What is the minimum clearance that I should allow between the top of the track and the bridge I want to put over the track?. I am hoping 5" inches works as the tallest MTH locomotive that I have seen is 4.25".
Your thoughts are appreciated!
Bill
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Forget the engines...do you own any Premier husky stack cars? If so, you might want to expand that to 6" or so. Unfortunately, I found this out the hard way....and after the fact! 
- Mike
What bridge is it? Is it a MTH bridge or is it another brand? Does it come with supports or not?
Pittsburghrailfan
Mike is totally right I also would go 6 inches or 6 and a half
In the past on my layout I had tunnel portals at the height of 5 1/2
and engines and rolling stock were hitting.
Thanks, Alex
I have a ton of Husky Stack/ twin stack intermodals. So am I looking at 6"?? The bridge is a tin Lionel arch bridge cobbled together with supports from the 32" long MTH steel arch bridge. Supports are right around 6" base to tip with no cork road bed underneath.
Bare minimum railhead-to-overhead clearance to clear an MTH double-stack is 5 3/4 inches (23 scale feet) which gives you 1/4" (more or less) of clearance. 6" t0 6 1/2" is a lot better as it will allow for improperly seated containers and you can get your fingers underneath. On tunnel portals, add another inch to compensate for the curvature of the top of the portal
I actually went with 7 1/4" in my helix, but I had to allow for feeder wires.
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