@david1 posted:Buy what you like and can afford. Nothing else matters.
Dave
This for sure.
But beyond that, I run a mix. I have some older stuff that I love and it's "traditional". I run it just the same as the scale stuff. I'm also finding out that a lot can be accomplished. Norm Charbonneau and guys here actually add detail to those traditional items and dress them up. I've done this on some of my traditional rolling stock and been very pleased with the results. I think it's a good option to keep in your pocket if you like the building part of the hobby.
One thing that helped me was figuring out what makes things look so bad. This part is totally opinion based but I found I was bothered by the loop. And I was specifically bothered by the 90* turns you get in a square or rectangle. I think point to point track plans make for great looking trains because you don't see the train make an unnatural 90* turn and you don't really see them make turn in general. Point to point takes up a lot of space though. Luckily, I started watching Eric's Train on youtube and discovered that he somewhat hides his turns in tunnels and such and that was part of what I liked so much about his layout. I couldn't really see the things I didn't like (at least on the bottom level). So I set about accomplishing that in my track plan. Then I did some testing of my own on the basement floor and I think that's going to please me the most. There are a lot of ways to create that illusion of a long layout. A 4x8 layout that is split by a divider easily becomes an urban freight hotspot on one side and a full fledged farm on the other. So I think you just gotta play with your options. I spent 8 months tinkering with track plans and messing around with different looks on my 4x8 test layout. It was worth it.
So that's how I met in the middle of traditional vs scale. Obviously I wouldn't put my postwar turbine next to the latest and greatest models because of the glaring difference but that's ok. That turbine is an engine I really like. I like how it runs and sounds so I'm sticking with it.
Common visitors won't ever know the difference, other modelers might yank your chain about it in good fun, and the people being jerks about it can hop off 
