Roots are out and track is going in

The past three days have seen a fair amount of work. I continued to dig and remove rocks along the fence line. Yesterday, chainsaw in hand, I went to work on removing some of the tree roots that were blocking the right of way.


As I don't want to cause too much damage to the tree, I've decided to elevate the roadbed along the fence line above what I had originally planned. I'll do this by starting the incline about 12 feet further east. As a result, the roadbed will now pass over some roots rather than cutting into them. And because of this change I've also decided not to build a tunnel here, but instead put the roadbed in a trench which I think will look better. My planned grade here was 2.5%, but I think it might end up being 3.0% -- I still need to do some more measurements.

Some of the concrete blocks I've dug up have already been repurposed as a retaining wall. This wall will help hold back that the "mountain" that the tunnel will be passing through.


Some of the track I ordered arrived today but not everything I need for my loop. Hopefully the rest should be here tomorrow.


With the track that did arrive I was able to lay it out and validate my roadbed is positioned correctly.


I could also at this point determine exactly where my tunnel will go.


And finally I ballasted some of the track where I'm confident the track is correctly placed and will not need to move again. Here's an overview showing today's progress.


Another thing I'm working on is a portal for the tunnel. This is my second attempt -- my first attempt went horribly wrong when the paint I applied had a chemical reaction with the extruded styrofoam base. This time I will be testing my paint before I apply it!