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Small dock railway (HO scale) Dream and design
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Active Member 32 posts ForAFewCentsMore Active Member 32 posts
ForAFewCentsMore

I had a poorly designed, too-big model railroad taking space in the basement which was piling up junk on top of it and was getting nowhere so I decided to start over. For several stories I've written in school and on my own time I developed a setting I really like so I knew that any model railroad I did would be set in that setting, which has a nice aesthetic of an anachronistic mix of 30's and 70's technology as well as few paved roads, dense forest, reliance of river transportation, and impromptu, casual, improvised structures and facilities. At first, I took inspiration from the Cleveland Flats O scale model railroad for the track plan, although I'd do it in HO scale and I'd use a leftover building from the old layout, cut up and reshaped. Later I decided to change the setting since the building was a bit too modern and I didn't feel like the urban setting was right for my setting. There are far more interesting and colorful city scenes to model in my fictional world so I decided to switch to a rural one.

The new setting I chose was a small river port and fruit shed, where the main traffic would be fruit brought in from fruit-growing villages along the river, as well as assorted freight to or from those villages that would be loaded or unloaded at the dock tracks. I'll attach the track plan now.

_6063(1).jpg 

D is a non-rail-served industry, but it might be cool to make that some kind of community lodge or something like that, C is the fruit packing house and loading dock, B is a track that goes out on a stone pier, A is a track with an unloading crane that is on a quay. The muddy river would have some British-style canal longboats and some small barges if they would fit, and some smaller boats. If I wanted to run passenger equipment I could put a little platform where the road runs parallel to the track. For motive power, I have an NS SW1500 that I poorly painted with acrylic but could be customized and played with a bit, and an eBay NW2 in a weird DRGW/RDG hybrid scheme that could also be modified. I'd also like an old gas-electric boxcab, or an F7B converted into a boxcab. I have some modern rolling stock but I think replacing them for older 40-foot style stuff would be better, and would fit the theme more.

The layout is one foot by six feet, in order to make it easily portable.

Does anyone have any suggestions or improvements they would make?

 
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Ken Hutnik huthut Regular poster 191 posts
Ken Hutnik huthut

Looks like a great small layout

Looks like you have put a lot of thought into what you want to do, moving to the smaller layout rather than the large basement filler. I myself downsized and am building a small layout.  In your plan, Tracks A/B... do you really need two tracks going out onto the wharf / quay, or could you consider another building / industry to serve?  I think you are on the right idea of smaller engines and 40' box cars.  But for the 1970's (if that still fits in your plans) 50' was also popular, so you may want to consider design for 50' for flexibility.

There are a lot of concepts that micro and small layouts use that you might be able to use here.  For instance off to the left you could add some staging using a sector plate, transfer or turn table.  That would give you trains coming in and out and the ability to fiddle with them.  Here are some resources to explore:

Tons of info and track plans in different scales: Carl Arendt Original Micro Layout Scrapbook

Micro Model Railroad Cartel Blog

Micro Railroad Cartel on Facebook

Micro/Small Model RR on Facebook

 

From these you can get a lot of feedback and ideas on your small layout, you are off to a great start!  Build it and enjoy.

Ken

Ken
My projects: Ken's Model Trains
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mark_h_charles Regular poster 439 posts
mark_h_charles

Interesting ideas

Are you tbinking west coast (lots of fruit there) , Lake Ontario region (NY and Ont.) , tropical fruit???

Remember rule one- it's your railroad.

Bave fun and please keep us posted.

 

Mark Charles
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Ken Hutnik huthut Regular poster 191 posts
Ken Hutnik huthut

If you are having fun, you are doing it right...

Ditto what Mark said, have fun.  It is your railroad and as long as you are having fun, you are doing it right, no matter what anybody else says!

Ken
My projects: Ken's Model Trains
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ForAFewCentsMore Active Member 32 posts
ForAFewCentsMore

Ken, I figured having two

Ken, I figured having two wharf tracks would just allow me to run a bit more, as I could, say, have a flatcar of pulpwood for pickup that had been loaded from a boat on one wharf and have a boxcar for setout at the other that has supplies that need to be loaded into a boat. I've seen those micro layouts and they gave me a lot of inspiration for this project. Also the times and eras are going to be a little mixed up and vague so there could be some 50 foot boxcars

Mark, I'm not really going for any kind of specific setting in the US, it's a completely fictional country. My main inspiration is the Lehigh Valley in PA, so it's more temperate and deals with apples and other temperate fruits, which are grown along the river and transported by boat to the port, but it might stray from that setting or incorporate elements of other places at times.
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