I love Anyrail (tried XtrkCAD and the free versions of the others - each one has its own problems), but have a few suggestions:

1) Set minimum parallel track distance. I think having this feature would make placement of parallel flex trach much easier.

2) Have the ability to "break" or split the track anywhere (except turnouts or crossovers, or similar). This would make insertion of turnouts after the fact quite a bit easier.

3) Create another way to do elevations (an optional alternate method). You know how you can "lock" heights? Well, what if you allowed the user to lock heights wherever they felt were key points on a plan, and then pressed a button to calculate the grades and intermediate heights for every point in between? It's sort of how it works now, but it's not quite the same.

4) Along with #3, if you float the cursor over a point on the track have the readout on the bottom of the frame also show the grade.

5) Easements and flex track. There is one feature oin XtrkCAD I do like, and that is the ability to just select "Sharp, Normal, or Broad" easements when connecting track. What if you had this as another option, and then when using flex track to make a connection, have the flex track turn red (or another color) like it does now when it has been bent too far. In other words, tie that alert to the desired easement for that connection.

If some of these have already been done then my apologies for not having found them yet!

  -Tony

Understood. Maybe my statement was misleading. Once a plan has had a grade implemented, then at any point you could, say, calculate the grade by taking a small distance from either side of that point. Just enough to get an approximate value.

No, I can see where that would even be impractical.

We could have a funtion that would generate an elevation drawing of the entire plan the way John Armstrong did in his layout books. That could be displayed on the same page as the layout, but maybe lower on the page.

I need to be more careful with my choice of words, sorry. What I meant to say in my last post was a "grade profile" drawing. It's very effective at showing in one glance how the entire layout is graded.

I hesitate to post an example out of one of my books because it is from a published document.

Ah, I found a link of an example. Look at what is called the "Elevation Profile" on Sheet 3 here

http://www.spshastaroute.com/layouts.html

Note that while it is called "Elevation" it is in fact a profile of the grade along the layout. I can send a detailed scan of another example privately if needed.

I have been experimenting with the Grade feature in AnyRail, and while it does seem to work, I believe it can be facilitated a bit differently along the lines of what I suggested earlier. Imagine this: designate one or more points along the layout for which you would like to "lock" to a particular height. Also designate the minimum clearance (distance) between graded track and the track below it. Press a button and have the grade(s) throughout the layout automatically calculated. Put in exception handlers to alert if either a maximum grade value or minimum vertical separation distance has been violated. This will allow the operator to adjust either the lock points or the maximum allowable grade and try again.

I have found with the way Grading works now that very often the minimum vertical separation is below NMRA standards, even if there is enough height identified in the selected point to go over a lower piece of track. If I missed some aspect of how to do this I'd be happy to imptove my method.

Thank you David. I have to say again how much I like this program. It is by far the easiest track design program I've used - that is worth using.

I'd be interested also in your opinion of my easement suggestion. I think that also might be quite useful.