The track plan:

The layout represents the end of a freelanced industrial track - one of those tracks that branches off the main and winds a couple miles or so serving a few industries that seem to be more common than you might at first think.  I've selected the industries to give me a mix of car types, car flows, and switching.  The industries are all cribbed from real prototype industries in eastern Massachusetts, with varying degrees of modeler's license.

Why Eastborough?  Eastborough is not a real town in Massachusetts, but it could be.  There is a cluster of -borough's that includes Marlborough, Northborough, Westborough, and Southborough, but no Eastborough.  So, the name Eastborough sounds plausible and for those familiar with the area makes you think of where it's imagined to be - somewhere near where routes 495 and 95 cross.  The CSX mainline (formerly Boston & Albany) runs through Westborough, and the Fitchburg branch runs through Southborough, Marlborough, and Northborough.  The Grafton & Upton shortline is nearby.

I haven't really decided for sure what railroad will do the switching.  A plausible case could be made for CSX, perhaps the Grafton & Upton, or a fictional shortline.

Operation

At the start of a session, a train is made up in staging with the engine on the front end, ready to pull the train onto the layout.  Train length can be anywhere from just a couple cars to a couple dozen cars, although somewhere around a dozen will probably be typical.  The runaround that should be mostly adequate, but which will require a couple runaround moves to deal with the largest sessions.  There are no tricks or switching puzzles, just some decent sized industries with a variety of needs.

The Industries

Trans Plastics

The biggest industry in terms of car count is Trans Plastics, lifted straight off my N scale Palmer Industrial Park plan, which was in turn lifted pretty much straight from the prototype Palmer Industrial Park.  The prototype industry went out of business over 10 years ago unfortunately - smaller plastic transload operations seem to have difficulty.  But I like the big plastic pellet hoppers and the car flow pattern and switching that creates so I'm modeling it anyway.  Normally the industry will be mostly full, but like the prototype will only receive and release 1-4 cars a week.  Cars are emptied apparently randomly since they get emptied by demand for what grade of plastic they contain.  Spots are stuffed in wherever they fit, placement is not important.

National Lumber

National Lumber is cribbed from National Lumber on "The Chocolate" - an industrial park spur in Mansfield, MA.  I like the large warehouse with the track only along half of it, and the two door spots on the warehouse, and the fact that the centerbeam unloading area is past the warehouse.  I "improved" on reality to have 3 centerbeam spots instead of just one.  There will be times when centerbeams are cycled through at a good clip, and times when there's no center beams and only a single boxcar at the warehouse.  Cars will almost always be unloaded before the next switch, so there will rarely be respots.

Tighe

There are a three rail served Tighe warehouses in eastern Massachusetts - Mansfield, Winchester, and Woburn.  I plan on cribbing the building appearance from the Mansfield warehouse, which has 9 doors spaced on 77 foot centers.  I'll keep the spacing and general appearance, but trim it to 8 spots.  There are rain diverters on the roof, which makes it easy to measure the spacing on a satellite photo, and which will make it easy to line the boxcar doors up with the warehouse doors on the model.  This warehouse will take more switching moves per car to get the job done than the other industries.  Each car will be billed to a specific door spot.  Not all cars will be unloaded by the next session, so there will be some re-spots.

Broco Oil

Broco oil is inspired by the prototype Broco Oil in Haverhill MA which just started receiving biodiesel heating oil about a year ago and has been ramping up considerably, adding track, a trackmobile, new storage tanks, etc.  My representation of it will need to make do with a single shorter track, but it's long enough to give a good feel of an active business.  Since they only receive only B99.9 biodiesel tank cars are simply unloaded sequentially.  The empties will always be at one end of the track, the respots (if any) at the other.  Broco Oil will be easy to switch, but should allow for moving nice long cuts of tank cars in the process.  Biodiesel tank cars are hazardous, with a 1202 placard, so there will be placement considerations getting ready to run back to staging.

Hi Ken,

I've been waiting to see your plans come together! The track plan and concept are great, it will be fun to watch your progress.

Any plans for an interchange track, or will staging serve that purpose?

Steve W

Steve, no on layout interchange, whatever happens happens in staging.  In practice that will be a bit of between session shuffling from either a storage track in staging, or off layout storage.

Both Georgia-Pacific and Sprenger Lumber on my abuilding Sioux Falls Terminal get both boxcars and flat cars.  In both cases the flats are unloaded in paved areas beyond the building where the boxcars are spotted.  The real G-P can get three 60' boxes and two flats.  Sprenger can get two 60' boxes and two flats.  The flats at both companies have to be spotted at least 20 feet past the building and with 20 feet between each flat to provide easy access for the forklifts.  So your lumber yard is not unusual.

I only have enough room on my layout's version of G-P for a building with two dock doors and one flat past the building.  And my version of Spenger is reversed, with the flats before the building, again for space reasons.

In both cases all the cars are unloaded before the empties are released, so the whole track is pulled.  In the spring and summer it isn't uncommon for both companies to be switched every day.

The company at "Tank Farm" on my layout got asphalt on one track and liquid fertilizer and speciality fuels on the other, with each holding nine tanks in the real world and five on mine.  I've added a spot for two propane tanks at the end of the fertilizer track.

At Tank Farm the tracks were almost always full with off spots held in the yard downtown.  Individual empties could be released so the place was switched most weekdays.  About ten years ago this outfit moved about 10 miles northeast of Sioux Falls and the line to Tank Farm was pulled up.  I model circa 1989-1994.

There are two outfits on the northside of Sioux Falls that use plastic pellets.  I only model one of them because they use a greater variety, and 30 years ago they only had room for four hoppers.  Ten or so hoppers were held off spot downtown and switching out partially empty cars for ones with different pellets was common.

And that only covers four of the twelve customers on the layout.  The five south of downtown are worked by the morning job and the other seven by the afternoon job.

Scott Chatfield

Scott, sounds like you’ve got a nice selection of industries on your layout.  The remote storage you mention definitely adds operating interest.  Its something I wanted to work in but couldn’t quite fit without making things too crowded.

Very nice Ken,

That min 32 radius will look good.

Not crowded nor cramped.

What rolling stock do you have so far?

My plan is a little more crowded than I'd like, but I'll live with it.  Sioux Falls isn't that big a town, so the industrial areas were crowded.  (Still are.)  My version of the downtown yard is about 80% the size of the real yard it represents, but it has to handle all the work in town when in reality there were three small yards in town.  If I later decide to stretch the layout around the basement more, I might include another yard that was mostly used for off spots.  Or I might just use the extra length to increase the distance between the industrial areas.  We'll see.

In your case, it sounds like you're modeling a  branchline that is a bit out in the woods by Massachusetts standards.  So you need more space between the customers to give that out-in-the-burbs feel.

Scott Chatfield

A nice simple, uncrowded, well thought out plan.

I could easily see wiling away an hour, or so, shuffling cars around.

Deemiorgos - So far I have  few boxcars, plastic pellet cars, and centerbeams, and one MP15.

Scott - There are a lot of industrial areas like that in Massachusetts - on the edge of towns and smaller cities, with woods around.  These days there aren’t many industries left actually in cities.

Rick - Yup, I’m hoping for op sessions that last half an hour to an hour, depending on how many cars need to be moved.

Ken you might have to put a copy right on that one, looks really tempting!