I am planning on building a parking lot for my 1950's Southern California PE branch, and was wondering what would be the best type of parking lot for a freight depot and a lumber company....gray gravel, black cinders, dirt or asphalt?
I remember a local lumber yard I purchased from the in 1950's and 1960's, blacktop in front of the office which faced the street upon which the lumber yard faced. You could pull in head first, about 6 spaces if I remember correctly. The rest of the lot, including where you went to pick up your wood was gravel, common to this area is a light gray color, crushed limestone. A RR siding severed several of the storage buildings. A wood shop completed the lumber yard, they would make custom moldings and other items that a builder would need. Great service, great wood, found a piece of #2 white pine the other day in my mother's basement, still straight, no cupping, just as straight as when I bought it in 1973. Do not find wood like that anymore. If you can find old pictures some where, the lumber yard was Jones Lumber Co., N. Sylvan, Columbus, OH.
For a 1950's era I would go with a crushed limestone/ gravel lot for both. Around here the common material was called B-2 limestone. It was a gray, angular stone approx. 3/4" in size used for driveways, parking lots, French drains, etc. It was too small for use as ballast. It was probably a by-product of the crushing process for ballast. It was cheap, drained well and the angular shapes helped to prevent from being kicked to the sides from traffic. Smaller sized limestone, also a by-product of the crusher, was used, along with liquid asphalt, as a road sealing topping. B-2 limestone was usually gray in color but the color could vary from a dark gray to almost a whitish gray depending on which quarry it originated. I would use the "fines" that are in every package of N scale ballast.
Thanks guys. I was thinking using N Scale ballast as well....the only reason that I said cinders is that I have a bag on Woodland Scenics fine cinders that I am trying to figure out how to use...
Gravel is probably the most likely, unless there's a genuine loading dock involved. I don't recall ever seeing a gravel apron to a loading dock. Height is pretty important if someone's going to be running a forklift in and out of a truck or trailer, and gravel can vary in height from day to day. These days we tend not to think of macadam, but it was pretty common back in the day. I don't know how I'd try to model the stuff.
Could be gravel, oiled crushed rock, paved or even simply dirt. I remember such things from my youth...
I use Woodland 'fine' cinders to represent coal mined via the long wall method. This coal is very small in size and used in electrical generation plants. The small size aids in combustion by increasing the surface area so the coal is instantly burned releasing all of is BTU's. Think of it as fuel injection. Just paint the plastic coal load that comes with the car or make your own loads with matte medium or white glue then sprinkle on the fine cinders and let it dry for 24 or more hours. Then shake off the loose stuff. Easy Peasy.
Yes- remember how 'humans' are going to use the 'ground' you are creating. Railroad ballast of any kind, if you have done any exploring as a kid, or worked on/ around rails, is a near impossible surface to walk on and do everyday things on- it is simply far too coarse. So (on your model world) a finer gravel is required for the yard area. Start off with just a dark base, the a grey dusting of real 'dust' captured from a garden or pathway gravel... and gradually build a shape and area of wheeled traffic and movements. Playing 'toy trucks' moving in wet gravel will give the wheel mark effects, just don't push down hard. Mix in a tiny amount of ballast around areas that don't see the traffic as a texture component. I maybe made 4-5 gradual layers when texturing an area on a friends layout scenery. Weeds, reeds, piles and fences etc. get inclusive texturing along the way. Regards Dave Edit: Photo>> Not the best example, and not a 'yard' as such but a scenic change as we fill in some bare board alongside Kato Unitrack between station tracks and main/ passing sidings. The scene of 'construction' is marked like this to remind the layout owner that indeed it is not safe to run trains along here as scenic aids and material is still scattered about. (Note: cleanliness mania is a disease too!)
I used a very fine gravel mix, not regular N scale ballast, for this parking lot. I really pressed it down into the glue, too
I thought about that, but the closest coal powered railroad to my prototype was 525 miles away, and my road was electrified until 1953, when it was dieselized.
Thus has me curious. SP shipped copper ore concentrates, to Butte, Montana for processing at the Black Eagle facility. In any vague way related?
