Hobo bridge finished

Today I finished the little "hobo bridge" on the main line. Glued down the bridge track on top. It is Micro Engineering code 55 bridge track. The rest of the railroad is Peco code 55 - very different track as far as thickness. But a little fiddling and the Peco will be perfectly level with the bridge track when I install it. I could have run the Peco over the bridge but it would not look real. The Peco track is bullet proof and I like it. Once it is ballasted it looks great to my old eyes. Un-ballasted the ties are very thick. However, this gives the track and turnouts a robust structure.

So all that is left on this bridge is to solder on the electrical leads and add the hobos making dinner underneath. They will wait till later as little details have a strange attraction to my shop vacuum. Once the heavy scenery work is done they get to come out of storage and continue making dinner.

Another detail - once my "wet" work is done I will cover the styrofoam with a fascia made from Masonite. It will be cut to match the ground countour at the bridge. Still thinking about the color. I was going to try a semi gloss black for the fascia as it more or less disappears and sends the eye up onto the railroad. On a recent trip to Seattle I saw a layout with the fascia painted to match the ground color and it worked really well. But plenty of time to think about that.