The crude drawing shown below was developed after a lot of initial thinking about the scope of the layout. The GWR section of the layout – the original plan – is indicated by the continuous lines in the drawing, and the LMS section is shown in dashed lines as a completely separate set of track. But things have evolved over time and the final layout is much more extensive.
The track shown at the bottom of the diagram are the lines through the GWR General Station, and the ones at the top are for five GWR fiddle lanes – with the central lane connected to both the ‘Up’ and ‘Down’ mainlines. (Note: subsequent to the drawing of this diagram one extra lane was squeezed in to the fiddle yard for both ‘Up’ and ‘Down’ trains to provide even more variety of train services).
The area of the model at the right hand end is intended for a town scene. Most of the Leamington buildings of that 1960s period survive today, although the LMS station and track no longer exist.
The area of the model at the left hand end has only recently been considered more seriously. In reality, this railway land in the 1960s consisted of a large exchange yard for goods wagons. I didn’t want to fill this area of the model with just track but I am coming to the conclusion that some parts of the exchange yard can be fitted into this space in a meaningful way. The ‘Images’ section of this BLOG shows how this space is developing.
To help you visualise the changes from the layout diagram (above) to how the layout looks today, here are some recent photographs to show you exactly how it looks at the moment.
The images above and below show the layout from the northern end looking at the GWR General Station on the right and the LMS Avenue Station in the middle of the layout. A much simplified exchange yard and carriage sidings are shown in the lower centre. A curved backdrop is intended to eventually disguise the border between the yard and the main lines passing at the bottom. The countryside modelled around this bottom corner represents the Hatton Bank.
The GWR fiddle yard on the left was designed to be screened off by a backdrop, and that is why no work has been done to hide the baseboard and point motors.
The photograph above shows the layout from the southern end. The girder bridges are shown in the bottom left. An attempt has been made to model some of the Leamington buildings in this area of the town. The curved nature of the layout has required a great deal of customising to fit anything into the space. The backdrop has not yet been developed to define the boundary between the layout’s front view (to the left) from the fiddle yard area (on the right).
Model of 1960s Leamington Stations 