I had a guest over and it took about three hours. There
were no tricks or complexities, the guest made no opera-
tional errors, and we worked at a realistic but relaxed pace.
How often will we operate
with guests?
How long do we want an
operating session to last?
I’m going to divide op sessions
into two types. The first is the
full-blown session with guests.
Outside feedback continues
to confirm that most guests
start getting burned out at
the three-hour mark. Three
hours (or a bit less) is gener-
ally the ideal session length
when guests are over. The fre-
quency of these sessions with
guests should also be taken
into account. Despite the
best of intentions, for most
people these full-blown or
guest operator sessions don’t
happen nearly as often as
the builders initially thought,
perhaps three or four times a
year max.
By far the most common op
session scenario is the layout
owner running by himself, or
it least it should be. Don’t fall
into the trap of thinking that
a session has to be the full
three-hour deal with guests
versus nothing at all. For
planning purposes, assume
that when you’re running by
Layout Size Using Op Session Timing - 2
2
2
2: The diagram above
shows the tasks from my
last op session.
MRH-Jan 2013
