Model Railroading > Ballast For Freight yard.

What colors of ballast should I use in my yard? I am using light gray ballast on the main line.

Paul B
Canton, GA

I think it depends what area you're modeling. I looked at Roseville yard (Roseville, CA) and Bailey Yard (North Platt, NE) and one was almos Black-Grey (Roseville) while Bailey almost looked like dirt. Search for the yard location for your railroad in google maps and switch to satellite view and zoom in! It's pretty cool the resources we get with the web these days!

- tum

If I cannot find (or take) prototype photos, I would generally use a much darker ballast in the yard. Around Diesel service areas and especially fueling points, really pour on the dark wash to your ballast to represent grunge.

Remember, yards are generally not well groomed in the ballast department like mains. Some remote parts of the yard could be nearly devoid of ballast. Same could be said for small town, low traffic yards.

Cliff Rutherford
Grain Valley, MO

Some yards use the same ballast used on the mainlines. Others use smaller rock. The color is up to you. Sometimes it's more regional. The yards in the Southwest use dark grey ballast because it is mined within the Division. I've seen photos of foreign yards in the East with lighter, whiter rock.

Best bet, Google railroad yards and get some ideas.

Posted from Android

Pink, for the CNW.

-LD

In the steam days, yards and other secondary tracks (including passing sidings) were often ballasted with cinders from steam locos. Yes, it was black but contrary to how some folks model, it wasn't all black. Some of the cinder ballast lasted a few more years after steam locos had stopped providing cinders. The Wabash often used slag from steel mills on secondary lines.

Victor A. Baird
http://www.erstwhilepublications.com

Our town uses cinders from the Labadie power plant on the streets when it snows. The maintenance yard has a huge mountain of them. I brought home a 5 gallon bucket of them and screened them and use them in my yards. I model 1943.

Here's a couple of shots of yard tracks. The first is the WP in Oroville (Ca), where you can see a mixture of light and dark ballast. The second shot is the ready tracks at the SP/UP West Colton (Ca) roundhouse tracks. You can see the light colored ballast and the area is paved for ease of walking.-BMT

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Don't forget that plain dirt appears in lots of yards in various places due to years of neglect and ballast sinking in wet times , dust storms ,etc.

Do you have a date for that Oroville shot?

Might even want to simulate some water / mud as in this early Conrail Elkhart engine service area scene I took in the late 70s

THAT-L-DO

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Agree it varies with region but also era, working yards need safe footing for climbing on and off equipment so loose ballast is not a good idea. The lean years of the 70's seemed to have simply local dirt or fine base rock. Drainage was also a problem in many yards, the yard would not have neat ballast slopes but more like flat ground. Many yards had work areas with vehicle trails along the yard, but also less maintained storage areas.

TT Wrote:
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> Do you have a date for that Oroville shot?

September 1975.-BMT

Thanks guys, That's a lot of useful information.

Paul B
Canton, GA