Middle sized city station plan - 13ft by 8ft

[Danfilm007]

1 hour ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Hasn't a lot of dead space now appeared at the bottom?

 

I think people were talking about more drastic curvature of the platforms to enable the station to be compressed into a corner. The question then is, as with moving the bay, is whether its any longer what you were choosing to model.

 

Yeah - I didn't feel the need to run all the way to the bottom of the available space - a couple of ft in width felt fine to me? If the boards were laid out in a curved manner, then you could run it through the middle to give the front and back more prominence at certain points? It makes sense in my head, I promise! It's not (nor ever was going to be) a 100% scale model of Oxford Road, more it was inspired by it in terms of its operational potential.

 

1 hour ago, Harlequin said:

It's not a good idea to use the turning route through a slip in a main running line - the radius through the Peco slips is a nominal 610mm (2ft) and so trains encounter quite a sharp turn.

 

 

Thanks for highlighting that, back to the drawing board then!

[TravisM]

I have to agree with @Harlequin, slip crossovers are never a good idea.  I'd keep the cross over at the east end of the platforms (Towards Piccadilly) and the use a pair of curved points after.  It's a bit of a space eater but looks more realistic, and probably operationally better.

[RobinofLoxley]

The alternative is fit shaped pieces into the corners, cut with a jigsaw, to round the corners. An almost indispensable asset in layout making.

[Danfilm007]

2 hours ago, jools1959 said:

I have to agree with @Harlequin, slip crossovers are never a good idea.  I'd keep the cross over at the east end of the platforms (Towards Piccadilly) and the use a pair of curved points after.  It's a bit of a space eater but looks more realistic, and probably operationally better.

 

Thanks, so something like this as attached seems to be quite a good compromise? The awkward kink in the middle of the crossover could be smoothed out if it was real I reckon! 

 

I also did a more curved version of the station that admittedly to me seems a bit less compressed (the white platformed one), do you guys prefer that then?

[simon b]

I like the first of the pair, if you swap the points around you could smooth out the scissors crossing leading into the platforms.

 

Have you thought of shifting the whole station to the left? Start your scissors pointwork just below your green line and let the station follow the corner round,that way you get more of a run at the other end of the station.

[simon b]

I do think the flow of the pointwork in the second version is better, a much smoother transition. But the bay platform needs to be longer like the first. 

 

Or try a pair of bay platforms next to each other with a headshunt?

[Danfilm007]

14 minutes ago, simon b said:

I do think the flow of the pointwork in the second version is better, a much smoother transition. But the bay platform needs to be longer like the first. 

 

Or try a pair of bay platforms next to each other with a headshunt?

 

Thanks! I have tried shifting the layout to the left (left/west is towards Piccadilly now, right towards Deansgate) but the curve on the entry becomes too tight as there isn't many flexible curved point options in 00 Code 75. I have extended the bay to fit a 3 car train in like a 323 but the real location doesn't have a headshunt. I could try fitting one in but it also to me seemed a bit too much like cramming options in for the sake of it - you can always keep an idling loco in the bay?

[TravisM]

I've quickly drawn out the track plan on AnyRail for Oxford Road, using images from Google Maps.  I'd also like to suggest that the station goes where the fiddle yard is, and that moves to the station location.  I will admit that the plan is modern day and can obviously be altered.

 

 

[Danfilm007]

Me again! I've recovered from my utter brain fart on the west side of the layout so got it to all work! That looks a bit better. Been bugging me as you can tell... sorry for the overload everyone haha

[Danfilm007]

Just now, jools1959 said:

I've quickly drawn out the track plan on AnyRail for Oxford Road, using images from Google Maps.  I'd also like to suggest that the station goes where the fiddle yard is, and that moves to the station location.  I will admit that the plan is modern day and can obviously be altered.

 

 

 

Thanks! That is really helpful. I was studying onboards of the layout to get it right - the last one I've just posted makes me a bit happier and your guide there helps a lot too, thank you!

[TravisM]

7 minutes ago, Danfilm007 said:

 

Thanks! That is really helpful. I was studying onboards of the layout to get it right - the last one I've just posted makes me a bit happier and your guide there helps a lot too, thank you!

 

Hi there, this might be better.

 

 

[Danfilm007]

2 hours ago, jools1959 said:

 

Hi there, this might be better.

 

 

 

Thanks, it has given me some more inspiration! I managed to get a lot better flow through the layout by re-reversing the layout (west to Deansgate, east to Piccadilly). The biggest platform should hold a 5 car IEP or a TfW 67 & Mk4s, and the rest should hold 4 car trains comfortably. The big green blob is the central operating space (ignore the bit over the running lines!). Does it feel a bit more natural to you? I expect I could get more curves through the platforms but best to start conservatively again after all my revisions and overthinking.

[DavidB-AU]

If possible, moving the main lines a bit might help eliminate some reverse curves.

Edited January 11 by DavidB-AU

[Danfilm007]

7 hours ago, DavidB-AU said:

If possible, moving the main lines a bit might help eliminate some reverse curves.

I'll give it a go! It then goes back to the previous curving in that area effectively

[Harlequin]

The movable section will now apparently be in the scenic area. That makes it more difficult to do the scenery and to engineer the section so that the scenery stays put and survives the section being opened and closed repeatedly.

 

Where the tracks cross the boundaries of the movable section they should ideally be running straight to reduce the chance of derailments (i.e. not curving while crossing the joint). They can be angled but not too much.

 

You should have a short length of straight track between the joint of the movable section and any turnouts. That helps in the construction (because you want to lay track across the join and then cut it) and it helps avoid damage to the turnout near the moving section. Damaged track is easy to replace, turnouts less so.

 

The tracks are very close to the cabin walls at west and east.

 

The fiddle yard doesn't have its own crossovers any more. So trains that terminate and reverse direction in the FY will come out running wrong road - unless you physically pick them up and move them in the FY.

 

I notice that the real station is elevated with some very tall buildings around it. That would be quite a challenge to represent but it would make a very interesting scene if you could do it!

 

The station building itself is striking and would be a fantastic model but you'd have to get the angle of the bay platform right. In your current layout could perhaps change the angle so that the bay projects into the operating well. You have the room, it wouldn't affect reach very much and that small projection would make sense scenically because it is isolated and raised in the real world.

From: https://modernmooch.com/2016/02/26/oxford-road-station-manchester/

 

Edited January 11 by Harlequin

[RobinofLoxley]

Looks like Sydney opera house

 

I bet the acoustics are terrible - you probably cant hear the train delayed announcements 

Edited January 11 by RobinofLoxley

[RobinofLoxley]

In keeping with @Harlequin's comments, those turnouts top right are probably superfluous. While in the real railway they might be relatively close to the station on the model they mean that trains are changing tracks up by the fiddle yard and could be running wrong line almost to the scenic break. Not a good look.

 

Personally I think that the first drawing that you did @Danfilm007 was pretty good on the scenic side, just the short platforms. Later versions with odd shaped baseboards (some with the point motor positions right on the join) - asking for trouble. There was a problem with the basic fiddle yard structure as well. On-scene, trains could arrive from the right side into all platforms, and depart on the left but going the other way cant depart from the two lower platforms. That seems quite flexible to me.

 

Bearing in mind previous comments I have made, Ive drawn a doodle below. Platform length is about 1.8M. All drawn in code 75 except the RH top corner where I used setrack to show the curvature required, which is otherwise hard to get. Plenty of space left around the short sides. The main island platform is 15cm clear width which you need. Red lines show possible limits of scenic section.

 

The main thing is that the curved turnout is your friend on more compact layouts. I have a terminus station on my layout accessed exclusively through them and the curve is very gentle, they look great and give no operating problems (so far, lol) but if you have 3 or 4 back to back you soon get round the corner.  So rather than tilt the station, Im hoping the slightly curved platforms will give the required look.

Edited January 11 by RobinofLoxley

[Harlequin]

4 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

In keeping with @Harlequin's comments, those turnouts top right are probably superfluous. While in the real railway they might be relatively close to the station on the model they mean that trains are changing tracks up by the fiddle yard and could be running wrong line almost to the scenic break. Not a good look.

 

Personally I think that the first drawing that you did @Danfilm007 was pretty good on the scenic side, just the short platforms. Later versions with odd shaped baseboards (some with the point motor positions right on the join) - asking for trouble. There was a problem with the basic fiddle yard structure as well. On-scene, trains could arrive from the right side into all platforms, and depart on the left but going the other way cant depart from the two lower platforms. That seems quite flexible to me.

 

Bearing in mind previous comments I have made, Ive drawn a doodle below. Platform length is about 1.8M. All drawn in code 75 except the RH top corner where I used setrack to show the curvature required, which is otherwise hard to get. Plenty of space left around the short sides. The main island platform is 15cm clear width which you need. Red lines show possible limits of scenic section.

 

The main thing is that the curved turnout is your friend on more compact layouts. I have a terminus station on my layout accessed exclusively through them and the curve is very gentle, they look great and give no operating problems (so far, lol) but if you have 3 or 4 back to back you soon get round the corner.  So rather than tilt the station, Im hoping the slightly curved platforms will give the required look.

 

That looks really good. The fiddleyard loops might not be long enough for Dan's proposed trains but that can probably be improved.

 

The real station has both trailing and facing crossovers at both ends. The trailing crossover is the outermost in both cases so you could maybe subsume one of them into the FY. Have a look at this google map:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Oxford+Rd,+Manchester/@53.4738414,-2.2424556,134m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x487bb18d95a2e85b:0x2a58e8246fd5b0a6!8m2!3d53.4663853!4d-2.2339112!16s%2Fg%2F1th7mfp7?entry=ttu

(The parallax scrolling is beautiful!)

 

You can see how small a station it really is - the island platform is only just long enough for 6 cars (I estimate).

 

Edited January 11 by Harlequin

[RobinofLoxley]

Phil - I actually had a look on Raildar to understand the traffic movements (still a wip, its a beta version and I dont think the Oxford road part is working properly). I havent seen anything use those crossovers yet (Yes def not working yet) . I simply didnt think they were needed, and if you recall on the RHS it can be fitted but impinges on the possible lift out section. 

 

Fiddle yard - certainly yes, especially as i think the OP used 14' across in one drawing, plus I have left big margins on the edges, due to the scenery considerations that you mentioned.

[RobinofLoxley]

41 minutes ago, Harlequin said:

You can see how small a station it really is - the island platform is only just long enough for 6 cars (I estimate).

 

There is a train just off on the LHS comprising 6 Mk2's, 2 locos and a tank wagon (??) and it would be hanging slightly out at both ends, but yes the 6 coaches look as if they would fit.

[Danfilm007]

3 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

There is a train just off on the LHS comprising 6 Mk2's, 2 locos and a tank wagon (??) and it would be hanging slightly out at both ends, but yes the 6 coaches look as if they would fit.

Thank you for your advice and plan, it looks great! It is a good idea so I'll have to go away and mock it up in my template. Does feel like I am getting closer to a resolved layout and your advice and others is handy. Fiddle yards etc are easy enough to design, I haven't really iterated on it as I wanted to get the layout to flow nicely. It isn't critical to have the second turnback, as you say, it isn't really used much whereas the ones in Deansgate are used a lot.

 

The island platforms generally can squeeze in a 6 car train - from some testing videos, a 68 and set of Mk5as really dominate the island platform. There is a prototype for everything, even trains the same length of the platform!

[Chimer]

9 hours ago, Harlequin said:

 

The real station has both trailing and facing crossovers at both ends.

 

 

I can't help wondering why those facing crossovers are needed (and whether they are a relatively recent addition, given the historical aversion to them).

[Curlew]

Aren't the tracks to Piccadilly signalled for bi-directional running?

[DavidB-AU]

More or less bi-directional from Salford Central to the Piccadilly throat. Simplified diagrams from OpenTrainTimes showing an example of how this is used.

 

 

 

 

 

EDIT: A handful of trains terminate at platform 3.

 

Edited January 12 by DavidB-AU

[DavidB-AU]

18 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

In keeping with @Harlequin's comments, those turnouts top right are probably superfluous. While in the real railway they might be relatively close to the station on the model they mean that trains are changing tracks up by the fiddle yard and could be running wrong line almost to the scenic break. Not a good look.

 

Personally I think that the first drawing that you did @Danfilm007 was pretty good on the scenic side, just the short platforms. Later versions with odd shaped baseboards (some with the point motor positions right on the join) - asking for trouble. There was a problem with the basic fiddle yard structure as well. On-scene, trains could arrive from the right side into all platforms, and depart on the left but going the other way cant depart from the two lower platforms. That seems quite flexible to me.

 

Bearing in mind previous comments I have made, Ive drawn a doodle below. Platform length is about 1.8M. All drawn in code 75 except the RH top corner where I used setrack to show the curvature required, which is otherwise hard to get. Plenty of space left around the short sides. The main island platform is 15cm clear width which you need. Red lines show possible limits of scenic section.

 

The main thing is that the curved turnout is your friend on more compact layouts. I have a terminus station on my layout accessed exclusively through them and the curve is very gentle, they look great and give no operating problems (so far, lol) but if you have 3 or 4 back to back you soon get round the corner.  So rather than tilt the station, Im hoping the slightly curved platforms will give the required look.

 

One thing I would do here is flip the fiddle yard. It allows some trains to shuttle between the dead end sidings and platform 5. Increasing the number of through sidings would be desirable.