What a lot of world that looks like! Always glad to see more space being added.
Each of the three tracks in the photo are waving around in a different way. The ones to the right might be straight, but are not level. And the tracks far right look like a rollercoaster. What is tamping and what else needs to be done (or not) to the tracks in the photos?
None of them have been surfaced at all yet. The two tracks with ballast still need to be lined and leveled, which is part of the tamping process. Tamping is where the ballast is forced around the ties to support the track evenly. They all will most likely need much more ballast to achieve the proper grade.
First, I will say that I enjoy following all of the blog posts on this site for the different projects that are going on. If I had a way out there, I would love to volunteer and assist on some of these projects.
It has been many years since I've been to the Museum, so I am trying to follow along by looking at google maps or bing maps to figure out where these new areas are at (Yard 13 and 14 for example).
Do you have any plans to update the map of the IRM grounds on the webpage? The one I could find on this site appears to be from 2009, and ends with yard #10 on the south end of the property.