Station ratings - old or NEW vehicles?
To LOAD or not to LOAD - make your trains pay well
Mixed trains! - make your trains work hard!
Avoid glutted stations/Airports
Stations with thousands of passengers...
Mousitis: Bill Gates' gift to the Universe...

- . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - Wycliffe, TV-series, BBC TV series . Chief Superintendent Charles Wycliffe; Chief Superintendant. 1 .
Wycliffe played by theatre actor Jack Shepherd (I), director, writer of plays. play, TV series, film, directed by, actor, Jack Shepherd, author. b .

Station ratings - old or NEW vehicles?
If you're happy with station ratings of 50...65% or so, skip this section!
But if you would like to transport MORE on your rails:

Station ratings depend on frequent visits. About 5-8 days after a vehicle has left, the ratings start to fall. Visits 4 times per month will usually keep ratings near to the maximum value. If fewer train visits, a 'piglet' truck is a cheap alternative.

But that maximum ratings value depends on the visiting VEHICLE. In the early game, most buses and ships have a maximum value of 80%.
Train engines vary a bit - 80 to 82%. Hovercrafts: over 90%!

But as some of you have noticed: after a few years your 80% station has become a 67% one, in spite of frequent visits, and maybe a 'piglet' truck/train loading all the time. WHY????

I've found the answer: The maximum rating depends on the AGE of the vehicles!
The 80 to 92% mentioned above is for THIS YEAR's vehicles. Last year's vehicles drop about 6 % points. After 5 years the vehicles' maximum rating stops at 67%, and does not fall further.

And for trains: The age of the LAST WAGON of each type is the deciding factor! The first 6 of your 7 coal wagons may be 10 years old, but the LAST one should be renewed each January.
Note: Engine SPEED also plays a part in the ratings, but not engine strength (hp). 128 km/h gives a few points more than 112 km/h.

So should one buy new vehicles each Happy New Year? That depends on the station - how much it produces, how valuable the transport is, etc.
New buses / mailvans / piglet trucks every 1 to 3 years - probably right if the industry or town is an important one.
New ships or planes every few years is probably too expensive. Use a piglet truck or bus instead, and renew that each year.

New last-wagons for your trains: this is relatively cheap, and demands less fuss to carry through, if you have a depot force once per round, at a point where the trains are relatively empty.
TTDPatch has a RENEW 'cheat' - taking all the fuss away.

- . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - Wycliffe, TV-series, BBC TV series . Chief Superintendent Charles Wycliffe; Chief Superintendant. 2 .
Wycliffe played by theatre actor Jack Shepherd, director, author of plays. play, TV series, film, directed by, actor, Jack Shepherd (I), writer. c .

To LOAD or not to LOAD - make your trains pay well

About 95% of other TT players whose games I've seen use mostly single-purpose trains, and set these to 'FULL LOAD' at the source station. This strategy is also used by your dear dear AS (Artificial Stupidity) opponents - it should have made you suspicious!!

Your payment per unit transported depends on the TIME it took. For bus or ship, this time is measured from the moment it filled up / went off.

For TRAINS: the time stamp is individual per wagon/carriage!
In a 7 wagon train, the LAST carriage to fill up is 'fresh', and pays the price you should be getting.
But the other 6 are stamped as older - maybe MUCH OLDER!

You can easily test this for yourself, in one of your games:
At a time when a LOADing train is almost full, save the game. Let the train go off, find out what it pays for the trip.
Restart from the save; let the train UNLOAD, wait 2 .. 3 days, then load up again, then go out at once. This time, your pay check is probably 30 .. 40% higher, for the same cargo!

The conclusion is plain: trains should NOT do 'FULL LOAD'!!!

Of course one likes one's trains to be reasonably full when they go - so do I. So what to replace 'FULL LOAD' with?

Calculate: What's the length of your trains' round trip, in days? How much cargo is produced in that time, at the ratings you expect to have? - How many wagons will that fill?
If the result is, say, 11 wagons: you will need 2 trains, 6 wagons each; - and maybe a piglet truck to keep the ratings up.
If your calculation is right, the 2 trains will go reasonably full. - What train A misses goes on train B.

One trick to help your ratings, and get some more onboard: Use more than 1 GOTO order: 'Goto A; Goto A; Goto B unload'. If your train is shorter than the station, this will make it turn around for the 2nd Goto.

This might be carried further:
'Goto A; Goto A; Goto A; Goto A; Goto A UNLOAD; Goto A; -- Goto B'.
For this to work, you could use "Trains reverse at stations..." in the difficulty settings; or, much better: a loop around the station track.
Note the 'Goto A UNLOAD' - before the last Goto A - to freshen the time-stamp for the whole trainful.

How about buses in towns? Buses will pay less, but work better to develop the town and increase your city ratings, if they go often, even with just a few passengers.
'FULL LOAD' is OK if your town stations are rather rich - but then you don't really need 'FULL LOAD'!

It's difficult to convince people not to 'FULL LOAD' their trains - they love to have their trains FULL when they go. One experiment I tried on another TTd player's gamesave:
He had a loop with too many goods trains, all with 'FULL LOAD' orders, and no depot FORCE (there were several depots on the loop).
I sent all trains to depot; reduced the number from 8 to 6 trains; exchanged the strong engine for a weaker cheaper one with better reliability (the trains were not heavy, and the tracks were flat).
And I changed the orders to plain 'Goto', and built a depot force once per round.
At the end of 1 year, 'my' 6 cheap trains had transported about the same amount as 'his' 8 strong trains the year before; but mine earned 40% more!
This in spite of my trains going EMPTY part of the time! Maybe 5 trains would have been enough.

In that experiment the rail loop was long enough, but over-stuffed. If your train loop is too short for the station's high production, you may have another problem.

- . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - Wycliffe, TV-series, BBC TV series . Chief Superintendent Charles Wycliffe; Chief Superintendant. 3 .
Wycliffe played by fine theatre actor Jack Shepherd, director, writer, plays. play, TV series, film, directed by, Jack Shepherd (I), author. b .

Mixed trains! - make your trains work hard!

My serious trains usually earn over 100000 £ - UK pounds - per year; even early in the game, and even without extreme use of MEGA stations: Because I use mixed trains, and no FULL LOAD - they're moving most of the time!

If you have learnt how to build extended or MEGA stations, You will have a number of stations with more than 1 resource. The most efficient way to exploit this is to use Mixed trains rather than single-purpose ones.

Example - 3 stations in a triangle:
A: Passengers, mail, WOOD; POWER STATION.
B: Passengers, mail, GOODS (sawmill/factory);
C: Passengers, mail, COAL; town large enough to accept GOODS.

rather than 3 separate lines: Wood A-B, Goods B-C, Coal C-A: try building a 1-way rail triangle loop A-B-C-A. Let ALL your trains have a little of each:
1..2 Coal wagons; 1..2 Wood; 1..2 Goods; 1..2 Passenger; 0..1 Mail.
7 to 9 wagons per train is OK, since some of them are always empty.

How many trains? Measure the length (days) of your triangle loop; Calculate how many wagons of each resource will be produced in that time, at the ratings you expect. Add up the wagons, rounding up a bit; divide by 7 or 8 or 9.

These mixed trains must not 'FULL LOAD', of course! Let them keep moving all the time, with just short stops at the 3 stations, and a depot-force once per round.

This scheme keeps up high ratings without using piglets, since each resource is train-visited frequently. Those passengers and mail - often a bother in standard stations - get a free ride on your industry trains. You get to develop all 3 towns just by adding passenger coaches and a few mail wagons to your trains. This might cost ONE extra train, but you get that back from the buses and piglet trucks you don't need to buy.

And the total number of train engines needed to move the Wood, Goods, Coal is lower than if you had built those 3 separate lines! The 3 separate lines would have given e.g. 6 short trains, 3 to 5 wagons. While the triangle project probably gives about 4 trains, length 8, for the same job + passengers, mail.

The example above looks too good? - I assure you, there are LOTS of opportunities like that on TT(d) maps. Look for good triangles in your games! Then build your MEGA stations and tracks to fit the situation.

. - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - Wycliffe, TV-series, BBC TV series . Chief Superintendent Charles Wycliffe; Chief Superintendant. 4 .
Wycliffe played by fine theatre actor Jack Shepherd, director, writer, plays. play, TV series, film, directed by, Jack Shepherd (I), author. c .

Avoid clogged stations/Airports
Bus and lorry stops and airports often have a traffic jam problem in TT - Especially when road vehicles cannot pass a broken-down one!
Cars pile up near each other, clogging roads and station entrances.

Airplanes circle over an airport, hoping for a chance to land. Remember: Airplanes spend most of their time on the ground, not in the air! And the Airport has only one runway!

Try to plan for no more than TWO - 2 - vehicles near a terminal at one time.

Road: make an extra bus/lorry station or two in the town; reroute the cars; spread the traffic!
Let one bus 'full load' at station A; the other at station B.

Air: same principle! - Look for new cities in which to add airports to the busiest (bus) station.

- . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - . - .

.

Stations with THOUSANDS of passengers / mail waiting: Example: In city Lillehammer, your small central bus station has amassed 1400 passengers! Buses are inadequate. The bus station is at an odd level, and difficult to extend out.
In old TTo: It's possible to delete the city's road squares if you place a rail over it first.
In TTd: Deleting the city's roads isn't so simple. You should have planned for this earlier, and reserved walk-tiles for future expansion.

So hop! destroy the bus stop; recreate it 1..3 tiles away, and maybe one level lower; repeat until your station is on a tile which is easy to extend out; but still reasonably central in the city.
Now extend the station out to neutral ground, and add a proper railway station and / or an Airport; maybe a dock?
Send trains / planes etc from other cities. You now have 3 to 4 different ways of getting those passengers out.

Few graphics? - see under Mousitis (painful mouse arm)
I have Mousitis in both arms, which stops me from editing too many pictures; Definition:
"Bill Gates' gift to the universe", or Mousitis, or Mouser's elbow:
Pains in the arm and elbow, usually caused by over-use of a MOUSE. Especially the DRAG, and the DOUBLE-CLICK - intensify the condition.

While in the Mouse and Man corner:
Last time i bought a mouse mat, the shopkeeper asked me:
"for a Computer mouse?"
If my drawing ability was better, I would illustrate with the following picture:
A cheerful mouse at the entrance to her hole, standing on a mat with "IBM" on it ... Can't one of you out there draw that picture for me?

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This page was tested on a 15" screen, full screen mode, in Netscape 4.7, and Opera 7

Last updated: stations.htm 2004-1001,0703,0607 ,0513, 0419,0410, 0213,0201,
2003-0106 (2001-0525 (2000-0508, 1999...)

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