Should 6 tracks provide adequite staging?

[Jake]

Hello, I have been planning my layout recently thanks to Alex who gave me a nice spring board. And every time I start to plan instead of Ideas, my brain clogs up with 'Staging Yard-not enough room' And I have worked out all of the details to adding a staging yard deck to WS Mod-U-Rail stands. So I'll spare you all of the tech specs. I plan on running long (20-25 40' Hoppers, speaking of which, can anyone tell me how long this should be? If you know, please at 20" to it for engine room and clearance of main for passing tracks) coal trains, medium length passengers. (Maybe 6-8 cars max) and medium mixed freights (8-15 cars) I don't have to worry about limited length. Using a split ladder from a single spur I can get two tracks about 12' 6" long, two tracks about 12' 0" long and two tracks 11' 6" long. I don't have to worry about a run around since technically that would be my main line/passing tracks. And I will probably have a maximum of 3 operators. While I do reckon a total 72 feet of staging is enough, I have seen much larger yards, maybe 125' to 150' total! 

[SteamGene]

Jake, take one 40' hopper and measure it from coupler face to coupler face.  Multiply that by 20 and 25 and add your engine length and your caboose length to get train length.  It will probably be something in the 15 foot range. 
this is what your math teacher would do:
Jake is making a model coal train.  He has 20 40' hoppers, each X" long, one locomotive, Y" long, and one caboose, Z" long.  How long is Jake's model coal train? 

As for staging, use as much space as you can.  The more staging the more variety in trains.

[Beatle (TrainBrain)]

I take up as much stagging money and room can handle!

LOL

[Jake]

Thanks for the help guys. I think I've got the staging plan down.

[rogertra]

Should six tracks be adequate for staging?

How deep is hole?

How long is a piece of string?

Put is as many staging tracks as you can.  You can never have too many.

[Woody Elmore]

You have to take spacing between cars and clearances in the yard when designing a yard ladder.

As for the question about the number of tracks necessary, this depends entirely on your own concept.

When I was into HO and belonged to a club with a layout containing a ten track yard with the capability of 20 cars on each track. The reality of the situation was that the yards became  too clogged with cars to do any kind of switching. If you plan to just run trains around and not interchange cars then this is not a problem - until something derails in the middle of the yard and you have to move long cuts of cars to get at the car on the ground.

[Scott S]

You have to take spacing between cars and clearances in the yard when designing a yard ladder.

As for the question about the number of tracks necessary, this depends entirely on your own concept.

When I was into HO and belonged to a club with a layout containing a ten track yard with the capability of 20 cars on each track. The reality of the situation was that the yards became  too clogged with cars to do any kind of switching. If you plan to just run trains around and not interchange cars then this is not a problem - until something derails in the middle of the yard and you have to move long cuts of cars to get at the car on the ground.

Do concerns about switching a yard apply to staging? Staging is not trying to model any sort of yard in the prototype, is it? I thought the point of staging was to have a place to pre-build consists that will be brought onto the layout and to run trains off the layout. Trains could be assembled and disassembled from stage to off-track storage via the 0-5-0.

[Jonathan MacCormack]

General rule of thumb:

Every 4 feet of staging needs an alternate track to match......

example: one four foot staging section with another fouir foot section along side, an eight foot section would require an additional eight foot section of staging, etc..

This gives maximum operqationl cpabilities and operation enjoyment.

Best,

Jonathan

[Woody Elmore]

I seem to be confusing staging with switching. If staging means laying up trains to run them around and around and around in circles then one track is required for each train. Simply measure the train length and make your siding longer.

As for how many you need , that depends on the number of trains you plan to operate. Will you operate more than one at a time? Then you may need passing sidings on the main line.

You still need to consider spacing and access to trains in the staging yard because they do derail or uncouple from time to time.

[ebtbob]

Woody,

      I think you have it correct.  At my club,  GATSME(www.gatsme.org) we have a staging yard in two places.   Both areas are simply a place to store built up trains until they are scheduled to run on the railroad.   The other,  Gateway Yard,  is an east/west switching yard,  where arriving trains are broken down and cars moved to other tracks to build up trains that will either leave directly from the yard to run on the mains or leave the yard to be sent to the staging yard.

[RAM]

Woody, I wouldn't think that Gateway yards would be staging.  It is a working part of the layout.  A good yard like that makes for a good operating layout.

[Woody Elmore]

When I was a club member we had 4 long passing sidings as well as a two track main line inside a mountain - the operator's panels were the back of the mountain and we staged trains there when we had open houses. A freight train would enter the mountain and a passenger train would emerge. All done with two way traffic.

The main freight yard was used for switching. When we had club shows freights started and finished in the freight yard.  Switching was left for club operating night, not open houses. We never got around to building a proper passenger yard/terminal so the passenger trains were stored in the mountain (which was 20 feet long!) During operating sessions we actually stopped passenger trains to add and remove head end cars and diners as well as change locomotives..

[Frankford el car]

The amount of staging trackage should depend on the actual number of cars and locomotives, you want to have on your layout trackage at any given time, for the number of trains you will be running. If you have a total of five hundred various freight cars, but only will be running three or four trains of approx. twenty cars in length each, it doesn't make sense to build a yard capable of handling three hundred cars, at the expense of losing the room for actual train running.

On the other hand. If your thing is switching a classification yard or passenger terminal, as opposed to running between end points, more trackage for staging yards would make sense. In my case, I model a city subway-elevated line in HO scale. So the subway car storage yard and shop area, also serve's the purpose as a staging yard.

[Beatle (TrainBrain)]

Woody,

      I think you have it correct.  At my club,  GATSME(www.gatsme.org) we have a staging yard in two places.   Both areas are simply a place to store built up trains until they are scheduled to run on the railroad.   The other,  Gateway Yard,  is an east/west switching yard,  where arriving trains are broken down and cars moved to other tracks to build up trains that will either leave directly from the yard to run on the mains or leave the yard to be sent to the staging yard.

You go to GATSME? Cool! I'm planning on going up there soon. In fact, I was talking to a friend who goes there about it last night!