The route through the canyon

With the basic bench work for the Palisade Canyon section of the layout in place I have been working on the track alignments.   Lots of experimenting here to get the optimal track grades, curve radius's and clearances in the area where the lines cross one another.  So far everything looks good with grade on the upper line staying under 1.4% and curve radius's on both lines at over 24".

With sub roadbed held temporarily in place with screws and the tracks and skewed bridge being held with clamps the tallest and longest cars are run through to check for clearances.

The back or upper track has been gaining elevation since Weso to get to the height where it could pass over the front track.  Ends up that it still came up about 1/8" short so some of the track on the Harney section is being pulled up and adjusted.

Creating a mock up of the upper line after is crosses over the lower line I could see that a solid earth right of way would block the view of the brass bridge.  The gray in this photo was photo shopped to simulate the fascia.

So what I am considering is having the area in front of the 200 ft brass bridge being a lower area and carrying the line across it with a viaduct bridge. To simulate this I again used photo shop.