the timeframe I settle upon) and into Southern territory, for two very good reasons.  Firstly I have a passion for the Maunsell moguls and tank engine variations and using the basis of a station elevated above other lines allows to me to follow better, the original concept of having lines at differing levels to allow me to make the most use of the awkward space I have.  I suppose at this point it would be helpful to show you what the layout space looks like so you can see what I see, unfortunately it is now dark and a photo using the light provided by the typical room light probably wouldn't show it at it's best.

The intention now, is to have a Holborn style station, probably four platforms, on the left, running off scene to the right towards staging.  At a lower level, appearing on the right hand end of the layout but from underneath (and behind) the upper level, will be a small goods area that will bare some resemblance to Blackfriars goods and/or some of the coal depots that the GNR and MR had south of the river.  The staging for the goods trains will be on the permanent part of the layout that forms the bottom of the L, the staging for the upper level will be removeable or if I can harness my inner carpenter, folding.

Now I've been on a bit of a mental journey to arrive at this point, having dabbled with the idea of scrapping any stations for a flat goods yard type layout, looking at (among others) Canada Road and Canada Street for inspiration, but I keep coming back to the multi-level option and the stations.  Finding out that Holborn hosted ex-SECR D1's helped as I am also a fan of these, and that there was parcels traffic to add operational interest also gave more reason to keep a station.  Finally I realised that being in Southern territory, I could run EMU's, which is a huge bonus and fills the void left by choosing not to model the Met Railway, the later decision taken on a cost and feasibility basis.