Adding unit coal train car set storage tracks

 

Modeling the AT&SF - D&RGW Joint Line through Colorado Springs from Milepost 70 to Milepost 80 circa 1978-1979

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Post 8: Adding unit coal train car set storage tracks

 

There's a saying among owners of layouts built for operation: 

you can never have too many staging tracks.

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In the late 1970s unit coal trains became a signature feature of the Joint Line, including BN trains originating in the Powder River coal field headed south to Texas, along with Rio Grande trains originating on the Craig Branch.

The problem is those unit coal trains won't do any work on my layout, they will just run through. I do need to model a few of them to simulate their presence on the line, but only just. I figure 3-4 max will be enough to suggest the traffic and variety in the car sets that could be seen then.

The catch is I only have room for so many staging tracks, six in the north yard, six in the south, and not every one of those coal trains runs on any given day and therefore in any operating session, meaning idle coal trains would just eat up staging tracks that could be used for other trains.

So what to do about that? Well, I could rotate unneeded train sets off the layout by hand, and then put them back on when needed, but that will get old fast, plus it risks damage to the cars and finish from being handled repeatedly.

I have read about other layout owners facing the same or similar situation adding extra staging or storage tracks to existing layouts by shoehorning them into unused space under the sceniced layout deck after the fact. This sounded like the ideal solution to the problem, and since I'm still in the benchwork phase of building my own layout, now would be the time to do it with the least pain.

Thanks to a couple of rainy days I managed to steal some indoor time from summer outdoor activities to work on the layout and used it to fit in the roadbed for three stub-end storage tracks for unit coal train car sets.

Out came the cantilevered plywood staging yard supports one at a time so that I could notch each out beneath the north, or Denver, staging yard to clear the storage yard, which will tie into the throat of the south, or Pueblo, staging yard.

Three half day work sessions later the supports are all back in along with the sub roadbed. And since I was able to reuse materials from the last iteration of my Joint Line layout, it didn't require any new funds from my hobby budget.

Win - win.

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