OK, Here goes and its just my opinion for the little it's worth. If I wanted to build a model railroad or any other simulation involving mainly the physical world with all of it's geological wonders, I would choose something like N scale, No doubt you could depict many different things such as a mountainous or a forested area without the thing having to reach the 'sky' of your layout space. You could certainly build models of things such as a lift bridge over a canal without the thing having to be 8 foot long in order for the proportions to look correct.
HO is great, but here the natural world begins to get a lot larger in proportin to that same space that we can muster. Mountains need to be quite a bit higher to appear corrrect. Having said this, you can start to make proper use of something called forced perception to put the geology into a distant background. Then the thing looks somewhat normal. Trains, structures and so forth become the actors on a stage with the backdrop taking on a some what theatrical function. You can add N scale structures in the background to forc the impression of distance. In short your world gets actually bigger and more distant as it were. What I like about HO is that railroad like functions such as a decent sized yard can be depicted as you can certainly place more cars in a given space than in a larger scale. I suppose you could have an even bigger yard in N and have it look like something from a photo of the real thing. With S you are beginning to have to make an important decision. How much detail am I willing to have in my trains structures etc. I don't have a layout at present(I'm planning one for when I retire next year- -we will be relocating at that time), but at one time or other I have built items across the board scale wise. I enjoy building in S the most for one important reason. Again, unless you have a lot of space and a very high ceiling, you cant do what you did in smaller scales. But it is much easier to add an awful lot of those wonderful things we call details on an S scale item. Again you can add HO or eeven some N structures in the background, but to do that properly you need to add a bit of distance from your layout edge. O scale is known by many as the king of scales. Well it is sure bigger, but here again you have to push that backdrop a lot further back so that the trains in the front of a layout appear correct against a distant horizon. If detail is your thing then O certainly fits the bill on that one, but to operate a typical model railroad you need to have a barn sized structure to put it all in. But wait, if your goal is detail and scratchbuilding, then you can restrict youself to a much smaller project in the larger scales. Something on the order od an industrial scene or part of a coal mine operation. Man you can add every nut and bolt or every pully and wire. I don't know how others see this? I love trains and my hobby for years has been fossil collecting as well as model railroading. I sure saw a lot of neat places in my traves where trains ran into mountains and quarries and such. I always thought how can I put all of this in a layout. The answer for me has been you have to come to grips with what your goal is. I knew from the start that I would never have the space or money to build a diorama that looked like it belonged in the American Museum of Whatever. Do you want to produce an image from nature and restrict the detail or do you want to minimize that depiction of nature and produce high up close detail in your models. Remember, it is all fun! Right? Now don't get me wrong here There have been a lot of tinplate layouts where the other elements of the scene were done beautifully and make a wonderful setting for those great trains that we loved as children or as those who just love tinplate trains. Each has to do what he likes for himself. I like S scale because I can make things using my eyes and hands without using some ort of visual aid to see what I am doing.I shouldn't say that too loud as the level of detail that some people will accept requires that you use a magnifying glass to put it all there for them. You know who they are. Yes, the dreaded rivit counters. L.O.L. Well, again it depends on what you want to do. Thank goodness, we are not all alike. The world would be a boring place.I have been told by certain Hobby shop owners that we are in another era where people want to buy only ready made ite,s. They say that the sale of kits are down. I guess that makes us scratch/bashers even more of a minority. I treasure the old magazines that included the work of folks like Jack Work and others who could make something from basicly nothing. Remember those guys didn't have all the wonderful Plastruct or Evergreen to work with. That came later. Let's not forget those folks who enjoy the garden type railroads. They are a welcome part of the model railroad family as well. I realize not everyone will agree with my diatribe here, but I felt that it was a story worth telling. Well forgive me for giving everyone eye strain when they attempt to read all of this, but that is what I am about. That is why I belong to this group and treasure each and every post. It's somebody's experience that we get to share each and every time. 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