SMALL COMPOSITE LAYOUT

Composite design is the concept of bringing together several disparate scenes into one cohesive layout, based on their appeal to the builder. Whatever shape your layout takes, it’s likely to comprise a number of long, short straights and curves, and identifying suitable prototypes of similar orientation is a great place to start. This is a typical ‘OO’ gauge oval with two long straight sides, given over to a representation of Hargreaves Oil Terminal at Heckmondwyke and the British Road Services depot on Hunslet Lane, Leeds, opposite. There are three prototype-inspired curved sections: Thornton Viaduct (bottom left), terraced bridging also at Heckmondwyke (bottom right) and Marsh Lane cement works, Leeds (top right), with just one remaining fictitious corner designed to serve a rear fiddleyard and the Hunslet Lane Depot. All have been selected for their relevance to an oval design, but I have taken these in context of their compositional value; dropped board with raised track on the viaduct (left), raised board with track (below right) to provide an interesting yet contrasting balance, and so on. Please note that trackwork is a mixture of both sectional and flexible pieces.

Hargreaves Oil Terminal at Liversedge. BR closed the EX-LNWR ‘Leeds New Line’ from Bradley to Leeds in 1965/66 but retained a short stretch from Heckmondwyke to the oil terminal. It built a new spur to connect it to the EX-LYR Ravensthorpe branch and the line was used until the mid-1980s. This rake of wagons sits on the old ‘Leeds New Line’ formation, with another rake being shunted into the oil terminal. The wagons are considerably stained, and there is even discolouration on the storage tanks.