Tandem placement and turning radius

Yes. That is 100% correct. I wrote ENTRANCE and EXIT on each gate. I tried to make that clear in the drawing.

Pulling straight ahead would definitely cause my trailer to track through the guard shack. You are correct, but I said that in the OP.

Well, i tried to draw the picture to scale as best as I could, but, of course, the picture is not exactly to scale. There might not have been enough forward space to "pull forward far enough to get straight again". I didn't exactly do it like you said that you would do. Let's say that the area I labeled "Grass" is to the South. The guard shack is to the North. The entrance is to the east. The exit is to the west. When i was driving forward to exit the drop lot, I tried to drive far enough to the South (and to the east) so that I would have room to clear the rear of the trailer from the guard shack, but there was not enough room. My interpretation of what you are saying that you would do is that you would pull far enough to the South and to the east to get the tractor straight with the trailer, and then back up enough to get the rear of the trailer far enough to the southwest to get back in the entrance. That might have or might not have worked. I don't know if there was enough space both to the south and to the east for that. It certainly would have had a better chance of success than what I initially did. If I ever return to this facility, I will definitely try it the way you are saying that you would do.

When I first tried this, I certainly knew that I needed to get the rear of the trailer far enough to the south and to the east to clear the guard shack, but I tried to do it all in one U-turn without backing up at all.

 

Westrock in Stevenson, AL

 

I believe that there are multiple guardshacks with multiple drop lots at Westrock in Stevenson. That might or might not be a photograph of the guard shack I was at. One difference between the scenario in that photograph and the scenario i was in is that there were multiple trucks in line farther to the east than the one parked bobtail tractor in that photograph.

 

There was a long line of tractor-trailers much farther to the east when I was doing my U-turn.

 

lol----There was far less than 100 yards to the South, let alone an EXTRA 100 yards to the South. I used my space on this U-turn as much as possible. You were not there. You don't know where the trucks were.