Geof says:

I’m not sure what you are asking but I’ll give it a shot. To actually put the track down on your table or bench work, you can go two ways:

Some like to put down foam or cork roadbed and then lay down track on it. The road bed raises the track to a realistic prototypical level but it involves more work (obviously). Some just use roadbed on the mainline track and leave the sidings and yards without. Either way looks good.

Others just glue or tack the track down directly to the table top. Gluing is slower simply because you have to wait for the it to dry before you can use your trains and if you change your mind on the track plan, you may damage the track when you try to move it.

Using nails or tacks work with or without roadbed but if you nail too hard you can actually pitch the rails inward and effect the track’s gauge which could cause derailments. Moving track later is a bit easier if you use nails but the out of scale nail heads between the rails spoil the realism unless you paint them black or brown. They also can rust if you are building in a damp area such as a cellar.

One thing to consider if you are building different levels of track is to make sure that the grade or steepness of your track isn’t too severe. What may seem like a easy little hill to run your track up and down may be too steep, limiting how much your locomotives can pull. Try out a test grade first with a few boxes or pieces of wood to get an idea how you want your track to look and then see how many cars your engines can haul before its wheels slip. Then run it in the opposite direction to check THAT grade effects since it is unlikely it will be exactly the same as the other. Curves on grades also impact how much your engines can haul. Generally speaking, when using identical grades, the one with the curve will always be harder to overcome when compared to a simple graded straight away.

Hope this helps

Geof