1940's goods yard ground cover - what would it look like?

[Black Sheep]

I'm trying to make my layout look accurate and am currently wondering what ground cover would have been for a late 1940's goods yard, would the track have been balasted or have acquired an ash covering?

would it be inset into the ground?

 

if anyone has photos showing examples then I'd be very grateful

 

Thanks

[TheSignalEngineer]

One example here http://bwtas.blogspo...ch-request.html

 

Would also depend on the area, as the surface may also depend on the traffic. Up to the 1960s quite a few Black Country yards had granite setts for the roadways with ash or slag ballast.

[Black Sheep]

Thanks for the photo,

 

The layout is set either in the north east peak district or the yorkshire dales, not sure if that would affect ground cover,

 

my plan is to ballast the track, and use finer ballast for the yard where vehicles and people would be moving around.

 

thinking cobbles is overdoing things for the size of yard.

[coachmann]

Probably ash for good drainage. As they had been built many years before, there would also be a good amount of spillage from goods wagons.

[gwrrob]

I used one of Green Scenes textured paint coverings for doing mine.It don't look too bad.A sprinkling of Treemendus earth finished it off.

[Armchair Modeller]

Photos of a similar station to what you are modelling in the area are pretty essential to get a good idea of how things were. Heavily-used urban goods yards would be different to quiet rural locations etc. etc.

[Black Sheep]

The yard is alongside the station of my rural market town, It's a fictional layout and the scale is N if that affects anything?

[coachmann]

The yard is alongside the station of my rural market town, It's a fictional layout and the scale is N if that affects anything?

 

Depends...... If your Sun in your natal chart is at 25 degrees Virgo, and Saturn is moving towards that same degree of Gemini (25 degrees of Gemini), Saturn is said to be transiting square your natal Sun. The Uranus energy brings a great need for spontaneity in your connection, and it is best to use 'N' gauge ballast.

[Metr0Land]

Sounds like your truss rods are playing you up again Coachman.

[darren01]

HI

C+L do a very nice ash ballast ,i have used it in my yards on my new layout.

Darren

[Mythocentric]

I spent most of my youth living between and visiting the yards in Blackburn and surrounding district. Islington EL Goods, near the station and Crook Street which was a large yard mostly dedicated to coal traffic with multiple sidings but most of the others, Mill Hill, Pleasington had just one or two. In all cases track was ballasted with ash with granite setts on roadways for motors vehicle access. I believe that this was pretty much universal in most yards. Makes sense, since rain and ash on an earth surface don't mix. I once got a good example of this when one of the drivers tried to take his Scammell through the yard to Havelock St. rather than the main gate on Duckworth St from the BRS depot. I learned a lot of new words that day as the depot crew unloaded the trailer they'd just finished in order to extracate him! But as Armchair Modeller advised, check the area you are modelling first!

[Richard Mawer]

I have come across air drying clay being used in yards to look like the high levels of ash and debris built up around the tracks, almost obliterating the sleepers, but has anyone tried using Artex type textured paint?