I’ve been fighting with this one on and off for several months now. Last year I bought an MTH Ellicott Mills dry goods transfer warehouse and located it on the layout in a nice big spot between the rail lines and the highway. I scenicked the lots and roads around it but couldn’t decide how to create a lot for such a relatively large space.

Finally I decided I would first pour concrete pads for the trucks to back up on, and then make asphalt for the rest of the lot.

I started by marking the corners of the warehouse and then drew lines where I wanted the concrete lots to be.

I found some stuff at Scenic Express called Scale Concrete so I thought I’d give it a shot. Here are the tools you may need to do the concrete.

I used Woodland Scenics paving tape to outline the lots, and then masked off the areas around it with masking tape.

I then scooped a bunch of the Scale Concrete product into the masked area and spent a while with various tools spreading and smoothing it. Wetting your tools occasionally can help smooth the concrete, however it was difficult to get a really smooth surface over such a large area. It was not the most fun experience I’ve had, but came out ok.

About an hour after I poured I cut around the edge with an X-actoI knife and pulled up the masking tape. I came back after 24 hours and tried to sand it, and it was still damp! This stuff took at least 48 hours to dry but it was around 60 degrees in my basement so I’m sure that had an affect on it. I saw some flaws in it and figured that was like real life and let it go.

I then masked off the concrete pads and poured the asphalt lots around them using Woodland Scenics Smooth-It. You gotta work fast with Smooth-It. Once it starts to set up, it gets hard like a rock real fast and your tools get all messy. Smooth-It worked best when I kept it on the runny side.

After it dried, I again masked off the concrete and painted the white Smooth-It with Woodland Scenics Asphalt paint. In retrospect, it probably needed another coat but it’s a little late now.

I replaced the building, did some nearby landscaping, and put the thing to bed. It came out pretty nice and I learned some new techniques.