I'm shocked to see I actually had a few page views.  I've been so lax keeping up with site. I think these 6 people have given me some motivation to add more content and pictures and more frequently.  So I'm off to find that folder with the early photos. Once I find it I will walk you through what I have done. But first I have to finish a work project.

And the healing has begun

Ok. So I started the reworking of my layout. I scrapped the full tear down and went with a modification of the existing track work. I widened the span between the 2 tables and ripped out the rear span because it was way too narrow and replaced it with a wider and deeper section.

My next step was to build a river bed which was a mash up of the prior landscape and some new sections. Overall, it's coming along quite nicely, but I found the truss bridge I wanted to add would not work with the turnout because the turnout was too close to the bridge entrance and my longest cars would have scraped one side of the inside of the bridge support as it exited the span.  So I'm opting to scratch build my own bridge. This is going to take some work but in the end I think it's going to look just as impressive... Or better.

As for the rest of the layout, the other side of the tables will have a 6" span that lifts out to allow access to the center of the layout. I am planning on adding most of the controls, transformer and switch controls in this area.  In addition, I'm going to add two turnouts to the narrow span so that I can add 2 additional tables for a rail yard and a full blown train station... Likely this is where I will move the Hoboken terminal.  I cannot add turnouts to the ends of either table because one table is too close to the wall and there are the palisades cliffs that i would have to rip out. On the other table I might have room to add the switch, but I'm not there yet and I need to pick p a pair of o-72 turnouts and see where they will work best.