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Getting Real Column - 8
5: “YIKES! What the #$#% did I just do?!!!!” is the
thought that goes through any layout owner’s mind
when demolition begins. Oh well, there’s no turning
back now. It took less than an afternoon to clear most
of the old layout out down to the open grid lower deck
benchwork.
Before I started drawing a track plan, I decided on some basic
assumptions:
Single level
Minimize the number of turnback curves in the space
Model a couple of recognizable CV locations as Layout De-
sign Elements (LDEs)
“Comfortable” aisle widths
No grades
Simple, open, accessible staging
The initial sketch of the new footprint is shown in Figure 6.
Everyone who has seen the “before” and “after” versions of
the layout agrees the current arrangement represents a signifi-
cant improvement. As you tell from the track plan, which is still
very much a work in progress, there’s lots of room for filling in
the details.
A new layout
I also looked upon this as a chance to radically improve the
traffic flow in the aisles. So, although it was painful to make
that first saw cut on the helix and upper deck, once it was gone
I could immediately tell I’d made the right choice.
In an effort to reuse as much of the existing wood as possible,
I removed the helix but simply slid the base grid frame away
from the wall to form the basic benchwork for the new lobe
end of the peninsula (Fig. 7).
Hopes of keeping some of the old layout’s lower deck track
in place were soon proved more problematic than they were
worth and in the process of rebuilding we’ve raised the track
height 5” or so. On a multi-level layout 45” seemed fine for the
lower level – on a single deck layout that just seemed a little
too low.
The flow is much improved – both for the trains and more
importantly the operators. Road crews pick up their trains
at the north end staging yard by walking around the end
of the peninsula, follow their trains through the first aisle,
back around the end of the peninsula, and follow their trains
through the longer aisle up into White River Junction – and into
the south end staging yard. Once the train is tied up in south
end staging they are at the other “end” of the layout in the util-
ity room.
5
MRH-Mar 2013
