Modeler's Notes on Interchanges for the RBL

Modeling Notes

From a modeling perspective, all four interchange tracks are included in my plans for the RBL. Freight car exchange can be easily simulated using the standard 4-cycle waybill methods which cause cars to be delivered to the interchange track, switched to the destination industry (in my case by the Richmond Belt Line) then are returned to the original Class I railroad interchange by the RBL shortline.

Here’s what I have in mind for each one.

BNSF/RBL Interchange

The delivery of cars from the BNSF to the RBL occurs when a local move from staging arrives from lower level staging on the BNSF Siberia Lead found at the back of Marina Yard near the wall with pink ballast. The BNSF local places cars for the RBL in whichever track has been designated by the RBL.  This track assignment could be handled by local RBL crews or by a designated operations manager for the RBL depending on the number of people at the operations session. For the most part, it will be the yard track closest to the BNSF tracks. That yard track is long enough to hold about 22 fifty-foot cars.

Cars bound for the BNSF on the other hand will be dropped by RBL crews in the BNSF track adjacent to the Siberia Lead. This track is double ended so it can be loaded from the end closest to the yard throat and cleared on the other end by whichever BNSF power is collecting those cars. In this way, the cars are “facing” the way they need to go to BNSF Richmond (staging). This is similar to the set up for BNSF cars set out for the BNSF by the Richmond Pacific and makes for very simple pickup move by the BNSF with no runaround move required.

UP/RBL Interchange

Recall that on the prototype, UP drops cars on the Waterside track near the Stege Wye, while the Richmond Pacific drops cars for the UP on the Waterside Track near Central Avenue. The MRVOA backs cars into the drop off point and the MOARV also has a simple trailing point pickup to make.

I recently redesigned the tracks representing the UP so that instead of the UP tracks dead ending at the wall, the plan now allows for live operation on the double track UP main with prototypic connections to two interchange tracks.  Here’s a view of the plan.

The drawing is a little busy so let’s look at the various tracks to see how they function. The UP tracks are in dark grey ballast at the bottom of the plan. They punch through the wall (horizontal light grey rectangle) from staging under the layout in the railroad room and pass into the rest of the garage at the lower right of the plan (in pink ballast at that point).  The UP tracks curve back toward the wall. The double track divides into two double-track mains which connect to each other on the lower left of the plan as a double track return loop.

This configuration is kind of neat. The way it works, a train coming up from staging running right-handed will pass through the 2-track to 4-track junction go around the loop and return through the junction still right hand running. It will do this no matter which way it branches where the double track splits into two double tracks.  The same is true for trains running left handed out of staging.

The 2-track-to-4-track junction provides the option of running any UP train from staging (i.e. the MOARV or the MRVOA) and sending it eastbound or westbound through the interchange junction which is loosely based on the double crossovers at Stege. More on that junction in a moment.

With me so far? Hopefully, yes!

Basically, the UP tracks are a means of providing eastbound and westbound mainline trains to the short interchange junction with the RBL.  The UP trains all start and end at staging and have a very brief appearance in the scenicked portion of the railroad at the interchange junction located inside the railroad room. Importantly, the UP tracks which are located in the garage proper take up a minimum of space. The loops at either end will be removable when not in operation and are each a bit smaller than the FremoN modules I am currently building - see, there is method to my madness!! The FremoN modules will provide all the necessary experience with temporary connections.

Okay, with a means of getting UP trains to the interchange, lets look at the pickup and drop-off scenarios.  Here’s a closer view of the UP interchange junction.

Again, the UP tracks are in the darker grey color and the other tracks are RBL. (The wide dark grey lines at the left of the plan are actually roads which you’ll see in the 3D renderings.)  You’ll see another light grey horizontal rectangle on the plan representing the other part of the internal wall. This is a key aspect of the design. The wall is in two sections offset by about 6 inches from each other with a gap between the ends.

 The UP interchange junction is inside the layout room, while most of the UP track, including the return loop and the 2-4 junction, is outside of the layout room. The nice thing about this approach is that the “behind-the-scenes” parts of the UP operation are actually easily accessible from the garage. Being out of the modeled realm, I can justify the highly functional but totally unprototypic return loop or 2-4 junction without any need to dream up ways to disguise them were they to be located inside the layout room.

Here’s the UP interchange junction itself.

The interchange with the UP is loosely based on the tracks at Stege crossovers and incorporates some aspects of the wye as well. The bias is toward functionality rather than faithful representation of the prototype tracks at those locations. I’m striving for realistic operation as seen from the layout room and that is accomplished quite well by this plan with a very modest amount of space dedicated to the interchange.

The UP tracks have two crossovers and there are two crossovers connecting the UP main to the adjacent RBL track. This RBL track simulates the Waterside Drill track which runs beside the UP double track main on the prototype.  There is also a spur to the Safeway plant (not shown in the plan above but present in the 3D renderings below.) This spur will add an interesting job for RBL crews or create a very simple UP Oakland local assignment.

Oakland is to the left of the plan, while Roseville is to the right. The UP drops off cars for the RBL on the Waterside track on the Roseville end of the junction (the right side). No cars are seen on the plan above. The waterside track runs along the garage side of the wall and can hold 23 cars.  The MRVOA will arrive from right to left and will back cars for the RBL through the crossovers onto the waterside track. The MRVOA operator(s) will be able to stand in the garage area to watch the backup move while dropping off the cars for the RBL. The cut of cars is left with just the first car or two visible from inside the layout room making the RBL pickup easy from inside the room with little worry about backing in blind to collect the cars come off the waterside track.

After dropping off the cars for the RBL, the UP train from Roseville then continues toward Oakland (to the left) and disappears from the layout room through a punchthrough in the wall (hence the roads in the corner to disguise the hole in the wall). It heads around the return loop and the 2-4 junction and back to staging.

Let’s take a look at this aspect of UP interchange. Below we can see the MRVOA coming up from staging and taking the junction to enter the layout from the “Roseville end”.  This is seen from the garage space. It is running on the right hand main and takes the branch that allows trains to pass into the layout room through the gap between the wall sections.

Below we see the MRVOA entering the layout space “from Roseville” and it will pass through the representation of the crossovers at Stege before making the backup move onto the Waterside track. I would expect this junction to be the main signalling example on this layout.

Here you can see the MRVOA making it’s set out of cars for the RBL onto the Waterside track.

Later in the session, or even next session, the RBL switcher collects the cars set out by the UP, and a new collection of switching assignments arrive on the Richmond Belt Line layout.

Now let’s take a look at how the UP gets its cars back from the RBL.  Ideally, I would have liked to continue the Waterside track beside the UP main towards Oakland and have the RBL set out cars for the UP there, just like the prototype. However, space is limited in this corner and I would need about 12 feet of track to hold 23 cars. More importantly, cars may sit on the interchange tracks between sessions so the interchange track needs to be permanent. Looking toward Oakland at the interchange reveals why the prototype can’t be followed here.

The UP tracks bend around to the left and punch through the wall to the garage space and the tracks on the other side of the wall are only in place during operations. So instead of using the Waterside track, I opted for creating a two track yard to hold cars for the UP. In the view below the interchange yard is seen curving to the right, away from the UP crossovers.

This two track yard comfortably holds 23 cars for the UP. It has no prototype representation but in the scheme of things it will work well and can readily be built and weathered to make it look like interchange has always been handled using these tracks.

Let’s take a look at the pickup routine for the Union Pacific.

This time, a train from Oakland does the collection, so the MOARV comes up from lower level staging and takes the “Oakland branch” at the 2-4 junction.

After rounding the big reverse loop in the garage space, operators in teh layout space will see the MOARV glide out from under the freeway overpass “from Oakland” and pass through the double crossovers.

It then backs through the crossovers and onto RBL tracks to collect the cars in the RBL interchange yard.

After collecting all the cars bound for the UP, the MOARV continues in the direction of Roseville, exiting the railroad space and soon rejoining the double track to staging as in the rendering below.

In this view from the garage space, we are looking back to the interchange junction which is found in the layout space just on the other side of the gap in the wall sections. The Waterside track is seen just above the units. It has a couple of curves in it to add a little length and increase it’s capacity by an extra car or two. The blue rectangle at the gap between th two wall sections is a simple sky-board to prevent operators in the layout space being distracted by activities in the garage space.

Notice also that the permanent tracks here (the ones flat against the wall) are covered by acrylic. This protects the track and cars left standing between sessions from dust or other disturbance such as kids and particularly the felines that frequent the garage area.

Design leads to a wall

The design of this section of the layout has been unusually painstaking to ensure that it can be built and to ensure that the interchange operations will function smoothly during operations sessions. I’m satisfied that the design will work having operated the 3D layout extensively.

What this now allows me to do is begin construction of the wall sections in the garage knowing where tracks will pass through knowing that the positioning and dimensions of the wall sections are compatible with the design. I’m also glad of he FremoN experiment which will validate a lot of connectivity assumptions for the temporary track sections well before the RBL is constructed. This is important as the design depends on those temporary sections being very reliable.

- Coxy