Best Scale Structures Are NO Structures

That is beautiful.  I have reserved about 40% of my layout for "open country" - like you I think its fantastic to see a train out in nature, alone.

Hal,

Great scenes - my kind of country.

I agree - some of the best looking scenes are those with the fewest man-made objects, although trestles and bridges wouldn't disqualify a scene IMO. After all, the presence of the track itself represents civilization.

Jim

I'm not civilized

I'm not ready for scenery yet, but this is my idea of the hobby. Not so many people...

George (G3)

Thank You, Jim & Lee,

I'm glad that you agree with my philosophy on scenes of barren, desolate, wilderness which the vulnerable lonesome Freight Train conquers on its way to its destination! 

Yes, Nature is beautiful, but harsh at times. My rugged buttes were purchased ready to install from Home Depot!

BAD ORDER HAL,

Apple Valley, CA

Looks like a great place to film some b-western outdoor on location scenes.

Very nice

Gulches,arroyos, and those dry washes scar much of that terrain, so culverts and low trestles are almost inevitible.  I would have to put in, at least rotting, telegraph poles.

Those poles, marching into the distance, give a sense of how far it really is from Point A to Point B.

To each his own....Looks great.

That's why it's a great hobby...ten people can build 10 different types of layouts, and each modeler can emphasize a different aspect of their "world" as they see it--and all of the layouts can be "right", because there is no wrong way.

Jeff C

Let's keep in mind that although most of us think of a "structure" as a building, mountains, cliffs, rocks....they too are a form of structure. As mentioned above, what a great hobby where all can do things a bit different and yet still bring a awesome aspect in the hobby.

I agree, everybody!

Let's keep our scenery and structures as we would wish them!

As for me, I like the idea of not having to "scratch-build", "kit-bash", or "weather" anything on my precious 123.5-foot 2-rail, O-scale folded dog-bone railroad! 

BAD ORDER HAL

Looks Awesome.

My new layout is up to 25 by 50 feet and will be mostly open country; scrub brush, mountains, and washes, gully's and sagebrush.

I expect it will have touches of yours and of Jims, I like them both.

A Mountain and rural town on one end and Ogden yard on the other.

That's the plan and I'm stickin to it.

GOOD FOR YOU, RUSSELL!

Here's my track plan:

Just an unbroken circuit around the game room, (leaving room for the furniture along the entrance wall and the pool table in the center), using 123.5 feet of Atlas Flex-Track, or 1.12 miles in O-scale.

(The Piano is in the right-hand corner of the entrance wall).

It's basically no different than the small circle of track around our Christmas Tree in 1942, supporting my old tinplate toy wind-up train!

It was boring then, and it's boring now, but I like the way it looks, so I won't be changing it either! 

BAD ORDER

Awesome!  Prowlin' and Growlin' through the desert.  Nicely done.

Wish I had room to do a town on each end and 'open country' (think Western Kansas or central Missouri) in between.

I agree seeing trains in the open is, if properly done (like this one) excellent layout material. Bravo!