Mark,
I know I don't want to get hung up again. Though with the limited room I have, the benchwork has to be built very conservatively around the track to maximize standing room as the aisleways are going to be 20" wide or less towards the rear of the layout so some careful planning is required on my part to get the most out of the limited space available.
Chris,
This particular plan is drawn up with Atlas track and switches on their free planning program as my SCARM program is on a friends computer I used before I purchased my own. I have to switch it over to mine one day. The outer loop is O54, the flood loader turnouts are O54 as well as the double leads into the top of the yard so I can back larger power in to grab "interchange" cars. The inner loop is all O36 switches and curves. The Shawmut used 4 axle diesel power so I can run my road specific engines down there. I'm going to go back and see If I can work in O42 switches instead, that would open me up to running Mikados down there as well, and in the steam days that was the biggest power they had. I originally planned to use Gargraves track and Ross switches and am going to rework it with that set up as well to see what it looks like.
The benchwork will be tricky, I think I'm going to attempt a sort of combination L girder/table design. 15",18", and 24" wide tables with "joists" on top overhanging to extend the bench out where it's needed(each dot on the picture of the track plan is 6"). Also in modules 4' long so I can disassemble the layout when I inevitably move as it's in an apartment.
