Basic Dimensions for 'Shoe Box' and 'Tilt-up' Factories etc

[Gary S]

Here are some photos from Houston. The height of a boxcar door above the railtop is around 3 feet 8 inches. I got that by measuring some HO scale boxcars. Using the 3'-8" as a standard, let's see what we get.

The first photo is from Shasta Beverages where they make soda pop, typically in fruit flavors. The industry still gets corn sweetener by rail in tank cars, but as you can see, the rail doors have been bricked up. Each yellow line is around 44 inches long. That puts the door opening to be about 10 feet x 10 feet.



Next is Gulf Winds International, a shipping company. Door dimensions again look to be 10 by 10.



This is Univar Chemicals. Still get chemicals via tank car, but the boxcar doors are no longer used. This opening looks smaller, so maybe 9 feet x 9 feet.



Last is Texatlantic Textiles. No longer get rail service, but the door opening looks like 10 x 10 to me.



Seems the 10 x 10 would be fairly standard, can't go wrong with that.