Tehachapi, BC

[Philip H]

Finally, a shot down the east slope, mildly cropped:

Gary,
I sort of like this concept, but where the overpass heads to the left of this image is where you can get into trouble.  You will need some sort of scenic blending here because just running the bridge into the back of the Loop backdrop adjoining it will be a bit jarring.  Perhaps a hill here, or something to soften the edge.  I can't draw it up . . . lacking the software at work.

Philip

[GaryHinshaw]

Well, I went out to the garage this morning and decided I didn't really like the overpass as a device to hide the exit to staging.  It just seemed a bit busy and forced.  So I went back and tried to mock up something closer to my original mental picture, where the fascia from the desert slope splits and the top part merges to the side-drop.  I also repositioned the desert backdrop and (crudely) tried out Mark H's single layer proposal for the main Loop backdrop.  Here are some new shots - first an overview from across the room:



The red arrow indicates the level at which the desert fascia would continue; the yellow arrow roughly indicates the extent and elevation of the Loop scenery in front of the split fascia/backdrop.  The side-drop photo would be continued closer to the split, possibly fading to fascia color behind low trees.

Next a more oblique angle of the desert shelf and the transition:



I'm really liking this angle.  The repositioning of the desert backdrop with the receding mountains is intended to help force the perspective a bit so the exit looks like it's reaching a vanishing point in the open desert.

Finally and eye level view down the desert shelf showing both scenes together:



This last shot still has too many unfinished distracting elements to gauge the success of the concept, but here are a few more thoughts:

* There is less side-drop encroachment on the Loop scene with this configuration, and the split fascia helps to force the desert perspective.  To reduce encroachment even more, I might I want to move the split a bit further up the desert shelf.  However, a person standing in this position should really be focusing on the desert, so maybe the encroachment helps separate these scenes.
* The single layer Loop backdrop does look simpler (and thus better) to me.  I think these photos probably need to be shifted rightward a foot or more.  I haven't really tried to optimize the photo placement (and mounting quality) at all yet.
* The curved backdrop gives a bit of a bowl-like appearance to this part of the scene, but I think I need to see some 3-d landforms in there before really passing judgement on that.

Thanks for looking - comments welcome,
-gfh

[Scottl]

This photo captures the feel of your layout really well, Gary.

http://railpictures.net/photo/432070/

[C855B]

According to the date, that picture was taken the day after the signal bridge was removed. I find it odd there are no comments to that effect.

[GaryHinshaw]

This photo captures the feel of your layout really well, Gary.

http://railpictures.net/photo/432070/

Too green*.    (I'll be modeling bone-dry late summer.)  But congratulations to Mathieu (magicman_841) on the POTW!

I hope to have some layout updates to post later this weekend.

-gfh

*Ed's Loop is a good match.

[magicman_841]

According to the date, that picture was taken the day after the signal bridge was removed. I find it odd there are no comments to that effect.

It indeed was. In fact, if you look close enough, you can see the signal bridge lying on the ground to the left on tunnel 9.

But congratulations to Mathieu (magicman_841) on the POTW!

Thank you, sir! That was quite unexpected!

MT

[GaryHinshaw]

Here is a brief update.  After mucking around with photo backdrops, I decided it was finally time to take care of the panels behind the Loop shelf (the signature scene, after all).   My plan had been to attach a narrow Masonite strip to the top of the garage door proper, but when I thought about it some more, I came up with an alternative plan: a pair of removable panels in the same plane as the lower ones that are held in with 4 screws and can be slid out without too much effort if I need to open the garage door.  (I'm not quite ready to completely sacrifice the operability of the door.)   Here is the before & after:





If you look closely you can see a horizontal seam at the top of the original panels.  There are also two small pieces outboard of the door rails that are permanently in place.  In person the seams are mildly annoying, but still way better than a rusty tension rod.

In other news, I got the roadbed for the shoo-fly cut out and hung under the Loop (where the staging helix will go).  A portion of it is indicated by the red arrow in the 2nd shot.  I now have about 15' of track to lay to (temporarily) close the loop on the upper deck.  More on that soon.

-gfh

[Zox]

That's an elegant solution, and well-executed. I have to believe that, if you find those seams annoying, you would have found your earlier backdrop-on-door plan to be quite intolerable.

[Scottl]

Dangerously close to running trains continuously!

[Coxy]

Love the backdrop behind the loop going to the ceiling. It would be a good idea to unplug the garage door motor to prevent bad things from happening if the garage door button or the remote is accidentally pressed.

Garage door tracks could be painted backdrop color to help make them disappear, at least on the non-running portions.

[GaryHinshaw]

I have to believe that, if you find those seams annoying, you would have found your earlier backdrop-on-door plan to be quite intolerable.

Indeed!   

Dangerously close to running trains continuously!

Dangerous, for sure.

It would be a good idea to unplug the garage door motor to prevent bad things from happening if the garage door button or the remote is accidentally pressed.

Motor and remote are both gone.  It was non-functional when we moved in, and since it was unsightly, I just took it out.  This post has a shot of the garage from almost 2 years ago now, complete with relic motor.  The room seems so much different now!

[GaryHinshaw]

[Warning: long ops-focused post.] As noted, the temporary shoo-fly roadbed has been installed, and cork is currently being glued down.  While waiting for the glue to dry, I have been thinking through the installation and operation of the south staging helix (which will eventually replace the shoo-fly), and the full ops plan.  Here is an updated schematic of the staging tracks, with a track arrangement at the bottom of the helix that will actually fit in the available space (black is the visible main line, orange is the terminal/staging track - see below for a more complete mainline schematic):



As noted in an earlier post, SY1 (staging yard 1) is the main yard that represents both Bakersfield and Mojave (but mostly Bakersfield); SY1 will host SB (clockwise) traffic at the start of a session (hence represent Bakersfield).  SY3 is the sequential staging helix under the Loop that will host NB traffic at the start.  Each yard can hold up to 8 trains when full, but 6 is probably more realistic.  SY2 is an overflow yard that can hold 6 trains.  So the staging capacity is in the range of 18-20 trains, of length 12-16 feet (a few staging tracks are longer).   The connection at the bottom of the helix is single track, and a bit of a choke point.  But as described below, this connection should only be used infrequently during a session.

Here is the start of a stringline diagram for the mainline ops.  In the schematic, industrial and set-out tracks have been suppressed, but all siding and crossover lengths have been represented approximately to scale. Fast clock time is shown down the side; scale miles across the bottom; and the grey regions show single track.  The staging helix connects points "A" in the diagram. (Click for a larger version.)




Here are a few basic considerations:

• The visible portion of the mainline is about 5.1 scale miles. The prototype line between these points is about 30 miles, so there is a factor of ~6 linear compression, thus I'm planning a 6:1 fast clock.  I'm picturing a session would cover two dispatcher shifts (05:00-21:00 PT), so this would take 160 min of wall clock time, which seems to be a good target.
• Z trains (high-priority intermodal) would make up about half of the traffic and can run at 20 smph.  Manifests can run at 15 smph.  The 5.1 mile visible traverse with no meets or set-outs would take 90 smin (15 real minutes) for a Z train and 120 smin (20 real min) for a manifest.  In the diagram, 20 smph Z trains are shown in red and 15 smph manifests in black.  All are shown as non-stop for now, but obviously, the meets have not been planned yet (see, e.g. the circled cornfield meet of two Z trains).
• The room can handle about 4-5 operators (plus terminal manager) and I think the mainline can handle about 4-5 trains at any given time.  (The dispatcher would be in another location, communicating by link.)  So I think there is a good match between crew size, room capacity, and line capacity.
• With meets, delays, terminal overhead and such, I expect a typical through train will take about 30-40 min (3-4 shrs) to complete, so we can probably push a train out every 90 smin in each direction, on average.  (In practice, the prototype often has parades of trains in one direction or the other, where one train in the minority direction has to wait for 2-3 opposing trains.)
• In a perfect session, we could end up running 9-10 trains each direction, which pretty much maxes out the staging capacity, even when the overflow is accounted for.  In practice, there will probably be issues that slow progress (some planned by the devil), but to keep things running smoothly, I might want to boost yard capacity by 1-2 more tracks in SY1 and SY2.
• Staging maintenance would proceed as follows: NB trains depart SY3 in the order prescribed ahead of time (but some limited flexibility exists to change that order), SB trains depart SY1 in the order set by the dispatcher.  NB trains arrive and terminate in SY1 (on either the UP or BNSF side, as appropriate).  SB trains nominally terminate in the SB track of SY3, but this will need to be flushed occasionally.  If there is space in SY1, trains could proceed to there and pretend it's Mojave.  SY2 can replenish both SY1 and SY3 as space becomes available.  Likewise, it can absorb terminated trains from SY1 (or SY3) as necessary, to keep things fluid.  This is the main task of the terminal manager.  The trackage arrangement should be flexible enough to accommodate such moves, and the single track at the bottom of SY3 should not be too problematic, given the inbound capacity of SY3.

This just might work.   
-gfh

[mark dance]

Very cool...and please add the addtitional capacity in staging.  You won't regret it.  For example, if your ops plan consumes all staging tracks then you won't have room to store trains that are not run every session.

You probably told me but are you going to automate the stagign in some manner so someone/something (JMRI, the Dispatcher or the Terminal operator?) "presents" the next train to the engineer at the start of visible track so they don't need to negotiate hidden staging or staging yards at all?  This would be key I think to a pleasurable session for guest operators especially...

md

[GaryHinshaw]

md,

Now that I've crunched the numbers a bit more carefully, I'm definitely looking to expand storage capacity some more.  SY2 is the prime candidate for it, though other spots have some potential.  What kind of ratio do you have on the C&W for cars moved per session to overall cars on the layout?

The staging tracks will all be relatively visible.  The SY3 helix will be under the Loop shelf and will be mostly exposed. Here is an old shot where the red rectangle indicates the approximate outline of the helix:



The blue arrows roughly indicate the successive turns.  A SB train terminating in the helix could park at the top and hand it off to the terminal manager, or they could run it down and follow their progress pretty easily.  A NB train will be handed to the operator at the top of the helix.  (BTW, I'd like to de-emphasize the helix while having it still be visible, I'm not sure what treatment makes most sense yet, but I'll know it when I see it.)  SY1 will be mostly in the open on the lower level (near the shelving on the left wall in the above shot). The run from there to the truly visible mainline is along the garage door wall (from the carpet roll to the plywood scraps in the above shot   ).

And one more item related to number crunching: in order to support the scenario envisioned above, I'm going to need of fleet of ~80 locos (unless I re-use some on late-day trains). My current fleet is in the mid 50's so still some ways to go.  Even more daunting is the intermodal fleet: a 12' train will typically have ~30-35 platforms which takes 30-35 trailers or 60-70 containers (double stacked).  If I need a fleet of 10 Z trains, I'm looking at needing 150-200 trailers and 400-500 containers.  Still a fair ways to go to reach that goal...

-gfh

[mark dance]

Having to buy more Locos and cars...gee, a nice problem to have!

Can the terminal manager recirculate trains until you have enough rolling stock? Perhaps allowing for loco consists to be flipped end for end (using an inline removable cradle somewhere) would be enough to make the train look different and allow its reuse?

As to car ratios, we move somewhere in the 350-400 car range every session. Every car in staging and on the layout should move. Additionally I have another 4x8' of storage track in the back half of the indexing table which is good for two complete passenger trains, a half dozen additional locos and probably 100 excess cars. The passenger trains are kept ready for visitor displays. During restaging I fiddle the required cars for the inbound Tadanac and Cranbrook trains from this excess rolling stock so probably 10-15% of the cars turn over per session and are replaced by new cars.

Hope that helps.

Md