Choosing a layout name...

[Kelly]

As the track plan on one layout is almost finalised (it needs some timber tweaking in Templot still) I still need to choose a name for it (and the other project too).

 

I've drawn up a list of road names in areas of interest, but still struggling to decide.

 

How did you come up with a name? was it simply a contraction/variation on the area? or a road name? etc?

Edited October 5, 2017 by Kelly

[MarkSG]

My current main project is an urban goods yard set in 1950s Stoke-on-Trent. So, for a name, I've plundered Arnold Bennett's alternative reality of the Potteries, with the working title being Moorthorne Road.

[Moggs Eye]

I took Cottleston from Winnie the Pooh (The song Cottleston Pie) and Emsworth from the BBC series "Blandings" (inspired by PG Wodehouse).

[rob D2]

Think of where you are modelling and find a village / town/street nearby and use that

[Andy Hayter]

I have to agree with the sentiment of Rob D2.  My under construction layout is based on the north bank of the Humber estuary.  The area where it is set is called Haltemprice (also and perhaps better known for the New Statesman comedy and the right honerable B'stard) so the port station simply became Haltemprice Quay.

[MarcD]

I was given a book of rude uk place names which gave us the name of "Scratchy Bottom". Another option is set your layout in Wales or Ireland and with the aid of google translate you can come up with a few good names.

Our current layouts are:

"Scratchy Bottom" which is a place on the Dorset coast. (7mm standard gauge)

"Crackpot Mining"  which is a place in North Yorkshire (7mm 18inch mining layout)

 

Previously we had a 7mm industrial layout called "Ultramarine Works" this was based in a dye/pigment works. We are currently developing a 7mm 3ft gauge layout depiction "Eskdale Green Station" in 1900.

 

Marc

[Guius]

Best 'made up' name I've ever come across is Dylan Thomas's 'Llareggub'. -  Welsh sounding through and through.

 

Best

 

Guy

[£1.38]

If your layout is inspired by a real station, just change one or two letters in the name. That way it retains an association with the original inspiration, whilst being different.

[Kelly]

Think of where you are modelling and find a village / town/street nearby and use that

 

I have been doing so and have a rather long list of possible candidates. Being London however, some of them sound rather too Devon/Cornwall (not that theres anything wrong with those locations) for the 'feel' of the layout. Though the plan is the (currently being worked on) layout is designed that with changes to features/buildings etc it could move around the Southern network (ambitious I know, but with careful thought it should work), so the name has to feel right for it moving around a bit, or choosing three names (i did jokingly suggest 'The Layout with 3 Names!').

 

A few do however stand out though.

 

I was interested in how others came to naming their layouts in general too really. I'm always terrible with thinking up names for things!

[Kelly]

If your layout is inspired by a real station, just change one or two letters in the name. That way it retains an association with the original inspiration, whilst being different.

 

An interesting idea, but one I don't think would work in this instance that I can think of for Shepperton or Woolwich Dockyard/Charlton Junction (the two locations of the layouts planned).

[Gwiwer]

Where is the layout set?  That might influence the name.  Certain elements in place names are specific to particular geographic areas.  You won't find a "thwaite" in Devon or Cornwall nor many "ington" endings away from Sussex as examples.

 

My Penhayle Bay layout and its numerous included location names all arise from typically Cornish words or place names which immediately places the context of the layout.  "Penhayle Bay" itself is a combination of Hayle (where I lived for many years) and which in cornish is Heyl, meaning estuary, with the prefix "Pen" meaning headland and the suffix Bay which is self-descriptive.  There is no Penhayle in Cornwall though there is a Penhale.  Penhayle Bay is thus the headland estuary with a bay.  Coincidentally it also includes the element "eBay" which site was used for a few early purchases.

 

I didn't use street names but rather looked to local culture and geography for inspiration.  The second station, Treheligan, means "home of willow" and was christened by my wife whose surname includes the element "willo" and who is also of Cornish descent.  The viaduct was built across a doorway and was named Darras Viaduct - darras is the Cornish word for a door.  Other names included the two mines Wheal Garden (a real name taken from an actual mine but also a pun on "we'll garden") and Wheal Julia, given a female in the Cornish tradition, often the first mine captain's wife, in my case in memory of a deceased close friend.  Other names included Men Tor, the hill rising above Penhayle Bay, which simply means rock but when rendered in English is "mentor" which was part of my job description at the time it was built, and Nansglaw which is Cornish for "rain down" and was a name given to the hillside built around a rainwater down pipe!

 

All of that might or might not help with your dilemma but the names came to me very easily.  I realise that isn't true for everyone.

[john new]

I would go for something that isn't cringe worthy and gives a clue to what you want to represent. Just going through the same process for my current layout. The last one was a seaside miniature railway set adjacent Chesil Beach and called Pebbles End.

 

If you want it to cover three areas perhaps something like Triton's Yard or Triton St/RD/Junc or even Trinity Street as that has a connection to threes if you can stand the religious correlation.

Edited July 17, 2017 by john new

[john new]

An interesting idea, but one I don't think would work in this instance that I can think of for Shepperton or Woolwich Dockyard/Charlton Junction (the two locations of the layouts planned).

Shepperton was the home of Ian Allan publishing for a while so Allan Street would be appropriately relevant and transportable. Again on the basis of your suggested layout name suggesting threes there is/was a Neptune Yard ship building and repair yard in Newcastle, and sufficiently portable for replacing Woolwich Dockyard whilst retaing the nautical connection if, for example, you shift the location in future to the Solent area.

 

Hope that helps.

Edited July 17, 2017 by john new

[Finsbury]

So simply a contraction/variation on the area? or a road name? etc?

Pretty much, as long as it means something to you.

 

Names are easy to change!

[BG John]

With rather a lot of small layouts on the go at the moment or being planned, I've needed to come up with a few names:

 

Abbotsbridge: EM gauge GWR West Country BLT - Inspired by Abbotsbury station in Dorset (well the goods shed is a model of Abbotsbury!)

Broadport: P4 broad gauge BLT - It's broad gauge and has a quay, and I'm assuming there are more port facilities off scene

Walkley Goods Yard: EM gauge shunting layout - Because it's an adapted copy of AR Walkley's pioneering 1920s layout

Cronstowe: OO gauge Timesaver shunting puzzle, with added branch junction - Cron from Chronos meaning time, Stowe means a meeting place, as it's a junction

Cheapside Yard: O/O-16.5 shunting layout - Original idea came from building the layout on the cheap, but Cheapside means something like a place of trade, so appropriate for an industrial setting

Holmans End: Forthcoming O gauge Kent & East Sussex Railway BLT - It's the end of a line built by Holman Fred Stephens

Ivory Quay: Possible forthcoming O-16.5 layout - It's based of Rev Heath's Piano Line layout. What were piano keys made from?

[The Johnster]

I have been doing so and have a rather long list of possible candidates. Being London however, some of them sound rather too Devon/Cornwall (not that theres anything wrong with those locations) for the 'feel' of the layout. Though the plan is the (currently being worked on) layout is designed that with changes to features/buildings etc it could move around the Southern network (ambitious I know, but with careful thought it should work), so the name has to feel right for it moving around a bit, or choosing three names (i did jokingly suggest 'The Layout with 3 Names!').

 

A few do however stand out though.

 

I was interested in how others came to naming their layouts in general too really. I'm always terrible with thinking up names for things!

 

Anything London sounding with 'Green', 'Hill', 'Park', 'Wood' or possibly 'Circus' as a suffix will probably do, especially if the first word ends in 'ham'.  Woodham Park; there, that's fixed that for you...

[Finsbury]

^ this reply has been constructed of %100 win!

[The Johnster]

Cwmdimbath is a real place, and can be found on an Ordnance Survey map, but you'll need to look for i!!  it is in Mid Glamorgan, and is a small valley formed by the Dimbath stream ('Cwm' is one of the Welsh words for 'valley' and is simply attached to the stream's name, 'Dimbath Valley').  It is off the A4093 road between Blackmill, to the north of Bridgend, and Tonyrefail, which follows the Ogwr (Ogmore) valley, of which river the Dimbath is a small tributary.  it is approached by Dimbath Lane, and, should you be in the vicinity on a nice day with nothing better to do, it is a nice spot for a stroll and a picnic, and is what all of the South Wales valleys must have been like before ironworks and coal mining destroyed them; a vision of sylvan loveliness especially gorgeous in the autumn.  Enough waxing lyrical; it is remote, it's lower reaches being farmed but it's upper ones forested, steep, and difficult to get to.  

 

I have decided that, because some of the best steam coal in the world lay beneath this valley, coal actually mined from Ogmore Vale and Gilfach Goch in the adjoining valleys, with the pits connected underground with each other and a third, Clydach Vale in the Rhondda Valley, there was an alternative reality in which a mine was sunk here, coal raised, and a village built around it, not an unlikely scenario in South Wales...  The pit still has a few years left in it in the 50s before geological problems render it uneconomic, but the village is on a bit of a downward slope (in more than just the geographical sense) and has seen better days; it's railway is, like many in the area in the 50s, looking a bit down at heel and unkempt, but fully working.  it looks like the neighbouring valleys, the trees all cut down for pit props long ago, and it's railway still serves most of the community's needs, the roads being steep, narrow, and winding.  Through passenger services to Bridgend and Porthcawl, a twice daily colliery trip, workman's services for the colliery and to the ROF factory at Tremains, Bridgend are provided (all actually ran to and from Abergwynfi, two valleys over), as well as a daily pick up and parcels traffic serving a Remploy factory.  The odd excursion to Cardiff for the rugby and a pigeon special now and then complete the picture.  The branch is only about 3 miles long from Glynogwr Junction, steep and sharply curved, ending in a pitch of a quarter mile at 1 in 34 just after the bridge into Remploy's which is the scenic break. Loaded coal trains have to come up this gradient to run around before setting off tor Tondu or Dyffryn Yard, necessitating 42xx.  Tondu provides the locos.

 

I like this approach, the sense of the railway being attached to a real place which actually exists, and serving a community that might have!  The locos are all types to be found at Tondu in the 50s, and most of them will be given numbers of actual Tondu residents eventually, with some being transferred in under the authority of Rule 1, on the basis that, had this branch ever really existed, Tondu would have had to have about half a dozen more locos on the roster to run the services!  It satisfies my need for a sense of probability that, had this railway existed, it would have looked a bit like and been run a bit like this.  The station and WTT are based loosely on Abergwnfi with 2 sidings for the goods and Remploy's, so it is rooted in a real place in the railway sense as well.

Edited July 17, 2017 by The Johnster

[Pete the Elaner]

My current layout is a model of a prototype location, so no thinking required.

My previous layout was a fictitious station on a real line, so I took the name from a nearby junction.

The one before that was a depot which served somewhere. I decided where the depot would fit then checked a map to find out what the area is called.

[unravelled]

My layout will be based on Thame, but not be Thame. So the station name is Wylde...

 

Dave

[rockershovel]

Best 'made up' name I've ever come across is Dylan Thomas's 'Llareggub'. -  Welsh sounding through and through.

 

Best

 

Guy

Terry Pratchett's "Llamedos" is presumably somewhere in the same area..

[clecklewyke]

I relied on the imagination of greater brains for two of my layouts.

 

Clecklewyke is JB Priestley's small West Yorkshire mill town created for his play "When we were married"

 

Royston Vasey is another imaginary West Riding town, this time from the League of Gentlemen, and so has local trains for local people and a local shop. When I chose it I had no idea of the Chubbie Brown origin.

 

Try mining from the works of authors who create a convincing sense of place. Hardy, Priestley, Trollope or even a TV or Radio series - The Archers (Borchester!) Coronation Street (Weatherfield, Rosamund Street, Florizel Street)

 

Simple theft!

 

Ian

 

(Edited to correct slip of the brain. "Friends" indeed!)

Edited July 19, 2017 by clecklewyke

[peterl]

Terry Pratchett's "Llamedos" is presumably somewhere in the same area..

 

There was a boat on the River Thames with that name many years ago!

Peter

[john new]

I relied on the imagination of greater brains for two of my layouts.

 

Clecklewyke is JB Priestley's small West Yorkshire mill town created for his play "When we were married"

 

Royston Vasey is another imaginary West Riding town, this time from the League of Friends, and so has local trains for local people and a local shop. When I chose it I had no idea of the Chubbie Brown origin.

 

Try mining from the works of authors who create a convincing sense of place. Hardy, Priestley, Trollope or even a TV or Radio series - The Archers (Borchester!) Coronation Street (Weatherfield, Rosamund Street, Florizel Street)

 

Simple theft!

 

Ian

Nothing wrong with doing that IF the works are out of copyright, Of the names on your list, Hardy I know is OoC* but otherwise it is, as you say, copyright theft. Whether any copyright holders would chase it up is a different issue but it might place magazine publishers in a difficult position if your layout is, in due course, worthy of a feature and the name and scenic treatment are copies of a TV series name and set. Perhaps wise to ask for permission first.

 

* not checked the others and don't know when the authors died which is the countdown start on written works.

[Gwiwer]

Terry Pratchett's "Llamedos" is presumably somewhere in the same area..

 

Ditto Posy Simmonds' fictitious Cornish village of "Tresoddit" which in reality is Port Isaac.  Now better known by many as Port Wenn from the Doc Martin series.