First, I would suggest trying to find a certain region or locale you would like to base it on. Not necessarily meaning it needs to be 100% prototypical, just to have some real place that influences your route. Also, not saying it has to be strictly based on a specific region or area, but having a prototypical influence will help. Pick an area on google maps, zoom in to street view, and just "drive around" for a while, take in the scenery, or find a cab ride on a train in your specific locale.
Second, I would try using more region specific assets. The crossbuck you have seems to be a builtin UK crossbuck. JR has crossbucks as well as a set of modern Safetran flashers and gates. UP8328 has a set of payware US and CAN WC Hayes gates on his site, reggiestrainz i believe. Another thing you could do would be to download all of the JR route dependency packs, these have a lot of good scenery items that aren't otherwise available on JR. Scoure the DLS and 3rd party sites for content.
Third, try to find influence in other extremely talented trainzers route building, kimo505, felix_g, sp9813, modeltrains, ekankal, roonthe (i believe is his name) knifeswitch, grogstop, and mezzoprezzo to name a few. Put their usernames in the advanced search and poke around on their posts, some of these guys aren't on the forums anymore, but sometimes if you search their posts, you can find them answering questions you may already have i.e. where is this or that asset.
Fourth, Don't be afraid to use assets made by or for foreign trainzers. Lots of useful assets can be found on foreign sites, especially ones from eastern europe. Just be careful on these sites, some can have some shady popups. trainzpremiumroutes actually has a page listing links to dozens of trainz asset sites from around the world. Check out those sites and see if there's anything you can use.
Lastly, for now, try messing around with different surveyor tools. Click on the advanced tabs for all the different surveyor tools, theres bound to be some things there you didn't know of.
Please excuse my rambling, its late.