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Track Plans for North American Layouts


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On 08/02/2019 at 20:26, Norton961 said:

Fascinating thread but I would like to see more ideas on FREMO modules. I want to build a module but would like some ideas!

 

David

There are a few Freemo modules in this section if you scroll through, the RS Tower group specification rather than FREMO, and pics of the group meets. 

Just search ‘Freemo’ ;)

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 22/02/2019 at 03:53, mdvle said:

The 2019 Model Railroad Planning has an article on 2 layout designs (1 HO, 1 N) for a switching area in Clackamas Oregon.  The author has posted the track plans to his blog for those who haven't seen them

 

http://mrsvc.blogspot.com/2019/02/two-for-one-sp-switching-in-mrp-2019.html

 

Can’t help being intrigued with the continuing American enthusiasm for 3-Rail O Gauge (alluded to at the end, by the specific reference to 2-Rail... no British or European writer would make such a remark...)

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On 22/02/2019 at 03:53, mdvle said:

The 2019 Model Railroad Planning has an article on 2 layout designs (1 HO, 1 N) for a switching area in Clackamas Oregon.  The author has posted the track plans to his blog for those who haven't seen them

 

http://mrsvc.blogspot.com/2019/02/two-for-one-sp-switching-in-mrp-2019.html

 

What size are the squares? 1 foot? 

 

There seems to be a roundy-round going begging there...

 

Edited by rockershovel
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3 hours ago, rockershovel said:

 

Can’t help being intrigued with the continuing American enthusiasm for 3-Rail O Gauge (alluded to at the end, by the specific reference to 2-Rail... no British or European writer would make such a remark...)

Possibly a sweeping generalisation, but I think it's part of the standard American 'mindset' about what constitutes a 'successful' layout - which is a multi-level basement empire. 

So if you want one of those in O Scale, curves are going to be tight even in a basement, & as the main Era of interest still seems to be the 1950s Transition, 2-rail steam locos of American proportions do not like tight curves. Therefore, they tend to think in 3-rail terms, & 3-rail is by far the dominant part of O Gauge in America.

It's really annoying... :shout: :mad: :rolleyes:

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10 hours ago, rockershovel said:

 

Can’t help being intrigued with the continuing American enthusiasm for 3-Rail O Gauge (alluded to at the end, by the specific reference to 2-Rail... no British or European writer would make such a remark...)

 

Well, when 2-Rail O is roughly equivalent to P4 and the OO market, the comment is somewhat necessary.

 

6 hours ago, F-UnitMad said:

Possibly a sweeping generalisation, but I think it's part of the standard American 'mindset' about what constitutes a 'successful' layout - which is a multi-level basement empire. 

So if you want one of those in O Scale, curves are going to be tight even in a basement, & as the main Era of interest still seems to be the 1950s Transition, 2-rail steam locos of American proportions do not like tight curves. Therefore, they tend to think in 3-rail terms, & 3-rail is by far the dominant part of O Gauge in America.

It's really annoying... :shout: :mad: :rolleyes:

 

More a case of almost everyone who is interested in scale models and/or basement empires quickly left O and moved to HO when it became viable, leaving O as the nostalgia "Lionel train under the Christmas Tree" market with the associated accessories.

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16 minutes ago, mdvle said:

 

Well, when 2-Rail O is roughly equivalent to P4 and the OO market, the comment is somewhat necessary.

 

 

More a case of almost everyone who is interested in scale models and/or basement empires quickly left O and moved to HO when it became viable, leaving O as the nostalgia "Lionel train under the Christmas Tree" market with the associated accessories.

 

But some of those Lionel 3-rail locos are hardly toys! 

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32 minutes ago, mdvle said:

More a case of almost everyone who is interested in scale models and/or basement empires quickly left O and moved to HO when it became viable, leaving O as the nostalgia "Lionel train under the Christmas Tree" market with the associated accessories.

 

Lionel is the predominant O gauge RTR supplier and is all 3 rail.  No DCC as far as I can tell.  Everything is forward and backward compatible.  Curves are OO radius.  Everything is very expensive.

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Changing the subject slightly, but to do with USA track-plans, I came across this on FB and thought It may solve some shelf layout problems, so I have copied it across. . As he says, it could be modelled without compression, but on the other hand compression will not cause too many problems - I did a quick check and the straight parts of the spurs hold 3/3/5 cars in that order from the main - almost Inglenook proportions! If you look closely at the industries on Bing Birdseye view, you will see that the spur can handle just about anything - indeed if you modelled a transload area at the right hand end on the track extension beyond Florida Potato......

 

 

FP&O.jpg

FP&O2.jpg

Edited by shortliner
my hand operated spill chucker doesn't work!
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13 hours ago, rockershovel said:

 

What size are the squares? 1 foot? 

 

There seems to be a roundy-round going begging there...

 

 

Looking at the magazine they are both 12" grids.

 

For the HO layout:

 

Size - 8' x 10' x 1'6"

Min. Radius - 22"

Min. Turnout - no. 6

 

For the N layout:

 

Size - 4' x 10' x 1'

Min. Radius - 13.5"

Min. Turnout - no. 5

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3 hours ago, shortliner said:

Changing the subject slightly, but to do with USA track-plans, I came across this on FB and thought It may solve some shelf layout problems, so I have copied it across. . As he says, it could be modelled without compression, but on the other hand compression will not cause too many problems - I did a quick check and the straight parts of the spurs hold 3/3/5 cars in that order from the main - almost Inglenook proportions! If you look closely at the industries on Bing Birdseye view, you will see that the spur can handle just about anything - indeed if you modelled a transload area at the right hand end on the track extension beyond Florida Potato......

 

 

FP&O.jpg

FP&O2.jpg

Can't quite believe how close I've been to that location - visited Florida in June 2017, and went to Plant City for a bit of railfanning, at the observation deck by the Railroad museum right in the middle of town. 

Hint:- Monday afternoons isn't the best time to go - not much rail movement (although what there was, was great for me just to see US trains for real for the first time!!) and the museum is closed Mondays... :(

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Here's the irony, I've lived in the US for 30 years and have no interest whatsoever in contemporary US railways.  I dabbled with 1920's narrow gauge steam but didn't really get the fever.  To me contemporary US railways are somewhat unexciting, all diesels and boxcars.  Most trains I've seen on tracks paralleling the Marta rapid transit in Atlanta are either stationary or travelling at 10 mph.....I'm guessing that the main interest is in operation rather than building, rolling stock that is.

 

This is definitely not a commentary on peoples' interests as I'm sure mine are very alien to some......

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 21/02/2019 at 22:53, mdvle said:

The 2019 Model Railroad Planning has an article on 2 layout designs (1 HO, 1 N) for a switching area in Clackamas Oregon.  The author has posted the track plans to his blog for those who haven't seen them

 

http://mrsvc.blogspot.com/2019/02/two-for-one-sp-switching-in-mrp-2019.html

 

And he has now added an O scale version of the above to his blog:

 

http://mrsvc.blogspot.com/2019/03/i-mentioned-my-model-railroad-planning.html

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On 21/02/2019 at 20:53, mdvle said:

The 2019 Model Railroad Planning has an article on 2 layout designs (1 HO, 1 N) for a switching area in Clackamas Oregon.  The author has posted the track plans to his blog for those who haven't seen them

 

http://mrsvc.blogspot.com/2019/02/two-for-one-sp-switching-in-mrp-2019.html

Those are some good track plans. Just add some evergreen pine trees and you will have a nice, Portland-area layout.

 

Wendell

Idaho, USA

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  • 3 weeks later...
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A diorama rather than a layout, but I've launched a proposal for a Billy Bookcase-sized HO Scale Model in the Micro-Layout and Diorama section of RMweb with an American city theme:  Union Station - an HO Diorama , following the US theme I used for a Cakebox model (49th Street Bridge by A Late Beginner) .  I haven't got space for the kind of layout I grew up reading about in Kalmbach publications (the great Andy Sperandeo once proposed a model for a Union Station in 100 sq.ft -  with a British Fiddle Yard using Peco Medium Radius turnouts, but I only have a fraction of that space).  Anyway, I post a link here for interest.

 

Edited by Keith Addenbrooke
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As seen on Facebook, an interesting alternative to an industry for a layout - a Training Center.

 

Norfolk Southern's training center - https://www.google.com/maps/place/Norfolk+Southern+Training+Center/@33.4035167,-84.1685275,15z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x3f1f8383ccc4cf69!8m2!3d33.4035167!4d-84.1685275

 

And a bit of an overview from a press release - http://www.nscorp.com/content/nscorp/en/news/norfolk-southernexpandsitsrailroaduniversityoperationstrainingce.html

 

Could be an opportunity to use some of the odd rolling stock we all seem to end up with.

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12 hours ago, mdvle said:

As seen on Facebook, an interesting alternative to an industry for a layout - a Training Center.

 

The National Academy of Railroad Sciences has one in Lexana, Kansas run jointly by Johnson County Community College and BNSF.  There are a couple of real industries there but the yard is used mainly to teach switching.  There are a handful of older cars there purely for training and a heavyweight passenger car fitted out as a classroom.

 

https://goo.gl/maps/f8m4AWqcAQCXD4r19

 

 

3/4 NARS Yard in Lenexa, KS 3-12-17

 

 

 

Cheers

David

Edited by DavidB-AU
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  • 5 months later...

Image posted of the New Haven in Holyoke MA on a blog (1), very compact little engine facility with turntable and freight shed with warehouse backgrounds.  Image is from 1951 and may provide inspiration for a smaller layout.  Found a Sanborn Fire Map from 1895 (2) that gives the basics, sadly not much remains and the site is now a park.  But the engine facility, freight shed, passenger station takes up about 11' if modeled to scale in HO

 

1) http://blog.thevalleylocal.net/2019/10/wordless-wednesday-285.html

 

2) https://www.loc.gov/resource/g3764hm.g037511895/?sp=24&r=0.419,0.133,0.576,1.006,90

Edited by mdvle
clarified scale for Regularity
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10 hours ago, mdvle said:

But the engine facility, freight shed, passenger station takes up about 11' if modeled to scale.

Which scale? We don't all model in H0.

Edited by Regularity
PS - Superb links!
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  • 2 weeks later...

For those who prefer passenger trains, a compact inner city style station from Troy, NY.

 

Troy Union Station shared by the NYC, D&H, and B&M (with trains from the Rutland using running rights) was demolished in the late 50s and at some point later most of the surrounding buildings along the rail line seem to have been demolished.

 

The station and platforms (Fulton Street to Broadway) were a mere 461' by Google Maps (HO: 5'3.5" / O: 9.6' / S: 7.2' / N: 2.9') and a doubling of those numbers gets you not only the station throats on each end but likely also a bit of regular track and the 2 over-the-track signal boxes.  With the station being so small (only fit 5 passenger cars at most without blocking roads) you could likely even shrink it by 1 car length with nobody noticing.  There's even a short tunnel at one end that could be moved closer.

 

A search will pick up some photos showing how compact and surrounded the station was.

 

Library of Congress have some from maps apparently from the early 1900s that either predate the station in question or have shown it incorrectly:

 

https://www.loc.gov/resource/g3804tm.g3804tm_g06307188501/?sp=41&r=0.182,0.759,0.941,0.577,0

 

https://www.loc.gov/resource/g3804tm.g3804tm_g06307188501/?sp=42&r=-0.66,-0.08,2.32,1.601,0

 

And someone got access to the 1955 version and posted them to Tumblr:

 

https://k-gnome.tumblr.com/post/60791239116/sanborn-maps-of-troy-ny-in-1955-merged-together

 

Finally, someone actually filmed the station and some nearby trackage in the final years prior to closing and demolition:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yw8AnDnDmwI

 

 

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Fascinating little site, scope for operations of different lines is huge, the video of operations was good too. Like you say, even a HO model based on the site would only take a few feet in length (good for a double track roundy?) But looks good fun for scenery and showing off different stock.

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Another interesting mostly passenger one was the CNJ Lafayette Street (sometimes called Broad Street) terminal in Newark, NJ. This was the subject of a Model Railroader plan a few years ago, although liberties had been taken with the design.

 

CNJLafayetteStreet.jpg.ef118af09bcea7dd936aa3ee6cd76387.jpg

 

The original passenger terminal building is still there: https://goo.gl/maps/QotHkGiPxF9zYrSR9

 

Cheers
David

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