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Post by mikerice on Nov 14, 2018 13:56:06 GMT -6
Hi all,
I want to put this out there for discussion.
I'm considering that we try to focus on a specific area for locals instead of trying to cover the entire region. I'm leaning towards the LA area as I'm still fascinated by how much there is to do on the BNSF and UP. What this would mean is the traffic from outside the region would come into Barstow or West Colton, and then to La Mirada, LAJ, Prophry, City of Industry, Weeds, 4th Street, J Yard, etc.
The balance of traffic coming into Barstow and West Colton would be for destinations outside of the region.
This would mean that local operations would be paused in Bakersfield, Mojave, Barstow, Seligman Sub, Victorville and San Bernardino. Probably some others I'm not thinking of right now as well. I know this would be a big change, but right now we don't have enough folks with either interest or time to staff all of the locals we have. As we get more folks, then we could turn another area back on again.
Bottom line is I want to be able to have dispatching sessions at least 2 times per week, without flooding the yards.
Let me know what you think.
Thanks, Mike
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Post by survivorsean on Nov 14, 2018 17:36:19 GMT -6
Hi Mike:
While playing with Florida earlier this year, I came to the same conclusion as you.
Here is a suggestion you may find as a balance, and I may have mentioned this before, certainly on my channel if you didn't catch it.
What I did in Florida (actually I only simulated Sanford Sub) that basically either gave the option to allow people to switch it, or after a period of time would automatically revert. This works well especially in yards with setoffs. It allowed me and others to continue to focus on running mains, but not grind us to a halt if enough crews suddenly where not available. What is cool is if they want to work it the work is there, if they don't want to work it the work gets flipped over.
This is how it is setup. Any place there is a yard you can have a number of designated setoff tracks. If the yards are too big you can get creative and block your train at the origin yard such as BAR so that you have a bit more flexibility in the outcomes. For each yard track that has been designated for setoff create an industry. Put in the returning symbol or tags for each car type. The only disadvantage to this is how loads and empties flip. Basically the industry will accept any car type that is possible with the various tags of the industries you would expect in that area. What worked well for me is for Sanford I didn't build the trains so the trains they created were already blocked loads at front empties in the back. This allowed me to be specific on a track setoff for loads and 1 for empties. Bigger yards you could get even more created. Set a time factor of the max number of hours this can sit without needing to be ready for the next train from this yard.
So with that being said this is how it works. All industries can still be in play with cars in them. They will likely be ready if no locals are running but otherwise continue to act as if it was all paused. If an available local operator is looking to run a complete run, they can go ahead and take those cars if they are still not expired, and tagged for the industries. They simply bring back after the work is done and it's available in the yard for the next outbound. If however no local operator is available, after the set number of hours the loads become empties, the empties become loads, and everything tags. It works just like any other industry, and acts as an AI style of local operation to simulate traffic.
With all the various yards such as Bakersfield, Mojave, even LA, and others, you should have plenty of options to try this. You could even set up a priority system in the registry so that things that need to be worked are shown where as others that are more automated show up as available. They too can be set to expire after a certain amount of time, or reset by an admin.
Hope that helps, as it worked very well for my operations on Sanford before I gave up on it.
Thanks
Sean
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Post by Deleted on Nov 14, 2018 19:23:45 GMT -6
I use a version of what Sean's talking about for my single-player stuff.
What I did, though, was modify each industry's trackage to include yard tracks. For example, every industry served by the BK50, Saco Local, etc. has additional space in UP Bakersfield. I have 2 tracks in Bakersfield for inbound trains, and those tracks have at least a dozen industries assigned. They all overlap, so no matter where I park a train on the track or what industry it's for, the train will process just by sitting there. You'll get all the same outbound tags and car types. All my locals run this way: Mojave has a track, Boron has a track, Cadiz, Kaiser, Victorville.
Lately, I just haven't felt like switching Bakersfield at all, so if I run a WCBK, it processes, and when it releases, I just run it off the railroad as BKFR. Same for BAK. You could just as easily flip it back as a BKWC if you can ignore all the northbound cars you end up sending south.
Doing it this way means I didn't need to create any new industries, and all the traffic flows stay pretty much the same. Industry work remains available if someone wants to do it.
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Post by survivorsean on Nov 14, 2018 22:25:38 GMT -6
Never thought of that, I think that idea has even more potential. I think the example out on Cajon that 1 track that has 2 industries using it is a good example. As long as there isn't more than 1 industry with the same car type, that would work just as well.
Thanks
Sean
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Post by mikerice on Nov 14, 2018 22:35:42 GMT -6
Very interesting, thanks for sharing guys. I'm pretty comfortable with the overlapping industry concept as this is how the intermodal yards are setup at SRS. But hadn't thought of extending the industry to include yard tracks. Very cool idea.
Thanks, Mike
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Post by Deleted on Nov 15, 2018 7:21:35 GMT -6
It actually works no matter what the car types are. I think the game strictly uses the industry tag to figure out what car is for which industry and how to tag it outbound.
One caveat is that your in-game switch lists, when you bring those up by local, will look funny if I remember correctly. I remember checking that to see if the cars were processing correctly when I was testing it out and being very confused. I didn't think it was working until I just manipulated the in-game clock to see each industry releasing its cars according to their set processing timer. Now I just grab the train and look at Tagger to see how it's coming along, and I don't really use the switch lists.
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Post by daverice on Nov 16, 2018 19:31:27 GMT -6
I can support this approach...it would push me out of my comfort zone in Bakersfield and give me a chance to explore LA.
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Post by hawk777 on Nov 18, 2018 0:25:36 GMT -6
Interesting that you say there aren’t enough staff to run locals. To me, it feels as if, quite often, when I have some time for Run8, I look in the registry work list and it’s a hump or two, a handful of hostling jobs, and stuff that needs DS. Although, that having been said, the last time I ran a local (La Mirada) it took six hours and I don’t have that kind of time for Run8 very often!
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Post by mikerice on Nov 18, 2018 2:12:06 GMT -6
You hit on one of the things ChrisB and I discussed today. Let's unlock switches and put signals on restricting so locals that would normally require a dispatcher can be run between sessions. Another thing is all of the flat switching required in a yard where the local originates (La Mirada, Bakersfield, etc.). The classification yards (Barstow and West Colton) need to send cars in blocks by local/industry. At the local originating yard the blocks can be put in the proper sequence for the local to operate more efficiently.
Thanks for your comments hawk777, the work list changes frequently, but in general yes it's hump/trim and hostler jobs the show up most frequently on the work list.
MikeRice
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Post by daverice on Nov 18, 2018 10:03:46 GMT -6
I like the idea of running locals during non-dispatch hours which can be accomplished rather easily in the Bakersfield area with all the handthrows around BK and BAK. I've moved the LS906J (Buttonwillow Local) from BAK to Kern Junction several times just so someone can work the industries during non-dispatch times. If there's no objection, I'm going to open up the other Bakersfield locals to non-dispatch hours with instructions to use handthrows to navigate the mainlines, validate there are no mainline trains that might block your path and proceed at restricted speed at all times.
Dave
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Post by mikerice on Nov 18, 2018 10:20:13 GMT -6
No problem at all Dave, that's the direction I want to go. For any locals we can take this approach with, let's do it.
MikeRice
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Post by mikerice on Nov 19, 2018 11:22:12 GMT -6
So my conclusion on this is we will not modify the locals we are currently running. Instead we will reduce the Dispatcher requirements on most locals by unlocking switches and restricting signals to allow locals to run between operations sessions with dispatchers.
Thanks, MikeRice
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