Killashandra - Irish Nn3

[OldEastRR]

Why do you need a through road on it at all? the less manmade lines built on this little space the better for your rural look, I'd think. There must be places where the railroad runs through that have no roads nearby. Put the dock on the opposite side of the track from where it is, and have a short "track-following" vehicle drive along the track that goes off the layout. This would give you a lot of open rural space. A well-worn footpath through the scene - one that wanders much more than a road, both side to side and up and down -- leaves a "road" idea but without overwhelming the scene. Since the Irish were more a bike- and foot-using people anyway .... this path could come down the steep hill in the upper-RH corner, leaving you the option of filling in the gap where the road was for even more "open country" look. And then the stone or wire fences ...
And would there be any fills along the ROW? It looks like there's only cuts. Putting in at least one fill would vary the look overall.

[VonRyan]

Why do you need a through road on it at all? the less manmade lines built on this little space the better for your rural look, I'd think. There must be places where the railroad runs through that have no roads nearby. Put the dock on the opposite side of the track from where it is, and have a short "track-following" vehicle drive along the track that goes off the layout. This would give you a lot of open rural space. A well-worn footpath through the scene - one that wanders much more than a road, both side to side and up and down -- leaves a "road" idea but without overwhelming the scene. Since the Irish were more a bike- and foot-using people anyway .... this path could come down the steep hill in the upper-RH corner, leaving you the option of filling in the gap where the road was for even more "open country" look. And then the stone or wire fences ...
And would there be any fills along the ROW? It looks like there's only cuts. Putting in at least one fill would vary the look overall.

It's a dirt lane, not a paved road. In this part of Ireland, even the road through the center of town was still dirt in most cases.
And since part of the road is already in position and sculptamolded, no changing it now.

As to places where the road isnt nearby, that's part of the reason I don't really like the idea of the road coming through the river scene.
I think of each scene as its own separate entity. Like a series of pictures that all serve to convey the same meaning.

And no fills. The roadbed is Masonite.

[VonRyan]

Here is Version 4.

With some fancy grasswork, I will hopefully be able to make the road invisible from eye-level in at least one viewing angle in the river scene.



The little section of the center hill on the left will be built up some more with sculptamold and have some small rock faces carved into it and blended with static grass. That'll provide a legitimate reason for my carving into the center hill a little bit.

This version has no overpass, but rather the road will cross the line at grade after paralleling it for a short time.


-Cody Fisher

[OldEastRR]

Devil's advocate ... who or what group cut the road through the hills? It had to have been cut through since there's no waterway. Old Roman road? And then, why did the road rate a cut and shallow grade there, yet not on the other side of the track where it nosedives down the river bank?
The civil engineer side of me just being curious.
Then again, I don't know what basic desire you're trying to satisfy with this layout: operations, nice scenery, landforms, exact fidelity to the real scene, showcase for kitbashed equipment, watching trains go round and round, etc. Not a critique, but I think it's easier to give advice or suggestions to people if you know exactly what they want to do. A lot of the time we tend to subconsciously assume the advice-seeker has the same layout goals and priorities we have for ourselves. Yet there are so many different primary desires motivating the people building layouts.

[wazzou]

I'm glad this isn't a bigger layout...

[DKS]

I'm glad this isn't a bigger layout...

That's funny. But... in all seriousness, the smaller the layout, the more effort it generally takes to get things to work. Micro layouts will often take a significant amount of planning. What Cody is going through isn't much different than what I did designing any of mine.

And it's funny you mention looking at it like a map, because I keep thinking in context of eye-level viewing.
To me seeing the road in all three scenes makes them closer together, but by excluding the road from the river scene, it allow there to be more "distance" between them.

Well, then I'd have to say you're making these connections in your mind. Because, as isolated scenes, there are no other visual clues to tie them together. But hey, what do I know?

I will say that, because you made the road rather straight in Version 4, you've created opportunities to see across the layout. Compare that with the one I posted, where the road has a number of curves: this not only looks more natural since it follows existing landforms, but it prevents line-of-sight views across the layout. Straight features will look far shorter than curved ones.

[VonRyan]

Devil's advocate ... who or what group cut the road through the hills? It had to have been cut through since there's no waterway. Old Roman road? And then, why did the road rate a cut and shallow grade there, yet not on the other side of the track where it nosedives down the river bank?
The civil engineer side of me just being curious.
Then again, I don't know what basic desire you're trying to satisfy with this layout: operations, nice scenery, landforms, exact fidelity to the real scene, showcase for kitbashed equipment, watching trains go round and round, etc. Not a critique, but I think it's easier to give advice or suggestions to people if you know exactly what they want to do. A lot of the time we tend to subconsciously assume the advice-seeker has the same layout goals and priorities we have for ourselves. Yet there are so many different primary desires motivating the people building layouts.

About 20 Irish blokes with picks and shovels. They found it easier to go around the rocks than to go broke trying to remove them.

The goal of the layout is to create a slice of rural Ireland during the 1940s-50s. Plenty of lush scenery for some reasonable looking trains to roll through.

[Ed Kapuscinski]

The goal of the layout is to create a slice of rural Ireland during the 1940s-50s. Plenty of lush scenery for some reasonable looking trains to roll through.

Then why screw around with a road at all?

[VonRyan]

Then why screw around with a road at all?

Because dirt lanes were common. Especially since there is a siding with a cattle dock. Need to have a way to get the cattle to the cattle wagons.

Plus having the dirt road gives me the opportunity to have it parallel the tracks for a short time, as I saw in the footage of some of the last Irish narrow gauge lines.


-Cody Fisher

[Chris333]

Less talk, more foam dust 

[Scottl]

+1.  Go for it.  If you don't like it, add a bit of new foam and try again.  No risk.

[packers#1]

Well, why not just have the road parallel the tracks by the cattle dock and have it remain on that side?

I see why you think the road should link all three scenes; however, on a layout this small, you don't want the scenes linked together in this manner, as it betrays the size of the layout. By not having the road cut across the hill, it will add distance; this is especially true if you would add the driveway to the cattle and kept the dirt road on the other side. Then each side has its own road, and the eye is fooled into thinking the drive would take longer and the distances are farther. This will still be accomplished, albeit to a slightly lesser extent, if you keep the road on the cattle side.

Just my two cents

[S Class]

Cody I think you and everyone here has missed the big picture in that, in the big picture how often are we going to view the layout from space like in your photos?

I would put the layout at eye level or at viewing level and then tell me if you can see both sides of the hill.
If you have some trees you can poke into the foam as a view block like everyone has agreed on then so much the better, but I bet it won't be as big in your mind as you think.

I say we take a step back and go from the fundamentals.

[OldEastRR]

Then why screw around with a road at all?

Ummm.. was this one of the site's veteran regulars agreeing with me? Yipes ...

[VonRyan]

Cody I think you and everyone here has missed the big picture in that, in the big picture how often are we going to view the layout from space like in your photos?

I would put the layout at eye level or at viewing level and then tell me if you can see both sides of the hill.
If you have some trees you can poke into the foam as a view block like everyone has agreed on then so much the better, but I bet it won't be as big in your mind as you think.

I say we take a step back and go from the fundamentals.

The layout is planned to be viewed at both eye level, and sky-level.
A eye-level the layout is planned to be viewed from four distinct angles.
Two near the cattle dock, one on the river, and one where the road parallels the tracks.
At sky-level, the idea is that it will be set at a height and distance to where it is like you are viewing a scene standing on the side of a distant hill.

Well, why not just have the road parallel the tracks by the cattle dock and have it remain on that side?

I see why you think the road should link all three scenes; however, on a layout this small, you don't want the scenes linked together in this manner, as it betrays the size of the layout. By not having the road cut across the hill, it will add distance; this is especially true if you would add the driveway to the cattle and kept the dirt road on the other side. Then each side has its own road, and the eye is fooled into thinking the drive would take longer and the distances are farther. This will still be accomplished, albeit to a slightly lesser extent, if you keep the road on the cattle side.

Just my two cents

I don't want all three scenes linked, so that distance is better conveyed. Which is why I would rather not have the road in all three scenes, as I have in Version 3.
By not having the road in the river scene, it allows the mind to think that this could be anywhere along the line, rather than just somewhere along the road.
The dirt roads of rural Ireland wouldn't always be anywhere close to the tracks. There are photographs of lines running through pastures with the nearest road way off on a distant hillside.


I'll have to take a photo at eye level at each of the intended viewing angles to further demonstrate what is rattling around in my skull.


-Cody F.