Work moves to Dolores

With the yard throat completed at Ridgway, I've moved over to Dolores, and worked on the staging tracks (McPhee) this weekend. These depart the mainline at the south end of Dolores, and duck into what will be a tunnel under the Vance Jct / Lizard Head area. I've had the staging track laid for some time, but it was connected to the main.

So - I spent a good deal of my day off on Monday laying more turnouts and tying those tracks into the main. It ended up being rather frustrating and messy, as the turn into the staging tracks is sharper than probably anything else on the layout, and I really wanted to avoid that. Yes, it'll be hidden mostly, but I like to maintain the 30" minimum radius, and I'm sure I'm under that here. Oh well - there's just not enough room there to fit everything in. If it's really bad, I suppose I could replace one of the turnouts with a sharper turnout, or even a curved turnout. I'll try some test trains on it later and see.

Once this is done and reliable, I can continue working on the mainline into Vance Jct, which will involve covering this staging track.