NYS&W New York Mills Industrial first plan

Even though it's a relatively small industrial track, there is still a total of almost 6 miles of track.  Here's a map of the industrial track from the prototype page.  This google maps link should put you in the same area as the map below.

The question is, how to squeeze that into the available space.  Here's my first reasonable attempt.

The New Hartford switchback and Oneida Warehouse are left off entirely.  The remaining four industries are compressed and slide considerably closer together than on the prototype, but that's inevitable if you're trying to squeeze 3 to 4 miles of prototype track onto a shelf well under a scale mile long.  The industries are all in the right relative positions on the prototypical side of the track.  A staging area could be added on the other side of the bulkhead door at the bottom, or the train could just be sitting on French Rd runaround at the start of the session with the engine in the lead.  The Di Highway section would be a fold down section to allow freer use of the basement for other non-railroad purposes.\

Things that bothered me about this plan was having an industry on a fold down section, a bit more industry compression than I was hoping for, and no chance of adding the New Hartford section.

NYS&W New York Mills Industrial second plan

The breakthrough came with the realization that if I mirror imaged the industries I could solve all those problems.

In this plan, the drop down section is just the lead off the Utica branch mainline.  The industries are a bit less compressed (although mirror imaged), and there's a bit more space between them.  And there is the option of tunneling through the wall to put the New Hartford section in the next room, with the switchback (which adds an element of intrigue when you're at the runaround out of sight of it trying to get the cars on the right end of the engine).  There is an additional drop down section across the bulkhead door to get to Di Highway, but that wouldn't need to be use much and it's only scenery, so no problem there.

So, why not build it?

I spent a month or so wanting to build this track plan but feeling unconvinced that it was the right one for me.  Finally I took a step back and thought about what industrial switching I like watching on the prototype most.  Any prototype switching is interesting to watch, but what really ticks both the industrial interest and gut feel of railroading boxes for me is not one or two car industries, it's bigger industries.  Industries where a full spot is half a dozen cars or more.

So that's why I'm not going to build this layout.  It would be a nice layout I would enjoy operating on, but it's not quite exactly what I want for a layout.

Layout footprint

Ken, 

What size room was this designed to fit into?

Footprint

The end wall that McCraith is on is 12’ 4.5” long.  The wall the French Rd Runaround is on is 14’ 10” long, and the wall bottom wall from the corner of the layout up to the bulkhead door is 17’ 5” long.  The overall room length is 30 feet.

Bigger industries?

It seems like a balancing act, if you can't increase the space you'd have to reduce the number of industries if you want to make bigger industries capable of handling more cars per session.  I do like your first plan, it seems very realistic in it's spacing and industries. If I was going to use the 2nd room I'd probably put all my staging in there and then figure out how to keep all the on scene operations in the 1st room.....DaveB

Paper Mill

I think a one industry layout serving a paper mill would be great. Many types of cars and spots. Usually complicated track and interesting structures and piping. The DOMTAR paper mill layout is a good example.

So many great layout themes...

Yup, a paper mill would make for a nice one industry layout.  So would a large chemical plant, a glass factory, and a number of other things.   So many great small layout themes and trackplans, but only time and space to build one...

The layout I’m actually going to build if I ever get to the construction phase is the Eastborough Industrial I designed for the same space: https://model-railroad-hobbyist.com/node/41457. Between other hobbies and and work I haven’t yet gotten it off the ground, but sometime soon...