Why are these towns not growing?

[sjiveru]

Running JGRPP with day length factor set to 7 and a significantly increased station catchment radius; the below three towns (and some others on this map) are described in their city panels as 'not growing':

Screenshot 2023-01-30 115629.png

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It's not at all clear to me why.

- Every building in each town is in its station catchment radius, and each station is entirely within its town's jurisdiction
- There is a decent volume of passengers flowing - the city panels report 53 out of 75, 64 out of 93, and 44 out of 55 transported last month, respectively, and trains arrive roughly every 25 days
- Other towns with apparently identical situations are reporting growth

To be clear, I'm not asking for how to maximise growth; I'm content with the amount generated by one decently-well-served station only handling passengers. I just want nonzero growth, which I'm not getting.

[kamnet]

Uploading a save may be more helpful in diagnosing your issue.

[sjiveru]

Here is a save!

Pilkington & Co., 1908-12-11.sav

(591.4 KiB) Downloaded 38 times

[Argus]

There are more smaller towns that are not growing along that line, and there are ITL houses, I would direct the question to the author of the given newgrf... Try to deliver food to them or arrange transportation other than train... In general, if there are ITL houses, it seems to me that it is stricter on the growth of cities, and cities require not only the transport of mail and passengers, but also the transport of food and goods.

[sjiveru]

That seems like an odd solution to me, given that other cities are growing - unless the issue is the proportion of houses from which GRFs?

[Argus]

Maybe. Satisfaction with the company also plays a role. In addition, I have the impression that they like variety more, i.e. more types of personal transport, for example. There are only trains in this game, no ships, cars or planes. But these are just guesses, it is best to simply try the proposed ones and possibly ask the ITL Houses author directly.

[Argus]

Another thing is that the day length factor is at seven and the growth of cities is extremely slow, that can affect things as well.

[sjiveru]

I still see other cities reporting things like 'grows every 800-someodd days'; these just report 'town not growing'.

[Argus]

And have you tried to transport something other than passengers and mail there? Or help the trains by bus? These things will often help.

[sjiveru]

Not yet; I'm only really interested in a passenger-train-only game. I did rebuild the line with the stations closer, and for two of the three towns it helped - but I'm still confused by why the last one isn't growing, since I can't imagine placing the station any closer!

Screenshot 2023-02-01 142703.png

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It seems like there's some kind of 'station closeness' measure that's not visible or described anywhere, which is annoying. How do I find out if a station is close enough without just running the line a while?

[sjiveru]

Here's a much clearer comparison:

Screenshot 2023-02-01 145435.png

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Two towns, with identical service frequencies and identical placement of stations relative to the town center tile, with both having nearly identical ratios of passengers transported to max possible, but one is growing and the other isn't. The only difference is the mix of house GRFs, apparently - the growing one is ITL houses + Japan Set; the non-growing one is ITL houses + North American Buildings.

Not sure if that explains anything, given that I have other cities with a mix of all three that are both growing and not growing.

[Argus]

Do you also follow the popularity of the company in the city? This is often a clue. I would also try to increase the range of the station in the settings. By the way, on the second screen, according to the green number of inhabitants, it is clear that the company is more popular in a growing city. The only thing I can think of is if the game doesn't expect some variety in transportation, or if people don't want to travel somewhere where the track doesn't currently lead... I play in a completely different style and I haven't experienced this much, but it's true that I like the growth of cities like this I don't notice. Hopefully someone else can give better advice.

[sjiveru]

The company rating is Very Good in the non-growing city and Excellent in the growing city, but as far as I've seen company ratings never get to Excellent in towns that don't grow. After any construction anger dies down, I can tell 100% whether a town is growing or not by whether the inhabitant number is green. (Larger towns where I've had to demolish things will grow even if the rating is relatively bad.)

Maybe that's the issue, though; there's somehow some cap on company rating that I don't understand that's impeding growth in some towns.

Also, the station catchment area setting is already increased to the highest it can go.

[Argus]

The only thing I can think of is if the game doesn't expect some variety in transportation, or if people don't want to travel somewhere where the track doesn't currently lead... I play in a completely different style and I haven't experienced this much, but it's true that I like the growth of cities like this I don't notice. Hopefully someone else can give better advice.
Sorry for the repetition, I edited in the meantime, so I'd rather add this part again

[Argus]

And now I managed to find a similar situation in my games. I tried to add another station to another part - here it was even a big city and even a local one with a neighboring city didn't help, but the new line led to a completely different place and it immediately started to develop... Perhaps adding a branch of the track leading elsewhere than so far will help. Because the local locomotive to the neighboring town really ran every day and didn't help. By the way, the city, which is not now final, also does not grow, although I also connected it to the old branch, and it must be added that in my game it is already a fast Shinkansen.

[sjiveru]

Interesting. Did you make a new line from that non-growing town directly, or just a new line to somewhere passengers from that town could access? If the second, it seems like the key is just 'expand the network', which seems relatively straightforward - though I will say multiple network expansions haven't helped those original towns to grow. If it's the first, that's a bit annoying; it seems absurd to make a hub out of a town with 80 people!

[Argus]

A new line from a non-growing city, but as I edited again above, the new final one does not grow again, even if it was connected to the old line. And that by Shinkansen. Of course, sometimes the city just takes a break from growing... Sometimes it doesn't grow and if I click after a while, it grows. However, this does not apply to the city, which is now the final point. It should be added that these are cities with over 500 inhabitants.
By the way, isn't it possible that the cities in question are just taking a nap when you check them?

[sjiveru]

I suppose it's possible, but in that uploaded save those medium-size towns I originally asked about have been failing to grow for nine years at this point!

[Argus]

In my experience, if the city is not growing, just add intercity transport, I have no experience playing with only trains. Moreover, as I already wrote, I really don't notice it that way. And as I see now, my situation was not quite the same, there was a tram in two growing cities... Unfortunately, I can't find an identical situation with my playstyle, maybe someone else can give better advice.

[sjiveru]

I appreciate the help nonetheless! At this point it feels like I've stumbled across a hidden bug or something in the game's growth check code; it just straight up doesn't seem to be behaving as described.