Operations - A Personal Struggle

[wm3798]

Steve,
You need to come over to run next time we have a crew over.  I'm set up more or less as you describe.  There's two tower operator positions that handle the basic routing on, through and off the layout, and enough staging to hold the thru traffic.  The working yard is big enough to handle the pick ups, set outs and locals, and when everything is blocked and sequenced, it moves pretty smoothly.

I'd like to add some more length to the main line run, and finish the Thomas Sub, which will basically be a stub-end branch to add some more destinations for local traffic.  Ultimately, I'd like to do the Dispatcher override to control the main on the Connellsville Sub remotely, but as long as I have tower operators, I don't really need that.

Having a functional operating scheme really helps make all the work on structures, scenery and rolling stock seem worth it!

And Dave, if you find yourself up this way before your transfer, let me know... Surely they'll need you to stop in at Dover to look at a thermometer or a wind gauge at some point...
Lee

[asciibaron]

Steve, I know you're on board with this idea!

the questions become staging and how you will do the Northumberland yard - it a major yard with 2 humps and did classification for Erie and Buffalo so that means most freights stopped there - it would have to be big.

then there are the details of how you would do the connection at Sunbury so things went in the correct directions.

if i wasn't doing the Panhandle, i'd probably model the Erie line from Lock Haven to Emporium - Renovo had a nice sized yard and there is a great helper district.

-Steve

[Dave V]

Yeah, Norry would be big.

Might need to model a small part of it and stage the rest.

As for the connection at Sunbury, I was thinking having Sunbury on the left side of a penninsula, and have the Shamokin line run through the backdrop at the middle of the base of the penninsula, gaining slight elevation all the way to the Glen Burns colliery, which would be on the far right wall (hard to do this without a diagram!).  It would mean having the Shamokin line and the mainline parallel on that far right wall shelf, but putting a 1% grade on the Shamokin line would help seperate them.  Plus, I could tos in some trees.  I'd probably put Millersburg on that wall too.  The far left wall would be Norry.  The right side of the penninsula (with Sunbury on the left) would be the PP&L plant.

Just a few random thoughts...

[BOK]

Lee:

I like the scheme of your layout and the use of a wye to a staging yard makes a lot of sense and good use of space. Do you have a track plan of your layout? It  would be interesing to see.

Nice scenery and the way you handled the reverse loop around the papermil looks great. Keep up the good work.

Barry   

[wm3798]

This is what I've got so far.  The lines marked in red are the temporary lines that we're using for ops.


Here's the "Big Picture" that will hopefully come to fruition in the next couple of years...


And there's a plan afoot to expand into the next room as well, but there needs to be a couple of graduations and weddings first...
You can see more about my layout at my website, click the link below my sig...

Lee

[Mark5]

Have to admit I'm coming in late on this thread, so I'm sorta responding to Dave's first post.

My model railroads have always been designed to please one customer - me.

Over the years the influence of others (early on in the 70s the RMC V&O series affected my thinking deeply) along with a better understanding of real operations has caused my thinking to evolve (my 1st layout was in HO with a loop and a couple sidings on a 4X8 sheet of plywood).

Like Dave I'm a railfan and there are times when just watching the train "snake" around (at eye level!) is all I want to do. But I also learned that alone can become boring. So my track plans increasingly have been designed to accomodate operations that resemble what real trains might do (albeit compressed).

Recent layout designs (recent for me is the last 15 years ) have multiple train operator capability. But for the most part it's mainly me running the things.

My take on operations (locals, yard assignments, etc) is still done with a "free form" approach, sort of like the way I approached play as a kid. The card systems etc seem way too rigid for me and remind me too much of "work".

I was in a HO club as a teenager but unfortunately before we got out layout to the point of operations we got booted out of the trolley museum.  :

I have an open mind about the structured train running though, and hope to take up one of Lee's invites to observe this sort of thing in person to see what it's really about.

My current layout is rather smaller than I want due to the kids taking priority in the limited amount of space in my house, but I'm already thinking about the next layout. I want it "bigger" but not in a spaghetti bowl sort of way. Most of the increase in size will be in the interval between "switching points" (towns, mines, etc). I do not want to create a maintenance nightmare!