Garden trains - elevated or ground level?

The main decision when you start thinking about the garden railway is how you're going to build it. There are two main options here.

Option #1 - you build it at the ground level.

This is fairly simple - you just lay the track in the garden you have. The ground needs some preparation of course but this could be fairly simple as shown in this tutorial:

 

Seems easy - some digging, some crushed stones and it's ready!

Option #2 - you build it on an elevated structure

This requires a lot more effort. You can make it simpler by building "train lanes" from concrete blocks as shown in some videos but ideally you would raise the entire "world" as shown in this great documentary:

 

That is a lot more work and of course a much more significant investment.

Personally I like the "elevated world" idea very much. There are several reasons to go for it:

• you have your layout at a much more convenient level to work on it (no back problems)
• you have your layout at a much more convenient level to enjoy it (your parents' backs are important, too)
• the train is less likely to get kicked or hit with a ball by your children playing around
• you have more control of the greenery on your layout since the plants from the ground level do not easily spread there
• ...and so on

Unfortunately my funds, my time and my commitment, too, are rather limited. And on the other hand, I'd like to have some visible results as soon as possible. So this year, for my first attempt I'm going to be building at the ground level and I'll see how that works out. And in the next years... who knows..