Small commuter focused layout?

[Green_Elite_Cab]

I've still been thinking about this subject, not so much to actually build a layout, but because there are so few model railroads that feature commuter trains.

Most people site commuter trains (and passenger trains in general) as being "boring to operate".Certainly, if you plan to just operate the layout with a single train shuttling around, I can see the issue.

So what would it take to make a commuter operation interesting?

There are two ideas that come to mind.

First, you could do terminal switching. there are several layouts that focus solely on this aspect. As has been mentioned here and elsewhere, one can shunt cars this way and that, and "dispatch" them to staging. A terminal facility might be interesting, but even then, its just a whole lot of back and forth.

The Second Idea seems more appealing- A "Fork" in the road.

For example, two commuter trains depart Reading Terminal in Philadelphia bound north. One train is heading to West Trenton, NJ, the other to Lansdale, PA. The Double track line to West Trenton splits north of Jenkintown, with the mainline continuing to West Trenton and the branch going to Lansdale. These trains are right behind each other, and need to be set on the correct track to be going to the correct destination. Whats more, a Philadelphia bound "Wall Street" returning from New York City will also be passing through that junction at about that time.

The trick now is to be able to sort those trains quickly onto their appropriate routes without holding them (for to long).

As a layout, you could feature the junction, as well as a length of the mainline in either direction to get the whole train in view. Staging can be on all three ends ( Philadelphia staging, West Trenton/New York staging, Lansdale staging).

In the late 70s the average Reading Company/ SEPTA commuter train was only 4 Silverliner cars long (maybe a little more for the old Reading "blueliners"), and intercity trains like the Wall Street and the Crusader were only two RDCs long.

In theory, one could have a relatively medium sized layout that has plenty of action with multiple trains zipping through within close proximity to each other. When you're running on a fast clock, you really need to be able to move the trains fast!

The only issue I can see with this sort of layout is that it may require more than one person to operate the trains, since it might be difficult to juggle all of that at once. setting up an Automatic system where the modeler simply acts as the tower man could be a way to resolve this.

This is just a hypothetical Idea, what do you think? (again, no plans to build this, just trying to come up with an interesting operation)