Where exactly to position station?

[spikey]

Having just finished one of the new baseboards for the third and hopefully final revision of my 00 layout-in-the-making, I'm anxious to avoid making the same mistake I made on the last one 30 years ago ...

 

We are talking here about a very simple little branch line station with a just passing loop and a goods yard and factory siding off that.  However, this baseboard's only 800mm deep front to back, and the through line needs to run along it as close as possible to the back edge.  This of course means that the platform and whatever goes with it by way of a station building needs to be as close to the backscene as I can get away with.

 

And that's where I'm stuck, because everything on this board hinges on the position of that platform.  That's the datum from which everything else gets laid out.   But how on earth do I manage the conjunction of the backscene and the back of the platform/station building so that the two are as close as possible without it ending up looking silly?

 

Right now, the backscene can be flat or it can consist entirely of low-relief buildings with which the station could merge, and it can be as urban/industrial as necessary to solve the present problem.  Period is 1940-1960.

 

Anybody got any cunning ideas?  Or can point me to a source of inspiration online?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[DCMarvel]

Do the opposite. Site everything as far away from the backscene and as close to the front edge of the board as you can. This way you are left with options for the blending into the backscene. If you squeeze up close to it you are stuck with a low profile or even a dead flat scene which once the layout is lit has shadows cast on it from the items on the board in front of it which ruins the effect. If you have space you can 'slope up' and have the impression of more space, plus you move the operating area closer to the viewer.

[spikey]

Do the opposite. Site everything as far away from the backscene and as close to the front edge of the board as you can.

 

Ah, but as I said, the through line needs to be as close to the back of the baseboard as possible.  It needs to align with tracks on the adjacent boards, plus I need space between the loop and the front of the board for my sidings (both standard and narrow gauge).

 

If I can just arrive at something by way of a station building/backscene interface which doesn't look ridiculous from a viewpoint almost directly opposite and 12-18" above it, I'll be happy ...

[DCB]

Put the sidings at the front of the board, the station building in the middle and the running line and loop at the back with a retaining wall at th back of the layout and almost nothing except sky beyond

[Rivercider]

For what it is worth here are a couple of views of my layout.

The board is 18" wide (480mm), and the back of the platform is about half an inch from the backscene.

I put concrete fencing all along the back of the layout to disguise the join. 

This does illustrate the problem highlighted by DCMarvel with shadows cast on the backscene though.

 

cheers

 

[spikey]

Cheers chaps.  David, the basic idea of that top one will work if I can arrange matters so that pedestrial access to the station looks plausible having regard to what else needs to go on the board.

 

Having said that, though, I could very easily live with the shadow shown in Rivercider's pictures, and access to the station building is then imagined rather than modelled, making that one less thing to consider!

 

I'm beginning to think this is actually going to boil down to whether I want to be viewing from platform or rail side when a train's in the station ...

 

BTW, it's an awful long time since I built one, but is that station building the old Airfix kit?

[Rivercider]

 

BTW, it's an awful long time since I built one, but is that station building the old Airfix kit?

I think it probably is, though I did not build it. In about 1970 my parents bought me a small 2nd hand model railway that included a number of buildings, some of them kit built.

When I got my old railway stuff out of the loft in 2009, after about 30 years storage, I decided to re-use a few of the buildings for sentimental reasons, so I gave it a quick repaint. 

 

cheers

[spikey]

This has made me realise that I haven't spent enough money on comics and enough time looking at other folks' layouts to have much idea of different approaches to common problems ...

[Peter Kazmierczak]

As Will Hay said in "Oh, Mr Porter", make sure the station is near to a railway.......

 

Seriously though, I like David's idea (above) of the sidings and station building/approach at the front. This is how we generally view stations in reality. We don't see the building as it's behind us as we wait for a train.

[colin penfold]

David's idea has an additional benefit that you can see what you are doing whilst shunting.

[Mark Saunders]

Playing Devils Advocate, do you actually need a Station?

 

Mark Saunders

[spikey]

Playing Devils Advocate, do you actually need a Station?

 

Mark Saunders

Oh yes.  Without a station, there is no justification for the halt on the narrow gauge.  And the narrow gauge is for my wife to play with while I play with the 00.

 

So there has to be a station ... 

[Signaller69]

Another idea if you decide to have the station building at the back next to the backscene is to flank the building with trees behind the platform and against the backscene, this should certainly soften any shadows created too?

[ejstubbs]

David's idea has an additional benefit that you can see what you are doing whilst shunting.

 

If I've understood the OP, their original idea would have allowed that, too.  I think Rivercider's photos demonstrate that.

 

My first ever "model railway" had a layout similar to the one that David suggested.  I found that the station buildings obstructed my view of the trains in the platforms - not helped by the layout being at chest height.  As well as that, the passenger access to the station being more or less in the middle of the goods yard didn't 'feel' right (though I have no doubt that there are plenty of prototype examples of such configurations).

 

The layout I am currently planning will be similar in its basic configuration to Rivercider's, except that there will be a bay road on the other side of the platform.  The station building will be very close to the backscene, and the goods yard will be at the front of the baseboard (my baseboard is even narrower than the OP's - only 375mm).

 

I guess it depends to a degree what you want to look at: trains, or buildings.  I know which way I am inclined this time round.

Edited June 26, 2017 by ejstubbs

[The Johnster]

Cwmdimbath, my South Wales BLT, is on a narrow board and the station is also crammed up against the backscene, but as the valley it is purported to be in, a real valley that never had a railway or a mining village except in my 4mm universe, is a particularly steep sided and narrow one, I have simply started what is the bottom of the side of a 1,600 foot mountain directly off the rear of the platform, leaving just enough space for a footpath at the 'town' end.  I have varied it by having parts rising straight from the rear edge of the platform mixed with parts rising from the bottom where it joins the baseboard.  A spear fence and some undergrowth, especially where there is a hollow because the mountain rises from the foot and not the edge of the platform, and I am happy with it.

 

I am sure you could configure such as steep natural slope for whatever your situation is, even if it is only an overgrown cutting.  The usual recourse in such situations is a retaining wall, which leaves you with the question of what to put on top of it in a very limited space, as it's very straight top edge jars against the eye otherwise.  My mountain only goes up about a foot, but the suggestion that it goes a lot further is compelling; even so it overhangs the back of the baseboard by several inches.  A steep slope of this sort, but heavily wooded, could be the answer in your case; these occur in urban and rural environments.

 

Another way is the opposite of my approach; you leave a gap between the back of the platform and the backscene, which is of hills or a scene a mile or so away. If there is a low wall or line of foliage between the gap and the railway, the impression is created that the railway is on the near slope of a broad vale and there is lower ground between you and the backscene that is obscured from your viewpoint by the wall or foliage, or some other low features.  This requires attention to lighting, because a shadow in the wrong place will completely destroy the illusion, but have a look at Black Country Blues in the Layout Topics section to see the basic idea; it is done very well on that layout.

 

I appreciate that you need to keep the running lines as far back as you can, but the further forward you can bring them, even if they are slightly curved inwards and drift back to that edge at the ends of the baseboard, the better and easier it will be from the visual viewpoint (and, of course, all viewpoints are visual...).  

 

And try and avoid a pure 90 degree right angle between the backscene and the baseboard; if you can merge it even slightly it'll look loads better.  Even retaining walls are rarely vertical, they slope backwards slightly to increase the strength of the retaining effect on the hillside they are retaining.  Disguise the angle with foliage, small buildings, woodpiles, derelict cars; anything to draw your eye away from it.

[spikey]

This is great, chaps.  Much food for thought.

 

My problem is actually compounded by the fact that the back of the baseboard is hinged in order that I can raise the whole lot up and prop it there rather than crawl about under it for repairs and maintenance.  Then there's a 20mm square batten along the wall which supports the back of sheets of Depron with which I cover the layout when not in use.  Consequently, my backscene will only be 110mm high (trackbed to bottom of batten), and anything tall towards the back of the baseboard has to be removable.

 

A retaining wall will do nicely for the backscene, but I couldn't think how to arrange access to the station building.  Then ...

I have varied it by having parts rising straight from the rear edge of the platform mixed with parts rising from the bottom where it joins the baseboard.  A spear fence and some undergrowth, especially where there is a hollow because the mountain rises from the foot and not the edge of the platform, and I am happy with it.

 

Thank you sir. That and a footpath parallel to the platform back sounds good to me.  I need to mock this up and check it would work ...

Edited June 27, 2017 by spikey

[The Johnster]

Glad to have helped.  To go into more detail, as I say the station is backed directly by a large mountain, but the situation would be similar with a cutting or retaining wall.  The station building is about a third of the way along the platform's length, and the platform is backed by a spear fence.  The pedestrian entrance/exit is on the 'town' side of the station building, and is a gap in the fence with an open gate blocking access to the rough ground at the bottom of the mountain, which then impinges more closely on the platform.  The station building actually overhangs the rear of the platform a little to emphasise that there is no pathway through there, and some undergrowth reinforces that point.  To further hammer it home, a fogman's hut painted cream with a railway lamp post by it acts as a ticket collector's booth at the entrance/exit, and there are 'way out' Tiny Trains signs. There is, therefore, no ticket office in the actual station building, nor any doorway or entrance on the non railway, I.e. mountain side, and it contains the supervisor's office (too small for a proper stationmaster), porter's mess room, and the waiting room.  The public access this by a footpath from the road with the spear fence on the railway side and the mountain, unfenced but rising steeply, on the other side, and at the 'town' end where it meets the roadway which is also the road access to the goods siding, there is a telephone box, again to emphasise the point and because that's a pretty likely site for one anyway, and a lamp post; important that this is a different type to the platform ones, as we're off the railway, now, and this is a street lamp.  On a bigger station than this you'd have a taxi or two and perhaps a bus waiting for punters as well, even a post office van.  On a really big station you'd have a lady of easy virtue with a handbag leaning on the lamp post, but we don't do that sort of thing in small Welsh mining villages in the 1950s, at least not under lamp posts...

 

It is inspired by, but by no means a model of, the real station at Abergwynfi, where a similar situation existed but had a colliery branch between the footpath, which in that case was a flight of steps from a road bridge, and the mountain, with a post and wire fence and low retaining wall separating it off, but there was a spear fence on the platform side of the pathway.

Edited June 28, 2017 by The Johnster