starting the design, I established several elements I wanted. These included multiple decks, full- length passenger trains, passen- ger and freight yard, double-track main line with the possibility for continuous running, branch line with lots of coal, functional engine terminal, industrial switching, an interchange with another railroad and sufficient staging to support operating sessions. I used XTrkCAD as my track- plan drawing tool and spent near- ly a year refining and tuning a design to fit into a roughly 30x30- foot space. Using the multiple lay- ers available in the program, I created plans for the open frame benchwork (to ensure framework wouldn’t interfere with switch machines) and overhead lighting. The double-track main line forms a bent dogbone with nearly one- third of it serving as hidden stag- ing for the western end of the lay- out (Columbus, Ohio) when not being used for continuous run- ning during open house events. This allows staging for seven 15-
car trains. Eastern staging (Har- risburg, Pennsylvania) is provided by a stub-end, six-track yard. Two additional trains can be staged in the area under the stairway on the Pittsburgh branch. Initially, room for the freight and passen- ger yard was a bit tight. Replacing two leaking water heaters with a tankless water heater freed up six additional linear feet for the yard. More room for the railroad, a tax credit, and more efficient hot wa- ter — that’s a win-win-win! A minimum curve radius of 30 inches was used (with much larger radii used in most visible areas) to support full-length pas- senger cars and large steam loco- motives. The railroad has a mix of Peco and Atlas turnouts, with No. 8s along the main line and mostly No. 6s elsewhere. All trackwork is Code 100.
A fully functioning engine ter- minal was a must. To justify the scale of a large engine terminal, I designated West Valley as a divi- sion point on the railroad. While it will likely be a long time until cat-
Terminal The locomotive facili- ties on the layout were designed and built with steam and diesel op- erations in mind. A large turntable with plenty of garden tracks is ready to service any steam locomotive that may show up on an inbound train. The diesel ready tracks and shop are also adequate to service the newer power.
NOVEMBER 2015 45
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