Pizza CAD - Cardboard Aided Design

With the basic woodwork completed on my O9 pizza project I have started to think about how the scenic treatment might work. I have therefore worked through a series of cereal packet cardboard mock-ups to explore a few ideas. Luckily I had a few bits retained from previous exercises to help with this.

The first has a distinct theme, backstory and to a degree, a sprinkling of whimsey, something it inherits from my other pizza 'Christmas Tree Halt'. When I built my O9 Railcar a year or so ago, I had visions of it running on a layout depicting some sort of tramway leading to a small hotel or resort. To the rear of the scene is a small station at the non-business end of the line, this would have a slightly rustic look, think Groudle Glen or Eaton Hall. Next to this is the ominpresent Port Wynnstay hut and behind both trees on the left give way to more non-descript shrubbery that extends behind the station building.

Around the other side of the trees the land rises, there is a tunnel but this may be a miniature railway folly built for effect rather than burrowing fully under higher ground. More bushes hide a bit of a perspective trick, the hotel/resort represented in the background at a smaller scale.

Next I mocked-up something based on the original sketch I made that started this project, a simple scheme featuring a garage-style building and large tree, adding in some additional trees to the back right corner for balance. The Motor Rail looks quite at home, borrowing the railcar's luggage trailer for this posed shot. It ought to be possible for it to have a couple of suitable 8-seater passenger carriages to haul in this scenario...

An observer commented that this was like a mini 'Bellfield Hall' (a pioneering circular O9 estate railway layout). That led me to develop a third mock-up, based on a plan I published here on the blog back in 2021 (Pizza Ponderings - Fresh Toppings) which is even closer to the estate theme. The main deviation from the original is to mirror-image the plan it to better suit the baseboard. 

The high baseboard edge at the back-right corner would have to be lowered to accommodate the road but this does seem to fit. The original concept was to fit a road vehicle in parked against the wall, I subsequently tried this and there was room to spare. Nothing would be able to get past, but I suspect this is not a frequently used roadway.

The area of ground that was cut away inside the circle would be lost to the platform but there is still scope to drop the scenery on the outside a little below the board surface. The plan had another hut/shed behind the Port Wynnstay office (but no big tree) and there should still be space for something here and a good pile of junk. 

Plenty of food for thought...

Colin