04-26-2012, 12:52 PM
It seems to me that there are some very successful shelf-type layouts here. Among the factors that contribute to their success are the ability to reconfigure quickly -- guys seem to be able to replace structures, change era, change region, or whatever, pretty easily. It also seems to me that the potential track arrangements for a layout 10 feet by 15 inches are pretty straightforward. My sense would be either to build the shelf and lay track on a temporary-pilot basis to see what works for you, or to draw a plan at maybe 1 inch to 1 foot and cut out pieces of paper that correspond in size to freight cars and locos, shuffle them around, and see what works best.
Industry types and regions can be changed pretty easily -- as I'm sure you've found yourself, what with how you've redone Haston!
My inclination, based on the experience I've had working West Egg as a small layout connected to a large one, is to take the space you have and make it "bipolar" -- for instance, two Inglenooks connected as mirror images, connected at their single track ends. Rather than have one side scenically "dead" as staging, I would make it a scenically and operationally active terminal, feeding another scenically and operationally active terminal at the other end. If you decide to have a runaround, which is actually a good idea, maybe it could be shared between the two ends.
The advantage would be to give each end a different scenic treatment, maybe a different prototype railroad as well. A possibility would be to say that one end is a piece of NS/CSX/BNSF/UP, the other end a shortline or regional.
Industry types and regions can be changed pretty easily -- as I'm sure you've found yourself, what with how you've redone Haston!
My inclination, based on the experience I've had working West Egg as a small layout connected to a large one, is to take the space you have and make it "bipolar" -- for instance, two Inglenooks connected as mirror images, connected at their single track ends. Rather than have one side scenically "dead" as staging, I would make it a scenically and operationally active terminal, feeding another scenically and operationally active terminal at the other end. If you decide to have a runaround, which is actually a good idea, maybe it could be shared between the two ends.
The advantage would be to give each end a different scenic treatment, maybe a different prototype railroad as well. A possibility would be to say that one end is a piece of NS/CSX/BNSF/UP, the other end a shortline or regional.