Well, heck, I may as well talk about this a little bit.
The general idea is St. Paul to the west. In my mind, the Twin Cities was the final stepping-off point for the westbound transcontinental trains. Trains from Chicago would take or drop a handful of cars in St. Paul and continue on to the west coast. The goal of this concept is to capture the express transcontinental traffic, as well as the slower regional and local traffic. The golden point of this concept is that any traffic I can think of is fair game.
#1. Western Avenue Interchange & Chestnut St. Yard. As far as I'm thinking, this will be represented by staging, perhaps even a modeled, on-layout yard. Last, but not least, this will serve as the origin and terminating point for a huge portion of automotive freight to and from the St. Paul Ford plant.
#2. Short Line & Short Line Hill. This is a local landmark of the Milwaukee Road! A definite must-have on a Twin Cities layout.
#3. Malacester District. Freight traffic in and out. May be omitted from operation, depending on space.
#4. Minnesota Transfer. A very critical yard within the Twin Cities, used by several railroads to interchange. This is one of two interchanges which grant relevancy to my Burlington Northern motive power.
#5. GN/NP/BN, CNW, Soo interchange. Again, relevancy for my Soo & BN power to be on the layout bringing cars to interchange.
#6. Missisippi River bridge. Another scenic highlight!
#7. Southtown Yard. Locomotive servicing, pooling, and freight traffic.
#8. Hiawatha elevator district. Grain hopper traffic, inbound and out.
#9. Lake Street Depression. Another major scenic interest.
#10. Bass Lake yard. Interchange traffic with C&NW.
#11. St. Louis Park. Interchange traffic with MN&S.
#12. Hopkins & Points west. For now, the end of my layout. Depending on space concerns this is subject to change. I'd love to push the railroad out west into the farmlands. Either way, this puts the West in Twin Cities & West!