Transport Tycoon Forums

Raichase wrote:I found that too, hence why I stopped using it. Currently I'm using the freight to subsidise the passenger services, which is, surprise surprise, how the real railways did it (in NSW, Australia at least)! Until they privatised the freight, and now the passenger services are a giant drain on the state budget...

... and of course the transport tycoons who assumed the freight services most probably got a subsidy and a tax holiday as rewards for taking them off the government's hands.

Much the same as in the US. Passenger service was a expensive and sparsely provided for as possible unless it was catering to the wealthy business owners, of whom would be wooed to employ the railway's freight shipping services. Railways only maintained passenger services by federal law, and was largely unprofitable. This was partially sweetened with government contracts to transport mail. With the rise of long-distance automobile travel in the 1930s and air travel in the 1950s, passenger rail service became such a huge drain that railroads were constantly selling to or merging with competitors to try to stay afloat. Eventually the US government took the responsibility of passenger service as part of a forced nationwide consolidation of carriers, and eventually the remaining railroads recovered, now focusing on freight services. The Northeast Corridor connecting Washington, D.C. to New York, Pennsylvania and Boston has been the only area where passenger rail service has ever been popular due to the dense population and the relatively close distances between these major metropolitan areas. Los Angeles & San Diego, CA is the only other significant passenger rail service between major cities, but this one isn't managed by the federal government. All of those mentioned cities, and a few other such as Chicago and Atlanta, also run their own inner-city elevated or subway rail services.

Anyhow, I'll stop babbling now. Thank you again for the great screen shots!

kamnet, and thankYOU for the interesting post! That's one thing I've always loved about TT-forums, the sharing of ideas and experiences from all over the world. It's one thing to look this kind of stuff up on Google, it's another to read it written by an enthusiast who has an interest in what they're discussing. Thanks again, I hope I can keep delivering on my end!

EDIT: I've got a little "competition" going between two towns located on the line between Munich and Roshorst. Whichever town grows to be the largest will end up being the "express" stop between the aforementioned cities. They're both serviced by the mainline train (BR38) and a local shuttle between the two (BR75).
It's fun to mess with town councils.

If it's anything like my current game, what will happen is that your cities will grow right into each other, making it easy to place one major stop in-between, or they'll both grow equally and make it worth your time. I had each scenario happen to two different sets of cities.

Raichase wrote:EDIT: I've got a little "competition" going between two towns located on the line between Munich and Roshorst. Whichever town grows to be the largest will end up being the "express" stop between the aforementioned cities. They're both serviced by the mainline train (BR38) and a local shuttle between the two (BR75).

Isn't this where that Local Authority guy enters stage right while carrying a rather large brown manila envelope stuffed with cash in untraceable small denominations?

If only! I eventually had to admit defeat, it was 1930 and I wasn't making any money, at least not enough to build any new railway lines. Combine this with the game withholding any useful new industries, and it was getting not worth it! So I reloaded the map and started again...

Raichase wrote:So I reloaded the map and started again...

And here we all were waiting in vain for the Maya to do it when all along it was you wot done us in.
Are you going to start one of those early 18xx games or are you going to let the world ripen a bit before you join in?

wallyweb wrote:

Raichase wrote:So I reloaded the map and started again...

And here we all were waiting in vain for the Maya to do it when all along it was you wot done us in.
Are you going to start one of those early 18xx games or are you going to let the world ripen a bit before you join in?

The current DBXL only starts in 1920, so that's when my games begin. A little birdie tells me the next version will start in 1900, so we'll see how we go when that comes out!

I ended up having to junk the map, I started two new games on it, and both failed to take off. Another 30 map generations later, and I've settled onto a winner, and my company is turning a profit (thankfully the two "goods" trains are subsidising the entire networks infrastructure costs, so all passenger, grain, steel and iron ore profits are paying off running costs, loan interest, and new lines).