Layout Design Thoughts - Part 2
In my last post of any substance, I wrote about my thoughts to rebuild my previous layout based on Norway Maine. While I still think that that is the most likely prototype for my next layout, even if that's only because I have a lack of other ideas. Grand Trunk New England lines seems like that it would be the best choice overall for a layout, but I'm still rather tempted to model the Bangor and Aroostook instead. On the whole, I'm rather disinclined to devote a large amount of time and resources, as well as a fair amount of space, to a layout idea that I'm not sure about. I did, after all, disassemble the Norway layout the first time, and at the time I decided to move on to something else, which makes me doubt that Norway is really the right prototype for my next layout. At any rate, nothing that I build will probably survive very long, as I tend to not get very far into building a layout before I disassemble it. With all these factors, it's rather hard to actually find the will to do any layout construction.
Maybe I should just model the Penobscot Street Spur?
The blogosphere certainly likes that plan. And, I have to admit, I quite liked the idea at the time and I'm not quite sure why I'm so resistant to going back to that idea. I didn't build the layout at the time I designed it because, as it turned out, the design wouldn't fit in the space it was designed for. But that shouldn't preclude me from building that plan now. On the other hand, I don't really have any space where the plan would actually work as designed. I could, I suppose, build the layout as some sort of island/modular thing but I feel like that would somehow take away from what I thought was one of the best part of the design, which is how it fit into the corner of the room.
I could perhaps build the layout with a sort of British style presentation, if it could not fit in a corner, so that the layout was built inn multiple sections and the assembled, but that approach doesn't really appeal to me. I tend not to work on layouts very often, and I think that a layout that had to be assembled each time to work on would essentially stop me from doing any work on the layout at all. In addition, it seems rather pointless to build a relatively small layout if it has to be built in a modular way. The whole point of the Penobscot Street Spur layout when I originally designed it was to build a layout that was easily accessible and easy to work on. By building the Spur as a modular design, there really isn't any point in the design. If it ends up that I can only build a modular style layout, then I might as well build a large layout.
I'm sorry for the somewhat rambling nature of this post. I haven't really come to any new conclusions from this post, though I think that I've come somewhat closer to deciding on a prototype to model.
Maybe I should just model the Penobscot Street Spur?
The blogosphere certainly likes that plan. And, I have to admit, I quite liked the idea at the time and I'm not quite sure why I'm so resistant to going back to that idea. I didn't build the layout at the time I designed it because, as it turned out, the design wouldn't fit in the space it was designed for. But that shouldn't preclude me from building that plan now. On the other hand, I don't really have any space where the plan would actually work as designed. I could, I suppose, build the layout as some sort of island/modular thing but I feel like that would somehow take away from what I thought was one of the best part of the design, which is how it fit into the corner of the room.
I could perhaps build the layout with a sort of British style presentation, if it could not fit in a corner, so that the layout was built inn multiple sections and the assembled, but that approach doesn't really appeal to me. I tend not to work on layouts very often, and I think that a layout that had to be assembled each time to work on would essentially stop me from doing any work on the layout at all. In addition, it seems rather pointless to build a relatively small layout if it has to be built in a modular way. The whole point of the Penobscot Street Spur layout when I originally designed it was to build a layout that was easily accessible and easy to work on. By building the Spur as a modular design, there really isn't any point in the design. If it ends up that I can only build a modular style layout, then I might as well build a large layout.
I'm sorry for the somewhat rambling nature of this post. I haven't really come to any new conclusions from this post, though I think that I've come somewhat closer to deciding on a prototype to model.
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