Station layout for passengers

[Ruudjah]

The best station layout for usual stuff to load is by far the roro station with depot. A few advantages:
-It makes sure the mainline is never jammed when a station is overflowed with trains coming back
-cheap (only one platform needed up to ~500tons production
-doesnt use a lot of space

For passengers (pax), the same station layout works also, but with an unload platform. Trains then go into the depot empty. This way, pax dont wait useless in the depot untill the only depot is freed. No money is lost in inefficient (late) arrival. Especially pax are worth much less when delivered late.

As said, this layout works for about ~500 production. After that, the depot is going to be the bottleneck in handling the demand. Trains go in with about 60KMPH, and each train needs to go in and out. Doing more then ~500 will always result in too much inefficiencies. Therefore, a new platform (two) must be added. But then the orders do not work anymore! The orders need the "repair in depot" order to make sure the train is forced into depot.

How to built a station handling more then ~500 pax efficiently, _with_ using a depot?

[Timitry]

Did you try just leaving out the repair in depot order and just use 2 orders: unload at station x and then load at the same station x. If the train is finished unloading, i'd guess that it would start moving and then look how to get to the next station, which would be the same. If you have a one-way-exit signal before the station, it can only choose the way through the depot, which is what you want...

You could improve the whole thing by using path signals (you need a nightly for that)!

[FooBar]

My bet is that if you don't put in the depot order, the train turns round at the station, drives to the other end of the platform and then starts loading. When done loading, it finds itself lost because there's no direct route to the next station.

[Timitry]

No, it does work fine, at least as far as i have tested it

And this shows how you could do the whole thing with path signals:

[Ruudjah]

Thanks for your reply's! However, without going to the depot, they want to load (after unloading) to the station (logical). However, if the name of the station is north, and the engine of the train is south, they simply turn around. If the name is north, and the head north, they don't know what to do, and enter a depot, and it works.

The problem is: you cannot change the location of the name of the station. When built, you would need to rebuilt it, usually not feasible since you have stationwalked into town. Also situations exist where the pax arrive from south _and_ north.

Try it!

[Timitry]

Hm, that's weird, since it worked when i tested it. It seems like your trains are shorter than your platforms, maybe that is why.
You could try to turn the "Reversal of trains"-switch in the difficulty options to "only on end of tracks", if that does not break any other stations of yours. Then the trains can't just turn around and will go to the depot whatsoever.

[Eddi]

make sure you are using YAPF as pathfinder, that one considers turning around in depots as a legimite travel path, so trains should not get lost. also, you can fiddle around with the penalty for that (typically, this is 5000, so turning around in a depot is considered as a 50 tiles detour.

[ostlandr]

I like that design for a terminal station- going to have to try it.

I use that order scheme for passenger trains all the time. My usual orders are like this:

Go to A
Go to B
Go to A (no loading)
Go to depot

That keeps the passenger trains in good condition, which cuts down on breakdowns. And as you said, the passengers aren't stuck in the cars while the engine is in the shop.

[Ruudjah]

Again, thanks for thinking here with me. However, I play mostly on servers where I cannot use YAPF (yet), and other settings unable to change. We need to solve this with the current rules

The trains being shorter or evenly sized as the platforms, doesnt matter. Also: I sometimes modify this design to have trains it using as a drop station only (ie food or goods). Trains sizes may differ, and therefore the solution must be so that smaller pax trains work with the system, too. I know guys, I am making this a tough one! A few solutions not (yet?) feasible:

-Join depots (like stations)
-Use of a joined waypoint (requires much more space)

I like the YAPF solution though.

[Eddi]

what you mean is YAPP, which will be new in 0.7, YAPF is already included since 0.5

[Born Acorn]

Please make your initial image smaller or make it into a link, as it breaks the tables, thanks.