Regularity

Just wondered if a retaining wall would look too urban, that’s all.

As built, not being a brake coach, that vehicle may not have had any brakes anyway.

It might help if you stated what "this point [in time?]" is. "Flatter parts" when it comes to grain cars means shipping out, rather than inwards. Other parts would received inbound shipments, sometimes in bulk quantities (large cities, ports) and sometimes in terms of the odd carload, depending on where and when you are modelling. A good processing plant might receive grain, flour (for example, in airslide hoppers or bagged), corn syrup, boxcars for packaging and canned products out, reefers for perishable fruit/veg inwards or just a few of those, and what about power to the processing plant? Probably electric, but maybe not. It depends on what you want: a single industry with multiple spots, or several different industries. Most people tend to go for the latter, but the former can be just as interesting. Even a marble quarry might produce large blocks of stone for transit to a stone mason's for cutting and shaping, smaller boulders for general use, still smaller for use as rip-rap, and wet slurry in tank cars. Have a look around the web - this was particularly informative, but Jack Hill went off at a tangent and did something else! Also Tom Klimoski has a new book out, which is an interesting read, as well as his own website. And of course, there is always Lance Mindheim... Those are generally more modern than you seem to be thinking about, but your GP9 is suitable for the modern era - perhaps it has been repainted as an heritage unit: you might need to add new reporting marks for your own fictional short line, but otherwise could leave it as it is.

They are very nice. As to the gubbins, it will depend on the era and the railway. Why gas tanks? They may have been oil.

Give them a vigorous stir and they emulsify?

Based on most people’s response, “Never ‘eard of it!”

Yes, but my post was already long enough.

Always a bit shy, compared to their more numerous brethren the 14xx.

Simple solution to this problem: don’t look at your bank balance.

Big assumption. Not necessarily true, either. We know your country is bigger, with a bigger population (but much less overcrowded) but I don’t think think you have a monopoly on bad drivers. Railways in this country own their right of way, but where they cross a previously existing right of way, they have to pay for the level crossing, the road bridge, or even abolish it as one of the clauses of the Act of Parliament establishing the route. Once that is established, though, they don’t have to pay to replace a crossing with a bridge, or an old bridge with a newer, wider bridge. That said, I am aware of two situations where due to electrification, the railways offered to put in a new bridge as it would have been convenient for them so to do at the same time as other disruptive work, but the relevant local authorities rejected the offer as they didn’t want to spend money on the associated road improvements. In one case, they built a new bridge 20 years or so later. In the other, the council concerned still takes to the news airwaves occasionally about the fact that the gates are down for 45 minutes of the hour during the day, and why won’t the railway replace it? So many people have died or had lucky escapes swerving round barriers of trying to get across them that we no longer leave it till the last moment before bringing down the barriers, but do it well in advance of a train coming. And pedestrians still attempt to climb the barriers and run across in front of a train: have s search on line. Doubt if you offended anyone, but your understanding of how things are in the UK doesn’t square with my experience of living here. I think that an understanding of the physics of momentum when applied to a train approaching s level crossing, and just how robustly built trains are compared to road vehicles, is simply lacking in large portions of the population.

Be funny if you arranged a swap, only to discover one of you worked in 4mm scale and the other in 7mm…

Yes, but they were motor trains: steam rail motors or more often, loco and motor (driving) coach. Goods trains had a brakevan at each end (of no more than six wagons): one (at the loco end) was simply for braking the train on arrival at the terminus once the loco was detached, which shunted from the other end. Not sure that’s a true run round loop. The other van carried the guard: leading uphill, at the rear downhill. The Prestatyn and Dyserth line similarly was worked by pushing up hill, including the goods trains. Unrlike Holywell Town, though, the P&D had sidings that were all accessible from downhill, so no run round was required.

We have plenty of bridges that are over 100 years old, clearly signposted, and trucks and busses still drive into them.

Also, they were returned to their owners. As of 1 September 1939, they were “pooled” - effectively nationalised - such that I recall reading one merchant saying the only he saw his wagon again was when is passed through on a train which didn’t stop.

What’s the vertical separation between the exchange sidings and the station?