Looking for Ideas

I think the rotary beacon may create some clearance problems with overhang on the interior of your curve.  Maybe extend the ridge to the right some more and place a rock face under the rear track, hiding the trestles to make it look more like a rock cut with the track running through the cut.

Well, a few thoughts:

- First, not a bad first effort at all IMHO -- good texture and coloring on the rock, forming a decent basis for the "cake decorating" you can do over the top and down the sides.

- OTOH, the shape seems to my eye  somewhat arbitrary and loaf-like, an abrupt and somewhat inexplicable intrusion into an otherwise board-flat and rather uniform layout platform. Believe me, I understand the dilemma (and have been there myself more than once!): it's a lot easier to just unroll the grass mat over the plywood and/or foam so you can lay the tracks and start operating (and FWIW many operators choose to just leave it like that), but that does leave a very obvious blank slate on which you must 'write' your landscaping 'story' (if you choose to tell one). The shape does not seem to follow the adjacent tracks, which if it did could support the potential viewer's impression that this was, as you say, a man-made cut through a natural outcropping. Instead, the shape is more reminiscent of an old-fashioned paper mache tunnel, forming an obvious add-on.

- The grass seems a bit too heavy on the vertical faces, and in any case a bit too uniform in color and texture. If the underlying structure is intended to represent a rock cliff (as it seems to be), any grass and other vegetation will grow poorly (if at all) on any vertical surface, and be lush (if at all) only on flat surfaces that have accumulated some soil. OTOH, if you are instead depicting an accumulation of soil and aggregate rather than solid rock, whether flat or sloped, you can be more liberal with the grass shaker. Otherwise, a few lines of white glue on the flat cracks and crevices, followed by sprinkles of grass, and removal of the excess when dry, is likely to be more realistic.

- Even with sparse vegetation, there's typically a lot of variety IRL. Bushes (ground foam) and small trees are wont to take root in available crevices, and even some flowering bushes or wildflowers can be scattered where appropriate, something to catch the eye and help sell your 'story' of encroaching nature.

- Finally, some further effort needs to be made to transition such an outcropping into the rest of the landscape. Here, there's a clear margin of base color visible, with little apparent effort to blend it into the surrounding scenery. Believe me, I still have plenty of such abrupt transitions on my layouts, but anything that you can do to make the piece seem a more organic part of the larger layout will help sell the illusion of the model.

I hope my comments haven't been too abrupt or demeaning -- certainly neither was intended, and are instead offered in the spirit of a constructive critique as you have requested. Besides, I'm getting too old to beat around the bush, even one on a rock face on the layout!

Add a few trees and bushes scattered about the hillside. Add a couple of small animals - deer, bear. Add some brown turf to the base alongside the track on the front to break up the continuous green and place a few rocks around. Add some water running down the hillside, perhaps to a small water hole.

Thank you for all your suggestions- I like coach Joe’s suggestion of adding a rock face to the trestle in the rear to give the impression of a rock cut - now I just have to figure out how to do it!

I also appreciate Steve and Ritchie’s comments/suggestions - like I said this was a trial - I did a 2nd layout which incorporated rock molds/ hills/tunnel/ ponds / trees and shrubbery

I returned to this “trial” which gave me the confidence to do the 2nd layout - my “problem was the limited space I have available-

thank you all again

Here's a suggestion for "the ridge" ...

That area could be the location for a Boy Scout campsite -- with pup tents, fire pits, a flag pole, a Meal Tent as the Kitchen and Dining Hall, plus lots of scouts and their leader(s).  Some merit-badge-related activities could be incorporated:  hiking along a trail or rock climbing.  Scouts making s'mores at a campfire would be appropriate.

If you were a scout as a boy, your experiences could be a source of ideas for the scene.

Carry on ...

Mike M.

I would consider raising and extending the hill through the scene from the wall, raising it up enough to look like the elevated track needed a cut through,  to the edge of the layout such that it looks like cuts were made in a long descending ridge line  to pass the track through.  At the wall it could also be part of the track support. A bump like this in the real world would have been removed completely and used as fill somewhere.  Also, the red/green beacon is sort of a conundrum.  A green and white beacon would mark an airfield, a split white beam marks a military field, red and green is colorful but not prototypical of anything expect in nautical settings, but they don't rotate.  Not knocking them as a Lionel accessory at all, I have two, the aggravating 394 with special lamp and the more reliable 494, but one of the microwave towers situated on top of the ridge would be really prototypical, and they have a flashing beacon on top too.  You can add a small structure ostensibly to house the electronic equipment  of the microwave relay station, and an access road to it also.  Just a thought.

Regarding the rotary beacon, I agree 100% with ur comments that it is not prototypical and I typically would not include on the layout. However the train set that I run on the inner loop is a Lionel 2328 freight set - original engine and 3 of the freight cars that I received as a Christmas gift in 1957. The rotary beacon joined the set within a year or so - so it’s a pure nostalgia play - brings back a lot of fond memories almost 70 years later.

Here's what I did with my 394 beacon tower. I created a hill on both sides of the track and made it look like the railroad made a cut to lay the track. The tower sits on the back part of the hill.

I know you don't have as much space, but this shows what you can do to a small hill/outcropping to enhance the realism.

Njcjoe and Richie thank you for sharing pics of your layouts - nice jobs!

I don’t have much space on the layout - the outer loop goes almost to the edge of the table

as one contributor suggested I think I will look at margins and clad the bottom of the trestle on outer loop with rock, lower the ridge from right to left to match the rock face and move the rotary beacon to the right

want to thank all for suggestions/ recommendations

tom