Developing a Layout Plan
My thinking on layout planning has been influenced by Iain Rice's plans featuring flowing, characterful, and well-observed vignettes; and the observation of Lance Mindheim and Trevor Marshall ( his blog of his amazing Port Rowan layout) that layouts don't have to be massively complex to be operationally interesting.
I wanted to build an HO-scale shelf layout along a wall in my living room, which has about 14' of linear wall that is bound by a wall on one side and a doorframe on the other. My priorities for the layout were to (reasonably faithfully) recreate a particular location on Store Street, include some characteristic buildings, and to be able to support switching operations for a single engine.
The prototype track plan above fades over the Albion yard trackage (at upper left, left of Chatham Street) but still suggests how packed this small area was with track and platforms, which you can also see in this awesome aerial photo. Operationally it made sense to focus on Albion yard, which had multiple team tracks fanning out off of a sharp curve out of Store Street and also featured two dedicated spurs for industries and a freight house; most cars going down the Store Street tracks would probably end up here.
Unloading at Albion yard. BC Archives photo, 1945
I wanted my plan to include the freight shed, some kind of fanning out of tracks, at least one pair of team tracks, and a platform. Including all the yard's tracks would result in a vary wide layout footprint, although it would fit almost exactly on a 4x8 (see below)! Platforms are in grey and the freight house in red. I've truncated a pair of spurs that ran outside of the city block that constrained most of the yard, as they would make the plan even wider.
Close-to complete Albion yard trackage, platforms (in grey) and freight house (in red), all within a city block
The complete plan wouldn't work as I wanted the layout to be against a wall and I like the idea of using manual uncoupling for operations, so I needed to keep everything within reach. This prompted me to linearize the yard (so no curve into the yard) and aggressively prune the trackage, removing platforms and team track pairs. I felt the feel of the place could be captured with one unloading platform and a few paired set of team tracks, which would allow for a thinner footprint and reach-in access from the front and right side. To keep some of the feel of the tracks curving and fanning out of Store Street and keep the justification for the oddly angled walls of the freight house, I twisted Store Street to compensate for the linear yard entry.
My current Albion yard plan.
The next additional elements of the plan would serve a backdrop for the Albion yard lead and allow me to include more characteristic buildings. Capital Iron is still an operating business that operates in the right of the two original brick buildings it occupied in the 1940's, pictured below. Both buildings have very ornate facades for what was an importer/exporter when it was built, then a rice mill, and then a ship wrecker in the 1940s. These are signature buildings for the area and I had to include them, even though Capital Iron was not served by a spur and will be a challenging scratchbuilding task.
Capital Iron buildings today
The next building along Store Street was served by a dedicated spur and during the 1940's housed Kelly Douglas, a food distributor. The building facade is very different today (and currently houses a donation centre and a Value Village), but when it was built it was a lovely art deco/moderne (to my eye at least) industrial building.
Kelly Douglas in City of Victoria historic property assessment photo.
Hafer Machine was clearly made from Walthers Modulars sections.
Hafter Machine in City of Victoria historic property assessment photo.
They can all fit at near-scale size! In my current plan (last plan in this post and at top), the spur for Kelly Douglas can't be served off of the main currently, but I plan to add a removable extension that would fit out over the doorway to allow access. There is no runarround, but the prototype didn't have one and all these turnouts are in the same orientation. This plan will allow/force me to do some challenging structure scratchbuilding but I feel it will capture the feel of this interesting small terminus yard.