Going Underground

There are many, many ideas in my sketchbooks of trackplans. Some of commonplace protoypes and some of more unusual protoypes. Like this one.

This one I call "Underground Armaments Store. It was inspired by pictures of Monkton Farleigh Armanents store at the Subterranean Brittanica website. (Be warned if you follow the links to this site you will be assaulted by a barrage of inspirational pictures for which I cannot be held responsible).

Something like this prototype is ideal for a small layout. Cramped conditions, tight curves on the track work. What more could you ask?

Operation of the layout could be quite busy. Wagons loaded with shells and other munitions would come down the incline and be shuttled off into the depths of the storage caves. Empty wagons would make the return journey to be loaded on the surface. Then of course there are times when the reverse operations would be true as well when munitions would have to be delivered to RAF bases throughout the country.

The working incline and the opening and closing blast doors would be interesting features to grab the attention of the viewers. Something I think very important for a small layout such as this.

This idea impressed me so much that I started to build it.

But that's a story for another day.