Last night, I put down the “bronze spike” commemorating the completion of track for the staging level. Not that exciting in the big scheme of things, but it is a major milestone in the layout’s progress!

The last piece of the staging level to be completed was the 4-track L&N staging yard representing Pennington, VA. This yard is stub-ended with tracks about 13.5 feet long. This is enough for a locomotive, cab, and about 20-28 hoppers. Based on photos, this will be more than adequate to represent the meager traffic the L&N hauled off the St. Charles Branch. I made it four tracks because I had the space, and this will give me some room to store trains and cars from “other eras” when not being used for a particular operating session.

There is still a bit more work to do before trains can run. I need to put in the switch control mechanisms and drop about 100 feeders to the main DCC track bus under the layout.

In the photo above, taken from the door to the layout room, you can see the Southern staging yard under the mess on the far left, the beginning of the Southern staging yard and end of the L&N stub tracks against the far wall, the Southern main linking staging to the helix (will occupy the open area on the right) along the right aisle, the L&N staging yard, and the continuous running connection entering along the right-hand wall–this last track connects to the Southern main via a switch just out of view in the lower right corner.