Need ideas on how to eliminate the paved drop-off

Maybe a bead of black, or paintable caulk?

I’m now filling a gap on the perimeter of my layout with round gray insulation cord. If filling the gap is what you’re referring to let me know, I wound up with 350ft of 1/2 round. I’ll send you some if you want. Then maybe lay in masking tape over it then paint as you want.

For gap filling you could also bevel a piece of wood to fit.

But for modeling ideas;

You could paint a piece of wood trim white to model a concrete curb

You could stack culverts and a pile of sand (held in place with water white glue) as a road project about to get started maybe include some construction equipment

You could model an accident or a good humor truck or a delivery to the dinner

Im not sure of the length needed or the adjacent scenes

Happy Holidays

Steven T

Not sure what the dimension of the opening is, but I'd take some rigid pink styrene insulation and a very sharp 1" Heavy duty Snap Off blade cutter and slice off a "wedge".    If you have a table saw, you could tilt the blade to the angle required and cut your long thin wedge that way.   The hard pink insulation takes flat black or any other color paint really well, and you could hold it in there with a good quality acrlylic latex caulk with silicone put small weight on it over night and it will be there for good in the morning.

Tape over the gap and paint it black.
or use black gaffer’s tape and just cover it up.

Guys, thanks for the ideas!

the dimensions of the gap are 12 3/4" long by approx 7/8" wide by 1/4" to 3/16" deep on the left, 0" deep on the right.  The curve is definitely not quarter round shaped.

I took the idea of the foam and given what materials I have on-hand (and the relatively empty shelves at the hardware stores here ...unless you're buying contractor bulk quantity),  I'm going to try this: I'll take some small project wood strips, glue those to the side of wood roadbed, just below the top edge of the road, then cut some black card stock I have cut to the size of the gap and glue it to the top of the wood strips ...and perhaps a small amount of glue on the sloped drive in case the cardboard doesn't lay nice.

stay tuned...

When I've used tape across gaps, I've found that the tape I have (masking or painters tapes) always sags on the gap.  

Here's the result of butting up the card stock to the wood road and mounting it to thin wood strips glued just below road level to create a ledge for the card stock.

There were, as expected, a few small gaps meeting the road to the card stock, so I used a light coat of  Woodland Scenics asphalt paint which is what I used to also paint the roads.  Results are shown below; paint is still fresh so there's some shine from overhead lighting.

Bass or Balsa strips, then fill with wood filler,sand,paint.

Looks good Scott. If you want, you could paint some gloss black into the seam to look like asphalt crack filler. Otherwise I think you solved the problem.

I was going to suggest low expansion spray foam, sanded to match the shape.

I took a look at it this morning and I put some non-shrinking lightweight spackle to the crack.  A light sand and paint to follow...

Looks good!  I might suggest extending the parking stripes onto the fill piece, provided you can find matching paint.  This would further disguise the fill piece. 

Tom

At least now it doesn't look like there's an alligator moat along the entrance to the diner!

Thinking of perhaps adding a rotating burger-boy sign from Miller and placing it in the foreground.

Well @scottv the Eastern Ky method to correct the holes, crevices, divot, or ditch is the fill the hole with a shovel full of gravel the first hour, a shovel full of sand the second hour, and then a prayer the next.  
After the next downpour repeat until the next fiscal court meeting.

Or, if the County Judge executive eats his lunch there the hole is repaired with hot patch the next day…

Your addition of the rotating sign is great, but be certain to employ the great looking blonde and the diner traffic count will surely increase enough to where the new owner can pay to have the hole replaced hereself☺️

And Your diner looks great in the space on your layout, have a great Holiday Season!