An Urban Terminus

Been playing around with C J Freezer’s Minories track plan, from the Peco 60 plans for small locations  book.

I just wanted to see what I could get on two 4ft x 2ft (1220mm x 602mm) boards for future reference.

These are just the station boards, any fiddle yard or other parts of any layout would be on separate boards, however I also wanted the main lines to enter from one corner not straight from the end, as whatever is attached would be at right angles to these two boards.

Looking at plan No. SP37 (for anyone who has the book), Minories was incorporated into the corner of a 8ft x 5ft layout with curved main lines into the station throat.

Also, whereas most Minories plans I’ve seen appear to have been drawn with the main lines entering the station from the right hand side, I have mine entering from the left. Basically, I just turned the book upside down and did a rough ‘best guess’.

(All plans draw in SCARM with Peco Streamline Code 100 track and short radius Electrofrog points).



The black line in the middle denotes the baseboard join between the two boards.

First thing I did was to include a three-way point, as two of the points were over the baseboard join.

Approximate platform face lengths are marked in millimetres.



Then I straightened the platform roads to get rid of the reverse curves.



Platforms 2 and 3 lengths have decreased a little and the goods line head shunt is a bit short, so I swapped a left hand point for a ‘Y’ point.




By moving the ‘Y’ point to the baseboard join, I managed to lengthen the goods head shunt but the sidings are now a bit shorter.

Platform 3 has a much gentler curve although platforms 2 and 3 have shrunk a little more. I added the platform face length in inches as I find it easier to judge as I use 10” as a average coach  and loco length. Theoretically platform 1 would take a four coach train and loco and platforms 2 and 3 a three coach train with loco.

The problem with using opposite handed points to form crossovers is that it results in narrower track centres.

The track centres between the platform 1 & 2 roads is only about 47mm instead of the 51mm Peco Streamline normal distance. Shouldn’t be a problem and is really more prototypical, however two trains passing while leaving and entering these two platforms could possibly side swipe due to overhang. The same problem exists to a much greater extent with the two main lines as they enter the station throat in the bottom left hand corner.

The only solution I came up with was to insert a small section of track about 20mm long at the toe of the three-way (marked in blue) and remove the siding for the pilot and replace it with an appropriate curve.



As there are no runaround loops in the Minories plan there has to be a pilot loco, so it probably needs to sit at the end of platform 1 which can longer be used for parcels traffic.

Another alternative is to use double slips instead of the three-way, which I think makes things look tidier, but Peco double slips are only available in Electrofrog in Code 75 and they ain’t cheap.




One other question is goods traffic. I can only think of Milk and/or some sort of Van traffic to a warehouse would really fit in a urban terminus type layout.

Just wondering if anyone has any ideas, or has built, is building, or is considering building a Minories type layout.

If I haven't made you all fall asleep with this rather long post, please feel free to post any thoughts or plans you may have.




Ed

Hi Ed,
What era/time period do you imagine this in? or is it open period?

in my opinion based on what I have seen from time period photos..

You could have the 'goods' area for parcels & Vans, vans could be for a local factory of sorts, parcels could be for royal mail or catalog mail

For up to and including late 1970s you could have milk with this as either a creamery or bottling plant.

For up to and including early 1960s you could have a coal yard .

For up to and including 1950s, a goods shed and the usual like would be suitable

If it interests you, maybe a loco depot/stabling point

Some good thoughts there Aaron.

If I were to build it I think I'd go late 1970s and have perhaps have a parcels depot and/or a private siding with van deliveries sent on from it's arrival at the main goods depot up the line.

Another option could be engineering trains, they have to leave them somewhere.

I tried curved points for the entry on earlier versions  of the plan and they didn't fit. But somebody else suggested it on another forum and I tried again as the plan has now changed quite a bit.



If anyone fancies steam era, I've put a goods shed in.




Ed

More thoughts to expand if anyone else is interested, the goods yard area could also be made in to a DMU/EMU stabling point, or even coach sidings.

Going back to your loco depot idea Aaron.



Just thoughts.

With a depot, you could shorten the entry/head shunt to a single loco and 1/2 Tank wagons. this would mean you could push the entry point to the back as per your First/Second plans and make a bit more space in the depot. although having the depot pushed away from the base board back dose allow for a bit of background scenery.

Good point Aaron, although you can only shorten the head shunt by as much as it still allows connection to the three-way point.


Of course theoretically in N gauge you'd only need 4ft x 1ft for the whole plan and if you made  it a bit longer you could extend the platforms to take eight or more  coach trains.


Ed

Don't tempt me, I still have my stuff N gauge Kicking about

Well, what can I say…………………..


Alternative depot layout.



I suppose with the diesel depot/stabling, it isn't really necessary to have a dedicated siding for the station pilot so that siding could revert back to being for parcels traffic.

I based the size of the Diesel shed on the Scalescenes R023a kit, which I  really like but haven't got anywhere to put on Latton Fields.

http://scalescenes.com/product/r023a-diesel-depot/

(also available in N scale Aaron  )



Ed