Starting a Model Railroad

So after many years of reading model railroad magazines and procrastinating, I finally decided I wasn't getting any younger and I ought to get busy and build a model railroad layout - but what?

Givens:
- A roughly 9' x 9' space at the end of my basement office that was 'politically' acceptable, but could also eventually be expanded into a fairly large adjacent basement storage area.

- I want to start off with something that can be (mostly) completed in a reasonably short time (1-2 years).

- I don't want to have to spend an inordinate amount of money (or time) until I know I will be in it for the long haul.

My first thought was HO scale, since that was what my dad worked with back when I was a kid, but I couldn't see how I could do much in the space available. I then started looking at where N scale had gone over the years and was very intrigued. I could pack quite a bit into the area I have available. But then I started thinking about all of the track, turnouts, controls, locos, cars, structures - the $$$ would start adding up very quickly.

Then I ran across photos of Lance Mindhiem's beautiful work (http://www.lancemindheim.com/index.htm). I was absolutely mesmerized by what he was doing with a unique prototype and a very simple trackplan. I briefly considered trying this in N scale, but quickly realized I would go blind trying to scratchbuild the structures and scenery to get the look I wanted.

Shortly after, I ran across this website (http://www.the-gauge.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=46&t=169) of a gentleman named Kurt and some beautiful work he is doing on a similar layout in Germany - I was hooked. So here is the trackplan I have come up with.

Across the north end of the room a "mainline" comes out of the north wall at the west end and exits at the east end. This will provide access to a small staging area in the storage room, but could eventually be expanded to a continuous loop, or extended up to 16 ft. east of the staging yard. The remainder of the layout will have a half dozen warehouse type industries very similar to those in the above websites. I will only need a single CSX switcher and maybe a dozen cars or so at first. I plan to go to DCC and sound as soon as possible. Turnouts on the main shelf will be manually controlled, those in the staging area will have Tortoise machines. I expect that virtually all of the buildings will be scratchbuilt.I know, it's not terribly original, and frankly I plan to shamelessly copy a lot of what these other talented modelers are doing. But I've never scratchbuilt a model structure before and this seems like the best way to get started - copying from the masters. This will be a case where imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. I'm sure once I start getting the hang of it I'll be striking out more on my own ideas, but for now this seems like the most productive way to get started.

I'm actually a little behind with posting - I started contstruction of the layout around the last week of July. I'll be getting caught up over the next few days with some progress photos I took along the way.