Conrail Windsor St Yard (York PA) Engineering Report

[Dave V]

Nah, Meatwad is in management...

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[John]

we could always build a hinged bridge .. similar to mine .

[Ed Kapuscinski]

we could always build a hinged bridge .. similar to mine .

I thought about it, but there wasn't a place that leant itself it it.

[OldEastRR]

What does the current full track plan look like now? I don't know if I've ever seen one.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Oh yeah, should probably do that.

Here's the current drawing of the York section.



The other end, for now, will just be a basic return loop.

[wm3798]

What about putting a drop leaf to get across the door to the utility room, then loop it around and pop out of a stair riser?  No duck under, no tight return loops.  Build a "snow shed" to protect the bit coming out of the stair riser, and call it good!
Keep the peninsula for a switching area and run the main around the room.
Lee

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Thought of that, but there's a LOT of bridgework that would have to exist to get around that part of the room. It's like all doors between here and the corner.

Plus, this lets me do the important York scenes.

[davefoxx]

You need a staging yard.  If there's one thing I have learned on my layout is that despite Hamlet Yard, there's not enough capacity for all of the cars on the layout without jamming up the yard or leaving trains on the mainline.  Since Hamlet Yard is supposed to be a classification yard and not a storage yard, that's a real problem for capacity on my layout.  I minimized that problem with the small staging yards I added last year, but they're still not enough.

On a similar subject, I'm almost tempted to tear out Hamlet Yard, replace that with something more scenic, and expand my staging yards.  That's because Hamlet Yard ended up too small for an efficient class yard on my layout (the prototype is a huge hump yard that feeds rail lines from four or five directions in the Southeast).  I'm jealous of your classification yard.  If I were to do it again, I would make sure that I had plenty of staging included in the plan, even if that made it necessary to exclude a modeled class yard.

DFF

[Ed Kapuscinski]

You need a staging yard. 

This is a topic I've wrestled with quite a bit.

The common wisdom is that I need a staging yard.
In fact, I need a HUGE staging yard.

But I don't have space for a huge staging yard.

So what do I do?

My first thought was to then do a fiddle yard.

Then I realized that, why not just actively fiddle on the layout?

So, in reality, and during operating sessions, the nice open Pershing Ave will essentially be my fiddle yard.

[davefoxx]

And you will quickly run into the same problem I have.  Once a train leaves your class yard, with the exception of switching online industries, it really has no where to go except back to the yard.  Build a couple of trains, and they're in each other's way.  Allow for a staging yard now.  Why not on the wall where the shelf layout was?  Even a four or five track staging yard will allow you to move freight out of the yard and move it "offline" before it comes screaming back into the yard.

DFF

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I've contemplated that approach too. I haven't thrown it out completely.

I've also thought about using the line that branches off at the top of the plan (not included in that drawing, but right where the turnout ending the siding is, there would be another line that went straight off the end) to also have some staging capability.

[mu26aeh]

How much space do you have between Windsor Yard and the benchwork.  Could you put a couple tracks in that area via a ramp from the back side of layout, bringing the staging yard tracks to the front area under the existing yard ?

[Ed Kapuscinski]

There's some space, but the problem is the ramp. There's no good way to lose the elevation. I might be able to pull it off on the one end, but not the peninsula end that's pictured above.

[John]

I had the same problem . you know how I solved my staging problem

[wm3798]

Yes... you probably used the nice tight helix I gave him...  This is why you can't have nice things!