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RE: (erielack) Tools for calculating yard sizes (sorta EL related, at least t...
What a neat way to plan a layout- never seen that before.
Happy Holidays Paul and All!
Joshua
http://www.joshuakblay.com
- -----Original Message-----
From: erielack-owner_@_lists.railfan.net
[mailto:erielack-owner_@_lists.railfan.net] On Behalf Of Tupaczewski, Paul R
(Paul)
Sent: Friday, December 17, 2004 3:37 PM
To: 'Dlw1el2_@_aol.com'; Tupaczewski, Paul R (Paul)
Cc: erielack_@_lists.railfan.net
Subject: RE: (erielack) Tools for calculating yard sizes (sorta EL related,
at least t...
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layout-line-model.jpg (image/jpeg, 51747 bytes)
For some clarity, attached is a "line drawing" of the basic layout concept.
A green box is a "definite," yellow boxes are "maybes", and blue boxes are
staging areas.
Also, don't forget, a lot of the cars set out at Dover, Lake Jct and Port
Morris are set out by eastbound freights (heck, if you're passing it, why
not drop it off?) So the reliance on Croxton for those areas is lessened.
- Paul
- -----Original Message-----
From: Dlw1el2_@_aol.com [mailto:Dlw1el2@aol.com]
Sent: Thursday, December 16, 2004 7:59 PM
To: paultup_@_lucent.com
Cc: erielack_@_lists.railfan.net
Subject: Re: (erielack) Tools for calculating yard sizes (sorta EL related,
at least t...
In a message dated 12/16/2004 3:47:15 PM Eastern Standard Time,
paultup_@_lucent.com writes:
Paul
In the real world the number of tracks would be decided by the number of
blocks ( blocks of cars ) that you needed to classify. Most modern and
large hump yards are always maxed out on there classification tracks. Many
times a given track humped on third shift has cars destine for destination
A. As soon as that track is made solid and pulled by a crew, Usually from
the other end, it will then become a designated track for destination B. It
may even change a third time on the next shift. Usually this is for smaller
destinations or destinations which have only cars coming in on one or two
trains to be humped. Sometimes when space is real tight, a track will be
slushed together and then rehumped or switched from the other end, further
breaking down the destinations. This is basically a no, no, and something a
real road would try to avoid, but sometimes the reswitching time is more
beneficial than taking the cars in a big slushed block to a destination that
has far less trac!
ks, is flat switched, and just plain time consuming. A good example of this
was the Dover Crews and the local Trainmaster trying to get the M&E cars
classified as a separate block at Allentown, instead of the Dover crews
having to drill them out of the Dover Block, over one switch, usually at
Washington. The Dover crews never won that battle. Allentown always insisted
there were not enough tracks available.
So, your first contemplation should be on how many blocks you will need to
have for freights starting out of Croxton. Blocks should be calculated by
the number of cars destine for that location, or distribution point. Some
Possibilities might be:
Silver Lake, If your going to have the Orange Br?
Boonton :) Naaaaaa LOL
Dover or Denville, for those local customers.
CNJs, for Lake Jct.
Port Morris, for westward locals out of there?
Wests, For cars destine west of Port Morris.
Or if Port is going to be a big yard, and location of locals, then all but
Silver Lakes could be classified as Port Morris cars. Your option. The EL
dropped cars via the through freights at many locations. Under the
Lackawanna this would never have happened, or not nearly to the same extent.
Almost everything would have been sent to Port Morris, and then classified
to a local out of there.
To make for a more realistic operation I would consider robing space from
your classification yard to have an authentic receiving and departure yard
or shall we say tracks, since you probably can't have three separate yards.
Just having several long tracks for the latter two functions might be
suffice, if space and confinements require.
Just some thoughts. :)
Bob
Hi folks,
In doing my every-so-often layout planning, I was thinking ahead to
operations. I plan on modeling, as many of you already know, the Boonton
Line, from Croxton to Port Morris. West of Port Morris is represented by a
staging yard, but the east end "is" the staging yard. Trains would terminate
at Croxton where two crews would go about breaking down trains and making
new ones to be sent out (for example, road freights would arrive, crews
would break up the trains into locals, which would then go out and disperse
the cars, then return with cars to go out, Croxton would arrange these into
westbound road trains, and repeat).
My question is, has anyone ever done any sort of calculating to figure
out how many yard tracks you'd need for a typical operating session? I
originally envisioned Croxton as a 12- or 13-track yard (how's THAT for
selective compression!), with 15-20 foot tracks. Then my analytical mind
started going, and I began to wonder about the following variables:
* Accounting for trains coming in off the "Erie side" (staging)
* Accounting for traffic fluctuation (7 car trains one day, 23 car
trains another)
* "Bottleneck" times - when many road freights arrive in rapid-fire
fashion, will there be enough yard room?
I was contemplating doing some Excel spreadsheets to figure out what's
happening in the yard, but then the variable and other factors made this a
non-trivial task, so I was going to write a database-driven application to
simulate a "day of operation." It would show the yard at different times of
the day to see how clogged/capable it is in terms of handling the traffic. I
can also do "what if" scenarios to see how elastic the yard's capability is.
The database would contain the trains, train arrival times (for road
freights), train time "out on the road" (for locals), and eventual car
destinations (down to the local train level, not town). The program would
then be able to easily flag if the yard would be able to handle the traffic
desired for the session. If not, I could modify the number of yard tracks,
length of tracks, or number of trains. Would anyone be interested in this?
(freeware, if I actually complete it)
Yes, it's tangentially EL-related, but to me, it's completely EL-related, so
any advice anyone can offer is greatly appreciated.
- Paul
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