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The Track Plan
Howdy!
So here is the track plan, it’s a a single line for continuous running, highlighting all the fun Unitrack bits…turntable, roundhouse, viaduct through town (think L train vibes), small yard. It has a small siding under the viaduct for passenger platform / passenger station. The track is a mix of new and used and it is not run parallel to the frame intentionally, I wanted to simulate a birds-eye photo and I hope the not-parallel decision feels more natural one scenery is added.
This is a fantasy layout with the main industry being railroad maintenance with some tourism. The mainline enters/exits the front right and back left corners from fantasy towns. The front right spur doubles as a the DCC programming track. A future idea might be to change the angles of these entrance/exits spurs to align with T-trak or N-trak standards for future expandability, but for now I just want to focus on learning the hobby.
The back right and rear center will feature a mountain and the white boxes are simulating a small commercial main street at the base of the mountain. Back left will have a road out of town with water tower displaying town name; name TBD. I plan to run anything and everything, so not modeling a specific era, but I am trying to capture the feel of the Blue Ridge Mountains in the fall (I know, crazy for my first go, grades and fall scenery). As such, I am most interested in mid-atlantic railroads at this time…Amtrak, Western Maryland, Baltimore & Ohio, Chesapeake & Ohio, CSX, Southern Railroad, Norfolk & Western, Norfolk & Southern, Virginian, etc.
So far, the only disappointing part of this track design is that longer steam locomotives cannot access the roundhouse because they are too long for the turntable. I also wanted a separate single or double bay diesel house, but I am going to use my imagination that a few of the bays of the roundhouse are maintenance bays.
As of January 2026, I have wired the entire layout. Main power is sent to a terminal block directly centered under the layout, power is then fed to a large terminal block supporting the roundhouse on the left and also to a smaller terminal block on the right supporting the yard. Power feeders are placed every 4 to 6 feet on the mainline and attached to the nearest terminal blocks below.
Currently, I am testing the track by running all the locomotives I can, various rolling stock, pretending to do different routes, sending trains in reverse, etc. I am trying to find issues before I glue down the track. Once the track is glued down I’m not sure what the next step should be…I might try to ballast, I might try to plaster, if you have any suggestions please share.
Thanks for your time, and if you spot something questionable please let me know, I welcome feedback.
Oscar, joeybinthegrove and 9 others3 Comments-
Do you know I filed the rails at each joint to give the layout that iconic “Ka thunk Ka thunk” sound as the train passes over the joint. (and to limit derailment probability)
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Angled siding required modifying a single piece of Unitrack to get proper length, interesting!
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Wow awesome update, very nice Hububba! Looking forward to see how you are going to make the scenery.
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