I believe I have come up with a plan for Blue Island. It will involve four diamonds, possible reverse switching and street running (on the siding).
See photos below for more information (lighting is horrible in the layout room at night - please forgive photo quality)
Mainline coming from Joliet on the right.
Stand-in industries to fill the area.
The industrial lead will cross the main with a 60 degree crossing
Mainline will curve around the back of the industries and head toward the front of the benchwork at an angle.
The background will be filled with some old four story apartment buildings
To the right of the photo is where the mainline straightens out after the curve (coming from Joliet). The siding will open up just outside the photo on the right. This is an double industrial crossing (former competing railroad line) protected by a tower.
Lumber mill located at double industrial crossing mentioned above.
Another view of the industrial crossing. The square in the lower left quadrant will be the tower. Across the main/siding will be the passenger station. Against the wall will be Chicago Foods (building flat) with 7 to 8 car capacity.
Another view of the same industrial crossing. The former competing railroad line crossing the main/siding, curves behind the freight house and in front of the Chicago Foods warehouse. It reconnects with the mainline past the freight warehouse. The freight warehouse will have an industrial lead with four car capacity off the mainline.
You can also see where the main (right) and siding split. The mainline will run behind the two city blocks of city buildings. The siding runs down the main road in front of the city buildings. Both tracks go into two banks of four staging tracks each.
A little better view of the separation of the main and siding.
The track in the foreground is the siding (street running). There will be connector track from the industrial (former competing railroad) lead into both the main and siding. This will be controlled by a small signal tower.
Looking back toward the west. Main and siding, industrial double crossing.
Industrial lead behind the freight house rejoins the main, plus crosses it to access the siding (right).
Also, you can view a glimpse of the nearly completely Davenport yard below.
Both main and siding will flare out into banks of four staging tracks.
A view of a messy Davenport yard. Construction debris is everywhere on the layout.
"lighting is horrible in the layout room at night - please forgive photo quality"
ReplyDeleteMaybe when Foreman Timmy returns from his "administrative leave" he can be put on a project by himself to add some lighting to the darker areas of the layout. If he does a good job, improved lighting might increase productivity of the rest of the crews.
Of course, being Timmy, he might just add a bunch of disco balls and sound-activated strobe lights.
Also, I've been meaning to ask a question. Will this layout have a hump yard? It doesn't really matter one way or the other to me, I just like that phrase. I bet Timmy does, too.
Sorry David, no humping cars here. Although, I do know of someone that has a very large hump yard in N scale.
ReplyDeleteThe plans for the lower level includes running Christmas rope lights under the top level to illuminate the layout below. Regarding the top, I'm not sure how to approach that. The fan, light kit in the room looks nice, but doesn't provide balanced light.