plan as you go

[dickgreen]

I have been trying to come up with a shelf track plan and I got an idea. What if I lay a main line from end to end and build industries and then add track to them. This is somewhat I envision happening in a modern industrial park.

Do buildings come first then the railroad lays track to service them or is it really the other way around.

Comments, opinions, Ideas,

Thanks

Dick

[faraway]

I followed a similar approach for my warehouse district when I rebuilt my layout last winter. You see the lead track at the right side with some industry serving tracks. I had no industry planned in detail at that stage just reserved the spots and made each spot rail served.



Modern industry parks are planned in a similar way. A web of streets two industries wide apart with a lead track in the middle. All industries have a road at the front side and a track attached to the lead track can serve the rear side of each industry.

[doctorwayne]

...Do buildings come first then the railroad lays track to service them or is it really the other way around.....

For the prototype, I suspect that it's a mix of both. Some industries would already be in place before a railroad was built, and some new ones would be be built to take advantage of the opportunities afforded by the new railroad. I'd guess that the existing ones would ask to have rail service (it's my understanding that the railroad supplies the turnout(s) for connection to their track and that the industry is responsible for the siding itself, both construction and maintenance).

For my layout, I didn't have a trackplan and simply built benchwork that would fit the odd-shaped room and yet leave reasonably generous aisles. Because of the room's shape...



....I layed-out the mainline curves first, using the widest possible radii that would fit, and then connected the curves with reasonably straight track. Any space which was left could then be developed as I saw fit. (The area in grey on the picture is for a partial second level, and is currently under development.)
I still don't have a drawing of the track layout, but did manage to include 32 rail-served and fully-modelled industries on the lower level of the layout. A couple are quite large, but there are also industries not-modelled but served by industrial staging tracks - their purpose is solely to receive or ship cars....traffic generators which take up little space.

Wayne