Talk to me about staging

[steinjr]

This will be my first layout with staging ( maybe ). My garage layout will be point to point with staging at both ends. The staging yards will be stub ended with run around crossovers. Now, I make my first staging run, switch some industries and an interchange along the way, go to staging and run around the train. To me, that train will now be "unworkable" going back. Am I correct on this, does the whole train need to be turned? Or am I overlooking the obvious? Also, would there be a train at each staging yard, or would one run back and forth between the two? I think what I am really asking is how do you use staging? Any info would be a big help.

Loren

For whatever it is worth, there are no hard and fast rules here. You use staging In whatever way you can think of to support the illusion of trains going from your layout to "somewhere else" and/or coming from "somewhere else" onto your layout.

In some pattern that works for whatever you want to model, fitting within whatever space you have available.

This is my layout:



It is a small layout, with very little staging. What I have is there is a cassette that can hold an engine and five 40-foot cars to try to support the illusion that short transfer runs consisting of a small diesel engine and 4-5 cars arrives from "nearby yards or industries" or departs for "nearby yards and industries" once in a while.

Using a cassette allows me to swap in or out an entire train - just grab the cassette (gently) and move it over to a shelf above my layout containing a handful of staging tracks and let the short train run from the cassette to one of the staging tracks on my shelf, or from the shelf onto my cassette.

It also allows me to turn the entire train - either after it's run from the layout onto the cassette or before it's run from the cassette onto the layout, by turning the cassette around (again - slowly and gently ).

To save place, I have placed the cassette in such a way (across the door) as to allow it to be used as staging from either end of my point to point layout (or to allow continuous running when I want that).

My setup allows me to swap trains in and out. At the expense of having to manually handle every single train that leaves for "somewhere else" or arrives from "somewhere else".

I also plan to stage trains on the visible layout before operations - like having a train on the curve on the right end of the room that has "just arrived from the west" and is waiting to enter the area at the top of the layout, and one train on the middle track along the bottom left of the layout, also having "just arrived from the east". Likewise, a session can end with a train "just about to depart for the east" and another "just about to depart for the west".

In short - a little can go a long way if you just think of staging as "somewhere else" while running trains, and if you are prepared to do a little pre-staging or re-staging before you start your session, or even a little "fiddling" (manual handling of trains in staging) during a session.

As for your question. A couple of ideas for your point to point layout with single ended staging on both ends:

You can simulate a train coming from left staging, going through the layout, and disappearing off into right staging, and that's it for that train for that session.

Before the next session you could then either back the train over the visible layout back into the staging it originally came from - ie "re-stage" the train between session, getting it ready for it's appearance during your next operating session. Or you can turn the train in some way in right staging, so during the next session it will make an appearance as a train going in the opposite direction.

Or you could e.g. have staging represent a branchline without the ability to run the engine around it's train - so the train will (after a decent interval spent "doing something down the branchline") back out of staging onto the visible layout, before doing a runaround move on the visible layout and heading back into the staging where it came from initially, either doing some work on the way back (e.g. switching spurs that were facing spurs going the initial way) - in the same session.

Or you could "fiddle" (handle manually) the train in staging before it comes back onto the layout - e.g. swapping out or running around engines, swapping cars and/or cabooses or turn the entire train around, before your train makes a reappearance going in the opposite direction through your layout - either pretending to be another train or pretending to be the same train returning from somewhere else.

No matter what you do - try to include as many and as long staging tracks as at all possible - it makes it possible for you to run longer operating sessions before you have to do something in staging.

With e.g. 6 single ended staging tracks of suitable length on each end of the layout (and a place where trains can pass each other on the visible layout), you could run as much as 12 trains before you have to re-stage or fiddle or otherwise deal with trains in staging. That allows you to concentrate on running trains on the visible layout rather than on how to work trains in staging all the time.

A couple of other neat ideas with staging (if you have the space to do so):

Shared double ended staging is often a neat idea that increases flexibility, if you can configure your layout in such a way that the same staging tracks are connected both to the east and west end of your layout. Then same tracks represents both "east staging" and "west staging", and a train that run from "east staging" through the visible layout and into "west staging" then immediately is ready for a new run out from "east staging" - either later in the same operating session or for the next session.

X factor staging (and idea popularized by Byron Henderson in Model Railroad Planning a few years ago) - having east and west staging facing each other across crossovers, like this:



Allows you to take a train that headed into west staging engine first and back it across to east staging, where it will be ready for a new appearance as a train coming from the east - either in the same session or in the next session.

Lots of options. What will work for you depends on what kind of traffic you want to model, and how many comprimizes you will have to make to fit in what you want in the space you have.

Smile,
Stein