South Oak Road

Platform construction

I was really looking forward to this part of the construction and have especially wanted to build a bay platform for sometime. Bay platforms have always appealed to me, a great spot to display my collection of parcel related rolling stock and a few well stacked BRUTE trolleys awaiting the next train. The two outside tracks are designed to represent the ends of two much long platforms, a fairly common design feature of many smaller layouts but one which really allows you to show off your locomotives as they await departure.

The basic platform structure is formed using Scalescenes.com’s Platform kit. This is a fairly easy ‘box’ build though care needs to be taken at all stages to ensure that the longest coaches happily clear the platform edges (as detailed in the kit instructions). I decided to double the thickness of the platform side wall for addition strength. I also trimmed 2mm off the bottom of the platform sides to allow for the thickness of card ‘footprints’ that I had laid prior to ballasting.

Instead of using the supplied ‘cover strips’ to conceal the joins in the platform side I thought it might be nice to include a small bricked up arch, perhaps part of a long abandoned subway or ventilation shaft. All the platform needs now are a few cables running just under the platform edge and some weeds poking up here and there.