Patch: Drive-Through Road Vehicle Stops

[bobingabout]

about placing on existing road. how about making it only placeable on your own roads and town owned roads. liks i said, demolition of the station would by default behaviour turn it back to road if both ends are road tiles, and the owner should be yourself, unless both ends are owned by the town, in which case the road returns to town ownership.

that possable to do?

[mart3p]

I have a question: does AI build these new stops too?

No the AI doesn't build drive-through stops.

about placing on existing road. how about making it only placeable on your own roads and town owned roads. liks i said, demolition of the station would by default behaviour turn it back to road if both ends are road tiles, and the owner should be yourself, unless both ends are owned by the town, in which case the road returns to town ownership.

that possable to do?

It might be possible, but I think it would have to cost more than building on roads you already own.

One problem is, this could be used to gain possesion of town-owned roads. Build three stops in a row, remove the middle one, the road remaining is now yours. You can then remove the other stops and because you now own the road on one side of them, these roads now becomes yours.

[bobingabout]

i kinda see your point...

anyway to remember that it WAS town owned to return it back afterwards?

[mart3p]

Even if there is room in the map array for the additional data required (which I doubt), I think the addition code required to implement this, would add a lot of complexity for little benefit.

[richk67]

mart3p... looks awesome. Please let me know here, or in the MiniIN thread when there is a patch you are happy for me to include. (ie. I would love this sooner than later... )

[mart3p]

Well thanks again richk.

As nobody has reported any bugs yet (apart form me ), I think it’s probably safe to presume that I haven’t broken anything major. If you're happy for it to go in that’s fine my me.

Please wait until I have finished the updated version (with build on slopes bug fixed and new graphics) and I will post a MiniIN compatible patch in the MiniIN thread in the next few days.

[R2]

Wow, that one really looks great. Some thoughts from me:

• I agree with bobingabout, you need to be able to build them stations over town-owned roads as well as on yours. It's a bit like with waypoints that are placed over existing tracks. Otherwise you would have to bomb half the city to get the chance of building it on your own roads. And even if you are "buying" the road tile in that way - what's the matter, why would anyone want to buy the whole city by that? Let's just have it first and fix that problem later, if it turns out to be one.
• I think - according to realism issues - the drive-through lorry station is not really needed. Yes it would improve handling of trucks, ob course, but I don't like it like this. It is great and needed for busses, but have you will hardly ever see something like that in a town - okay, trucks would then just park anywhere, but that's perhaps another problem. I really like the idea for busses, but don't like it for trucks.

But keep up the good work, this really is great and I can't wait to get it in the MiniIN!!! Any chance of having tram next?

[Ben_Robbins_]

This is a really cool feature, and it seems to work perfectly. Its makes buses such a good means of transport suddenly.

The only thing that i can spot with it that is strange, but doesnt really matter, is that viecles overtake if theres a long queue, and then shift sideways to share the same space, in the depot, with another viecle. This doesnt seem to block on coming veicles though, or anything other than how it looks, so it doesnt effect the game play at all.

If unsolveable that really doesnt matter

p.s. This made me think, would doing this to depots be an option as well?

<edit> (another visual observation) Ive just noticed that in the countryside in tropical climate, the station still has white lines. Would that be a posibilty to have removed?

[mart3p]

Otherwise you would have to bomb half the city to get the chance of building it on your own roads.

Well you don't have to bomb half the city, just one tile for each bus stop you want to build.

I think - according to realism issues - the drive-through lorry station is not really needed.

You don't have to use them.

But keep up the good work, this really is great

Thanks

Any chance of having tram next?

Have you read this page?

This is a really cool feature, and it seems to work perfectly. Its makes buses such a good means of transport suddenly.

Thanks for your comments Ben.

The only thing that i can spot with it that is strange, but doesnt really matter, is that viecles overtake if theres a long queue, and then shift sideways to share the same space

I know about the overtaking problem, this occurs when a vehicle has started overtaking shortly before it reaches the stop. To detect this and prevent it would be quite difficult. As you say it doesn't effect game play so I'm not too worried about it. Actually, I was quite amused to watch the maniac bus drivers racing each other into the stop.

(another visual observation) Ive just noticed that in the countryside in tropical climate, the station still has white lines. Would that be a posibilty to have removed?

Thanks for reporting this, I will looked into it straight away.

[richk67]

I wonder whether it would be possible to have two sets of owner-data embedded in the road tile? So you could *not* own the road, but own the bus stop on the road.

This would then allow the placing of bus stops without any destruction or change of ownership of the road; especially important if its a town owned road in a closed loop, with hostile or tolerant local authority, since you cannot clear the tile in those conditions.

To counter abuse, the road-owner cannot remove their own road if it is being used for another companie's bus stop. The bus stop owner can only remove the bus stop.

This effectively prevents any change of ownership of the road tile. Thoughts?

[comrade-max]

kinda like the remove waypoint button on rail but a wee bit different

[richk67]

kinda like the remove waypoint button on rail but a wee bit different

like adding a waypoint YOU own on ANOTHER players railway... yes

[mart3p]

wonder whether it would be possible to have two sets of owner-data embedded in the road tile? So you could *not* own the road, but own the bus stop on the road.

Even if there is room in the map array for the additional data required (which I doubt), I think the addition code required to implement this, would add a lot of complexity for little benefit..

But I am still considering this, if I can find away of implementing it without hacks and without loads of additional code.

[richk67]

Oops.... sorry didnt read the whole thread.

[mart3p]

Oops.... sorry didnt read the whole thread.

That’s ok richk, I’m having trouble keeping up with it myself.

(another visual observation) Ive just noticed that in the countryside in tropical climate, the station still has white lines. Would that be a posibilty to have removed?

Ben when you said "white lines" I immediately thought of graphic glitches! But I now realise you mean the dotted white line in the centre of the road. There are a number of other sprites that still have the white lines, even outside of towns in the tropical climate, such as bridges and tunnels, so I'm inclined to leave it rather than having to use special sprite combinations in this situation.

Anyway, in my experience of how they build roads in Africa, this is quite realistic (I was in Ethiopia for a while). You often see a nice new piece of tarmac with new white lines and pavements, that runs for a short distance, reverting back to the more usual unmarked pot-holed track at either end.

[R2]

Otherwise you would have to bomb half the city to get the chance of building it on your own roads.

Well you don't have to bomb half the city, just one tile for each bus stop you want to build.

Well but you normally aren't allowed to just destroy a tile in the middle of the town, so you need to destroy from the outskirts and by this way replacing all the city's streets - that's exactly what you wanted to prevent by letting ownership change when placing the station. But as this will practically due to the above reason be neccesary, let's make it the easy way and let ownership change OR - I would prefer that one - let stations build on city's roads (or on any road) without changing ownership at all. You are allowed to change opponents roads by building junctions - why not let stations to be build without changing ownership and just add the station to the road?
So, I agree with richk67:

This would then allow the placing of bus stops without any destruction or change of ownership of the road; especially important if its a town owned road in a closed loop, with hostile or tolerant local authority, since you cannot clear the tile in those conditions.

Ok?

I think - according to realism issues - the drive-through lorry station is not really needed.

You don't have to use them.

Touché - but I know I will use them once they are there just because they are more efficient - but I still don't like them

Any chance of having tram next?

Have you read this page?

Actually, that's where I came from to this tread... You were a bit vage though, I just wanted some more specific answer - you said you wanted the drive-thru-stations first and here they are - the question was if you will start working on it next...

[mart3p]

Well but you normally aren't allowed to just destroy a tile in the middle of the town, so you need to destroy from the outskirts...
[snip]
So, I agree with richk67:

As I said in answer to richk67:

But I am still considering this, if I can find away of implementing it without hacks and without loads of additional code.

Any chance of having tram next?

Have you read this page?

Actually, that's where I came from to this tread... You were a bit vage though, I just wanted some more specific answer - you said you wanted the drive-thru-stations first and here they are - the question was if you will start working on it next...

The relevant part is:

I'm certainly not going to start if someone else is already working on it.

There is an updated patch in the first post and a win32 exe in the second post. The build on slopes bug is fixed. Drive-through road stops now use custom graphics.

[Graphite]

I'm not all that familiar with the code behind it all, so I might just be talking gibberish here... does the info on who owned the road before really have to be stored in the map-array. I imagine a busstop has some extra data stored somewhere (like a name and the like), so why not add some extra information to that. The moment you build a stop, one field of it gets set to the previous owner of the road. Then when someone demolishes the stop, it checks that field and replaces it with a road owned by the stored owner. Though I guess it might add that field to all stations everywhere if they all use the exact same structure. Still easier on the memory than adding it to the map-array though.

[mart3p]

Graphite: you are right, the tile's original owner could be stored with the station data, I must admit I hadn't considered that. Thanks for your suggestion.

Having played with drive-through road stops quite a bit over the last few days, I'm even less sure that it's desirable to be able to build stops on a competitor's roads. It's generally better to build the stop alongside a road anyway (like a lay-by), otherwise all the traffic using the road has to pass through the stop and causes congestion.

Anyway, I have to make building on player owned roads (without removing them first) work first. I'm having a few difficulties with this at the moment. I have got it working except for when a problem occurs, such as the local authority not allowing the build. At the moment this leaves the road removed but no stop built. I'm still working on it...

[bobingabout]

I'm considereing "Middle of a City" i think you should be able to place it on town roads, but NOT competitors roads.