I have been working on my Richlawn Railroad for a few years and after much thought and making a list of "Positives" and "Negatives" it occurred to me that I would never finish the layout to my satisfaction.  In addition my layout shared my room with my office and I really needed more space.  The Mrs. was always kidding me (or not) about being a "railroad widow" so I finally bit the bullet and took it down.  It only took three hours to remove the result of years of work.

Here's what it looked like at 5:30 this morning:

Last week I was visiting Grand Junction, Colorado.  I went there by flying into Salt Lake City and driving.  While driving along the Central Corridor of the Union Pacific I saw some very interesting signals.  

I want to model a large industry, building is 1500 ft. x 1500 ft., longest rail is 5000 ft. What is best way to compress it down for HO layout?

Moderator note: Made thread title more specific to make it clear it's about modeling something rather than another thread on the hobby industry.

At what point does a model become "good enough"? I revisited one of my projects yesterday, thinking all I had left to do was paint and decal. Well, then I saw something that needed to be added, then I looked at my decals and thought they were too dark compared to the prototype so inquired about getting some custom work done. In the back of my mind there are a couple of things that I won't change to fit the prototype. It's just too much work to get this particular detail replicated from the prototype.