My awesome idea

[sedfred]

I have come up with an awesome way for people with smaller layouts with no staging or engine facilities to put locomotives on their layout with a minimum of actual handling. if you store them near the floor on a shelf, simply have some track running beside where the locos are stored, then if the layout doesn't take up the whole wall use the remaining space and build a wooden frame with a movable turntable at the bottom that can be moved up and down. have the track go to this turntable on the floor. then put a loco on the track and run it to the turntable. raise the turntable to track level on your layout and turn the turntable so the loco faces the layout, then turn on the power and move your loco from the turntable onto the layout, voila! then instead of picking up a locomotive and carrying it at a dangerous height you just pick it up and move it 2 feet, and the risk of dropping it is almost nonexistent

[Trainman203]

That is basically a vertical version of a transfer table, used at steam back shops  for decades.

[on30gn15]

Sort of like this concept?

World's biggest car delivery center
Wednesday, April 04, 2012 - 02:41
April 4 - The two gleaming glass towers of Volkswagen's Autostadt, or car town, house technology which automatically moves cars from VW's Wolfsburg plant to the towers, to the customer center where they are collected by their owners. Joanna Partridge reports.

http://www.reuters.com/video/2012/04/04/worlds-biggest-car-delivery-center?videoId=232867514

[jonathan]

I had a similar idea when I first started designing my layout.  It seemed so complicated that I abandoned the thought and searched for something else.  I found, with even a small amount of space, one could store or stage locomotives on the layout in engine houses.

This engine house sits on a shelf portion of the layout... only 9 inches wide:


The next two houses are on a part of the layout that is only 2 feet wide:



(Need to twist the smokebox front back in place)

For those with lots of room, there are staging tracks where whole trains can be standing by in another room.

Just a thought.

I've been away for a while dealing with an illness.  Trying to get back into time for trains.

Regards,

Jonthan

[rogertra]

Looks good. 

Roger T.

[ebtnut]

Jonathon:  Feel better real soon.  We miss your great work and commentary.

[austrian]

Jonathan: looks great and best wishes to you!

Thomas

[J3a-614]

Jonathan: looks great and best wishes to you!

Thomas

I can't add a thing. . .

[J3a-614]

One thing I haven't seen mentioned so far is the "cassette."  These can be made as long as can be handled, and in some versions are even available commercially, mostly in Great Britain.

http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/data/2015/IMG_4267.JPG

http://forum.railroadforum.com/lofiversion/index.php?t12236.html

http://www.bandrmodelrailways.co.uk/Accessories.html

http://www.metalsmith.co.uk/fiddle_yard_cassettes.htm

Some aren't even made with "track" as such:

http://www.zen98812.zen.co.uk/cassettes.html

Someone used some sort of commercial channel for this variation:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/stevepurves/13938258780

Some construction comments:

http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/11/t/104826.aspx