3rd Party Products
If you couldn't get your layout in one box, maybe two boxes was the next best thing. Creating that second box was the aim of these creative solutions. The whole Layout in a Box concept made the assumption that in most cases there wasn't room for a permanent layout. One major concern raised by that assumption was making set up, take down, and storage as easy as possible. These 3rd party solutions definitely addressed that issue. They also provided rudimentary landscaping which provided the basics of a creatively satisfying layout.
Tom Thumb Fold-Away Train Town
This was a third party product that was manufactured by
the Tom Thumb Train Town Corporation of Waterbury, Connecticut.
It was an ingenious system that allowed you to fold a 4x6 layout down to fit in a 2x3 box with the track left mounted
on it. It was prewired to provide power to the track via
spring contacts under the rails. This allowed track to be
removed at the joints of the layout and made it possible to
remove the track pins at the joints in the panels. In
order to accommodate the track on the panels that had to fold
inward, a small spacing panel was included at the joint of those
two panels. The panels when folded out do not appear
to have had any framework to hold them in place allowing the
addition of legs. Apparently the layout was designed
for floor use or on a table big enough to provide full support
for a 4x6 layout. The system provided hook ups for a wide
variety of accessories, including the talking station. The
station operated as designed provided
the direction of the train was clockwise.
Porto-Train-Pak
The
Porto-Train-Pak provided an open layout of 76 x 48 inches, a
little bigger than a 4 x 6 layout. From the advertising
illustration, it appears that the layout, which could be ordered
for either American Flyer or Lionel trains, provided good scenic
details. The ad notes "colorful landscaping decorated with
realistic earth for rough terrain, green grass, blue colored
lake, winding roads, track road bed and pine trees." The
two corners of the layout provided compartments for
transformers at either end of the layout. This, they
stressed, allowed both a father and son to operate their trains.
This would avoid the stereotypical scene of the father not
letting the son, for whom the trains were purchased, actually
operate the trains. They also noted that the layout was
wired for a second track as well as switch tracks, control
tracks and accessories. They even claimed that
accessories could be permanently installed. They
didn't mention that the height of the accessories would have to
be less than the combined height of the side pieces, which I
would estimate to be no more than 4 inches each. In
any case, it was a neat idea and when folded up provided
protection for the layout. (Illustration Courtesy of Lonny
Beno)