One great thing about a hobby is that you can do it when you want to, and put it aside when you don't. Another is that you have no deadlines and no requirements; you're completely in control of your project. After putting together nearly the entire baseboard and track for my layout, I realized that the design I had used had some serious drawbacks. There was only one passing track, the 'town' area was very cramped, and there were some small track design issues that I really should have caught, like putting a short straight section between two otherwise continuous curves.
So I tore it all up and started over with a new design. I put some thought into what I actually want to do with the layout, and realized that a point-to-point, rather than a loop, is fine because I find that putting trains together in a yard and sending it off somewhere is what is enjoyable about operations. This new layout fits into a corner, has a good-sized main yard, a small dockside yard, and three industries along the way. It also incorporates the wooden kit bridge, in addition to four additional bridges! There are some pretty dramatic elevation changes, but the steepest grade is still about 2.5%.
I'm going to try using open benchwork, as well as making the legs bolt on so one day I can try to move the layout to a new location. This is the current plan in Google Sketchup. The extension piece for the town year will be bolted to the main frame and the track pieces fitted together so it too can be removed if necessary.
Overall I am really looking forward to putting this new plan together. I am currently painting the first of my buildings, the signal house, and will post some pictures of it when it's done.
