Design

Watch the tails on your runarounds,   you have two long tracks you have to service but really short tail tracks which will make it difficult, well actually more like tedious, to get cars between the industries and the yard.

It looks like you have two spots with #4 double slip switches, which are expensive and could be a operational issue (the double crossover on the left end and on the right, just to the left of the curved inbound track.

I would simplify the yard by having the right most switch in the yard a right hand switch and then put a left hand switch in the runaround track, it eliminates that little jog and allows you to convert a double slip to a plain crossover.

On the topmost industry tracks the two switches are very close together, you may not have room for them.  

Scenically it will be very difficult to scenic because virtually every square inch of the layout is covered with track.  I would cut out a few tracks.

A suggestion I always offer is to go the Peco or Handlaid Track websites and print out some switch templates for the switches you are planning to use, or buy a switch, and scan it.  Then cut out copies of the scan/template and use that to layout out the layout full size on the benchwork, a table or even the floor.  You can set a boxcar or  engine on the "tracks" and see how much room you really have.

That curve to the right

 Looks like a natural setting for a 1950's era car float operation. Car float bridge on the right leg and pocket terminal on the area over the desk. These small terminals common in New York city had freight houses, coal dealers, team tracks, gantry cranes, flour warehouses, scrap dealers, etc. all in tight quarters with model railroad like curve radius and track lengths.....DaveB

good first design

Yes, try not to use double slips. Looks like 2 mainline in and out.  I would remove one, gives more space and operation possibilities. I would also remove one yard track and the short runaround from the yard. Remove that red track and add several loading socks as if you were looking from th "builbing" to the track

Thank you for the feedback!

I really appreciate it guys You all bring up very good points and areas that I was concerned with as well. DaveB, I thought the same thing when I first looked at my design without the building added. I would like to add a waterfront scene to a layout one day but I don't think the size of this layout will allow me to do one the justice that I would like one to have Maybe next time!

Dave H, I am going to try and eliminate both those double slips. You and Doug are right that they could cause some issues and be an unnecessary expense as well. You suggested "I would simplify the yard by having the right most switch in the yard a right hand switch and then put a left hand switch in the runaround track, it eliminates that little jog and allows you to convert a double slip to a plain crossover." however I am a little confused as to the turnouts you are referring to. Are you able to highlight which ones?

Doug, So I only have one mainline, the one that comes in from the radius on the right hand side. The two tracks off of that were both meant to be runarounds, one for the yard and one for the industries at the top. Do you think i should remove the runaround for the top industries and just have them connected to the mainline? Also, I wasn't sure what you meant by "Remove that red track and add several loading socks as if you were looking from th "builbing" to the track". I think you may have a typo or two and I wasn't clear on what you were suggesting. 

I was also thinking that I could do the following items as well:

1. Instead of having the interchange on this section of the layout, have it on the section along the wall instead. 
2. I could hide the interchange behind the buildings at the top of the layout by moving those forward and having a track run behind them. That would thematically send those cars "off" the layout but I am not sure if that could be problematic in terms of space I have or if it might look strange. Any thoughts on this?

Thanks again for your assistance!

Revised Plan

I revised your plan.  Removed tracks in grey, added tracks in green.

Right to left.

• Removed the stub tail track,  don't need it and give more room for an industry between the main and the one industry track.
• Made the right end of the siding a left hand switch , pushed into the curve.  It could easily be a #5 or #6 switch.
• Got rid of the little jog and made the yard break off the main with a single left hand switch.
• Removed the two yard tracks that looked too close together and replaced them with one on better spacing. 
• Broke the fuel dealer off the main.
• What I forgot to do was remove the track between the top fuel dealer track and the main.  Doesn't really serve a purpose.  Removing it allows you to add space between the main and fuel dealer track and increase the foot print of the fuel dealer.
• Options:  I would play around with bring in the fuel dealer spurs next to each other  or parallel and adding a fuel rack between them.

Overall that removes some of your tracks but spaces thing out more, gives better scenic opportunities with minimal reduction in operation and makes some of the operation smoother.

I'm not sure I understand exactly what your layout will look

like.  Your description in the original post sounds like it could be either an "L" or a "U" shape, but your drawings show a straight layout 96 inches long.  You mention three sections 60"x32", 32" x 24", & 60" x  24".  I look at your drawing and it shows a layout 96" x 16" at the left end and the other end has a triangular section that makes the right end 24" wide at the edge.  The dimensions of the drawing don't match the description given in the opening paragraph.  The description in the opening parragraph doesn't mention any part of the layout being 16" deep, nor does the drawing show anywhere that the layout is 32" deep.

How high from the floor is this layout going to be?  The advantage of a layout at waist height is that you can easily reach in 32" if necessary but you will always have a "helicopter" view of the layout unless you operate from an office chair.  

If the layout is at chest height, you can only reach in the length of your arm with your wrist bent enough to pick up and rerail a peice of rolling stock.  Also any structures, scenery, or even rolling stock on a track in front of what you are trying to reach may get knocked over of damaged because your arm does not have an extra elbow between your shoulder and elbow.  The advantage of the higher benchwork is that you get an "eye level" view of the tracks and trains.

I think it would help if you could draw a floor plan of the room showing where the desk is where the door is, and the relationship between the desk, door, and the layout. 

Too much track

You've got a lot of track crammed into a small area. Where is the room for the industries? Even if you're focused on operations, not building models, you still want to have some plausibility of what the trains' purpose is. If you look at that layout that you linked to, it's got a lot less track.

I'm not sure if cost is a constraint, or if it is space only, but keep in mind that turnouts are one of the biggest contributors to layout cost, especially with a lot of short, dense sidings, so taking out a few tracks will offer a lot of cost savings without really impacting the operational capability of the layout.

You also want to avoid switchbacks, as they just aren't prototypical, and create more of a switching puzzle than a realistic layout, but on a layout that small, you may not be able to avoid them to some extent. You did avoid using one industry as a switchback lead for another, which is good, as that is a cliche of unprototypical layout design.

If I were to cut out tracks, I'd look at what's going on between the fuel oil dealer and industry there's at least one extra track and some complex trackwork that doesn't appear to serve any purpose. There's also two tracks for the fuel dealer, it probably only needs one.

Have you looked into having multiple car spots on a single track, as Lance Mindheim advocates? That allows you more operation with fewer sidings and turnouts, but it is somewhat limited by length, as you need the length to pull a cut and sort it.