Ideas wanted for making a highway


Hey Dekker, where are you? Hope you are still following your thread (sorry). Have you tried any of these excellent suggestions?

Jos, Thanks for reminding me of that. I made that mistake on a crossing I experimented with and made using railroad ties. I sanded it down even with the rails and OOPS! What a nightmare to clean.

Grampy, that is an very real looking road and crossing. I hope I can get close to that with the road to the passenger station. The station is located in a mid-size town and next to the engine service area. It has a lot of traffic going to the station and industrial areas to wear down the road. Besides, the town's budget for roads has been pocketed by a Mayor that thinks he is underpaid.:D

QUESTION: I believe some of you said that you lay the road before adjacent ground cover/scenic. How do you prevent the yuk from getting all over your nicely weathered road?:confused:
 
Hi gang, hope you don't mind if I crash the party! :D

Here are a few shots of how I approached the road issue:

BuddCars_at_EM.jpg


The first view [above] shows an asphalt highway made of .060"-thick styrene sheet, painted with River Rock gray latex paint (sandy textured). A thin mist of Grimy Black from a floquil rattle can was applied to give it a 'dirty' appearance. The stripes were hand-painted. Whenever I want to clean the track, I just pull up the roadbed - it isn't permanently cemented.

Fagans_corner_roadway.jpg


The second pic shows a section of aged, patched asphalt roadway where I used paper-thin styrene sheet (can't remember the thickness - sorry!). I first spraypainted this with Floquil Reefer Gray, then hand-painted the striping and some darker-colored 'patched' areas, as well as places where tar has been poured in to seal small cracks. Unfortunately I had recently ballasted the nearby track and hadn't swept the loose stones off...:rolleyes:
 
RexHea said:
QUESTION: I believe some of you said that you lay the road before adjacent ground cover/scenic. How do you prevent the yuk from getting all over your nicely weathered road?:confused:
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lay newspaper or something to shield it from damage, or just be careful and rationalize that stray scenery material often gets on real roads anyway.....one of my pics shows some "dirt" that washed onto the finished road. surely you don't think I planned that do you? ;)
 
Rex, as long as all the paint and weathering on your road is dry, there's no rpoblem laying scenery next to it. Just have a big, soft brush to push everything back to the shoulder and apply the usual glue and water mixture to the ground cover. As Ken said, a little will slop over the road edges but, in an area where there's no curbs, that's what happens in real life.

Ken, that first picture of the asphalt road looks fantastic. I really like the way the road rises gradually to meet the crossing. The striping also looks good, especially the fog lines, which often get overlooked.

If you'll forgive me, I'll use your second picture to illustrate a common problem. The road itself looks very realistic but asphalt roads are always laid over a crushed rock sub base. In your picture, the road looks like it was just placed on the ground. Some very fine ballast, laid just a few scale feet right on and next to the road shoulder, would improve the realism immensely.
 
UP2CSX said:
Ken, ...., I'll use your second picture to illustrate a common problem. The road itself looks very realistic but asphalt roads are always laid over a crushed rock sub base. In your picture, the road looks like it was just placed on the ground. Some very fine ballast, laid just a few scale feet right on and next to the road shoulder, would improve the realism immensely.
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Jim you're quite right, I could see open air under where I laid down the 'road' - it just escaped me how to correct that problem. I'll try your idea this weekend.
 
From Coffee Shop thread:
Rex, if you're asking about standard city arterial street, it would have been 41 feet curb to curb within a 60 foot right of way. That grew over the years to a standard of about 50 feet in a 67 foot right of way. 41 feet is about 5.6 inches wide in HO, which you'll probably find too large to fit in your town. I've found about 4 inches still looks OK and you can fit more roads and scenery in the same space. You'll need an extra 1/2" per side for curbs and sidewalks.
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Thought I would put this where it belongs;).

Jim, arterial being a street to the downtown and including the main street? Does this street of 41 feet include the parking? parallel? How much allowed for angled? (I hate to guess how wide T-town's downtown main streets are. They are four lane with angled parking....very wide. My neighborhood street seems to be around 24 feet paved area.)

What is the width of the asphalt/paved area of a marked secondary rural road in the 1950's? I know a present day lane doesn't seem to be much more than about 4 feet wider than my 8 1/2' travel trailer. The Interstate about 6 feet. A 16' wide mobile home being transported on the Interstate has an edge very near the centerline with several feet hanging over the shoulder.
 
Rex, an arterial street is one that collects traffic for bigger streets. A normal business district street off the main street would be a good example. That 41 feet would include a travel lane in each direction and room for parallel parking on one side of the street only. The modern arterial at 50 feet would include room for parking on both sides of the street.

There really aren't standards for main streets with angled parking. For example, Prattville's main street has angled parking on both sides with only a narrow travel lane in each direction. I would guess it's not more than 65 wide and actually quite dangerous to back out of a parking space since the oncoming traffic is so close. Since these streets were built long before there were any standards, I would guess most towns with angled parking had main streets that were about 75 feet wide. Tuscaloosa's main street is unusually wide but not for traffic. If I remember right, it's about 150 feet curb to curb. This wasn't done to accommodate traffic but to allow enough separation between buildings on opposite sides of the street that a fire on one side couldn't easily jump the street and start a fire on the other side. This is really common in older Southern and Midwestern towns, where even arterial streets of 200 feet were common to prevent the spread of fire.

10 foot lane widths were common on rural roads until the 60's and the advent of Federal money. The minimum lane width now is 12 feet, and many roads in Alabama barely meet this requirement so your estimate of four feet of clearance for your travel trailer isn't far off. Interstate travel lanes are required to be at least 12 feet wide although some newer interstates with enough ROW go to 14 feet. A 16 foot wide load has to use part of the shoulder if it is to stay in its lane since there's no interstate lane that's wide enough. And, before you ask, the standard residential lane width is 10 feet wide although older roads can be as little as 9 feet wide and modern standards usually dictate 11 or 12 feet.

And that's Roads 101 for today. :D
 
:confused:Uh, ok, I get it...I think.:D:D
I believe Roads 101 will help me through this,LOL. Tuscaloosa's two main streets, University Blvd and Greensboro Ave., are more likely that wide because there used to be a trolley system down the middle and btw the pavement was brick and still under the asphalt in many places. Regardless, it would take a California forest fire to jump them now:D.

When I get back from camping next week, I will get busy and start using some of the great methods posted here. I hope this thread is known by many, as I don't recall seeing so much road info in one place.
Thanks so much and I will let you know how it goes.:)
 
I was in the WM hardware section today & found a new product that might make some nice roads. It's a 3" wide foam tape that U wrap around pipes in the winter time. It's about 1/16th thick & comes in 10 ft. rolls. I think it was $4.88.

Larry
 
Here is a pic of my roadway (sorry aout the poor pic)If its a 2 lane paved blacktop back road I just use plaster and smooth it out with a pice of thick plastic alittle grey paint weathers it nicely. . It works real well around RR crossings too as you can get a nice scale look to it. if you looking for concrete some sheets of thick styrene will work as concrete roads have saw cuts for expansion joints.

Trent
 
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Excellent concrete road and other great photos. Ha, even a guy that uses real dirt for ground cover like I do. Never figured out what people have against doing that. I have had very good results with it and the best part is ......it's FREE. :D
 
Rex, great site, thanks. That is really, truly, the best looking beat up concrete road I've ever seen modeled. The curb cuts and crumbling concrete patched with asphalt that appear to be just higher then the concrete are superb. I'd sure like to know more information about how he did it and I know I don't have the March '03 issue of MR, darn it. The only two small nits I can even find is that the road should have some kind of center striping and those grade crossing signals shouldn't have been installed in the middle of the sidewalk.
 
My first test attempt....Not too shabby mee thinks. I got the technique down, now I shall attempt to improve on it. Styrene .040, Poly scale "old concrete",
Decocolor yellow fine paint marker, Energel pentel pen(for expansion joints and cracks) , bragdon industries soot and Dulcoat. Thanks for all the ideas gang!
 
Steez, sorry I didn't give you the correct credit for that web site. Very good work for your first try indeed. My only suggestion would be to tone down the black drip line in the center. It's actually only dark black for a few inches in the center and then changes to a lighter black as the rain and road traffic moves is towards the side of the road. Try a little dark gray chalk on top of the black and rub it in. You'll have a pretty nice looking drip line then. Once you get those buildings set on the street line, don't forget about oil drip marks on the parking spaces too. Keep it up, very good work so far.
 
Nice going Steez. Now if I can only get started on mine. What width did you end up using for the two lanes and one sidewalk?
 
Actually the sidewalk isn't included. The road is 2.25" seperated into scale 10X20 foot and 20X20 foot sections. The 10X20s were going to be for parking but it seems to skinny for passing vehicles AND parking.
Regarding the oil marks....I will go with a dark gray. You are right, its too dark. After these shots I lightened it considerably by simply rubbing my fingers on it. Thanks again for the ideas and kind words.
 
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