Well after screwing around for so many years and not building a layout I have decided to build one finally. I have been planning many layouts recently but have changed my mind a lot recently on what, where, scale, era, etc. I have created a pretty nice L-shaped space to work with that is 13' x 16' plus a bit along the top as seen below at the left hand side of the plan. Unfortunately I can not use the whole space as the center of the room must remain open for other uses. I can use the walls for a shelf type layout though and have done up numerous designs that never really made me very happy. I am not particularly devoted to any specific railroad or area and just want to build something that I can run by myself but allow others to run as well once I meet other modelers around my area. I was on the Appalachian Railroad Modeling site the other day and really became drawn to modeling a coal road and this morning I was browsing through MRP 2003 and came across a plan I had not seen in some time done by Anthony Hardy. He is building an HO scale layout base on CSX in Hazard, KY. The plan was pretty cool and offered what quite a bit of operation plus a good bit of structure and scenery construction. I wondered how well it would translate to an N scale layou. Since I had nothing else to do today I decided to scan the plan in, scale it down to N scale, and see what it would look like. His plan was 9'-6" x 26'-0" so iwas not sure how it would look. Well it turned out very well if I do say so. I did have to strech the short sides a bit since people do not scale down and the aisles got really small. I ended up with a plan that is 13' x 7'-6". I also added a shelf along 2 walls to add a branchline. here is what I have so far as the branchline has not been designed yet. Staging is under the yard at the bottom of the plan. I am really happy with how this looks. The main yard a Hazard is at the bottom of the plan, and the large Golden Oak coal prep plant directly above. A backdrop divides the coal prep plat for the scene on the other side which is also not completed yet. The branchline will have 3 or 4 more loaders on it which will give me a LOT to do. I must give credit though, as this is Anthony Hardy's plan. I'd like to ask his permission to use this in a smaller scale so if anyone knows him please let me know so I can get in touch. I will probably add a roundhouse to this plan and backdate the era to late steam so I can run a good variety of motive power. Comments on this plan are appreciated as always. John
Access? Hey John, nice plan. Just curious, how are you going to access the area near the yard? Via duckunder?
Correct. Track height across the layout will range between 57" and 61" roughly, which is a perfect height for me. Should not pose too much of a problem as I am pretty limber and I'd rather have more room to work underneath with a high layout. John
