Does anybody now about the development of chatham mainline? I heard some talk about it I while back but now I can't find a mention of it anywhere? Thanks.
Not happening as far as I know. People talk about linking up Victoria on the London Commuter to Rochester on SEHS but it's just talk. Nothing official
Oh. That's a pity. I doubt it would be linked even if they did. They never linked ecw and bml. I never understood why dtg can't release a expansion pack when 2 routes share a terminus. Thanks.
These would be linked by a spur a few miles long which would come off the ECW at Lewes and join the BML just south of Wivelsfield. Very few trains (like maybe 2 a day) go from the BML to the ECW It's a pain in the neck and you end up with multiple timetables etc. In the case stated you'd have a BML timetable, an ECW one and a mixed one.
What I mean is you can't go down to Brighton from Victoria then hop on a train to Eastbourne. I know there's some messing about with time tables but it's a small price to pay for a better experience. And as you say if they was to add the stretch of track thru cooksbridge that would open up some aggregates services as well.
That's really only saving a few clicks. It's been discussed, but dismissed as fairly irrelevant compared to other things they COULD do Well they didn't put these services into BML at all because Joe focused on the passenger services... I disagree with that emphatically, but ah well I don't do their timetables
As long dtg is putting them self stones in their own ways with fantasy / a.i timetables, those extensions wont happen anyway. In tsw, a compatible service mod / timetable would be the most important thing for a merge / extension. Without that nobody makes the effort to go for a new timetable. In the case of bml a connection from wivelsfield would be the best part, but dtg would need to add tracks and a station.
Victoria to Eastbourne and/or Ore services go via the Wivelsfield branch from the BML to ECW all hours of the day... Couldn't imagine it being too much work, the branch just after Wivelsfield to Lewes is 9 miles of countryside with two very small, rural stations.
They said creating a timetable that links those together is a huge technical challenge. The game has to know if you have both routes or only one, etc. If they change the timetable in any way it can break the game too at least with merging two routes. Also, some routes are unable to be merged cuz of different eras. Dcz for example set in 2012 and dra more modern day. Rsn and rro don't really have trains that go from one end to the other at least in a forum post I read. Only freight goes the whole route. And other routes would need new track and stations which also takes away dev time
So basically it's worse than ts. If dtg was to make for example the sheerness branch line, which was released as a expansion for Kent High speed on ts, it would be a route of its own on tsw?
At least until they can get a seamless experience for a merged timetable if they were to merge. If it was possible, then rro and rsn would be merged already but it hasnt. Tsc doesn't have a timetable so there would be no like timetable issues. But yeah, for the time being, it would be a separate route. Tsw is more technologically complex so the extensions that are in tsc aren't possible yet. They are looking into building routes into like modules or something to allow extensions and stuff, but like it's gonna be some time to create them. The only person who could possibly merge routes and timetables is Joe lol.
So you missquote me missing out the part that would be required to fulfill your answer?!? Creating the route miles isn't the hard part...
Thing is, the game already knows what DLC you have, because it loads their prerequisites when the game loads, and this is being finessed as part of what they're doing with the DLC fix for PS5, so this "issue" becomes moot when they complete that work The timetables are something else that COULD be worked on depending on how they're built, and whether this can be automated. As I understand it from the timetable building vids they've put out these things are essentially manually created for the most part, or at least the start end and route are, with timings being automated for the most part Era is definitely a thing, and I would be interested to know if map tile swapping is a possibility, ie when you load the scenario and it has a timestamp in it could they swap out tiles to disclude certain things? Stations don't move all that much, nor does track, although specific layout and lineside assets do change over time, so where many of the stations are now is where they were 50 or 100 years ago for the most part and the track hasn't been moved 100 yards to the right (speaking for the UK in that, I'm sure there are places where stations and track have been moved over time) > Dcz for example set in 2012 and dra more modern day. Rsn and rro don't really have trains that go from one end to the other at least in a forum post I read. Only freight goes the whole route. What many people want is to be able to drive a train into a station, and then hop immediately (ie without loading screens) onto another train from that station going in a different direction, so they could drive one train in from RSN, park up, wander over to a different platform and then drive off onto RRO Probably not what they would do in real life, but in game people want that
Hopefully dtg will invest time into such projects. But not like tsc where route merges come a little to late.
Not sure why you say it's one of the most pointless things... The old Rochester station was on a side road cul-de-sac with difficult access, only a 32 space car park, no direct bus routes, and with two island platforms on brick viaducts couldn't be extended easily to allow for 12 car trains The new station is directly and easily accessible from a large car park, a main road with a dozen bus routes and all 3 platforms are 12 car or longer, it also provides direct access to all of the new housing developments going on north of the station The new station is also more tied to "Rochester" whereas the old one was more towards Chatham if you consider Rochester High Street's main drag is from the Castle to Star Hill, rather than from Star Hill eastwards
I'm not entirely sure why the car park matters. In a rural area where residents live 10 miles away from the station with no regular busses maybe, but Rochester? In this day and age where they are trying to get people to stop using their filthy cars in towns and take the train, ideally there shouldn't be a car park at all! The station where its situated now was the same brick viaduct that the old station is on? So rather than extend some platforms, let's demolish the station and build a new one because its more cost effective (not) and the residents in the new housing estates will be most pleased the station is a couple of hundred yards closer to them now. It was a 2 minute walk from the bus stop on the main road and around the same time to walk to the High St as it is now from the new station. If the station was originally in Chatham or strood I can understand moving it. But when they move a station within stones throw from the old one! Pointless.
Because the parking at that end of Rochester was awful anyway, because the main section of the city moved towards the castle in the hundred years the old station was in operation Which would mean having busses etc available, which weren't at the old location, but ARE now... On a section about half a mile further down where they could fit longer platforms on without hitting existing bridges and infrastructure... Don't know which bus stop you're talking about, but if it's the one at the bottom of Star Hill, it used to cause major hold ups. All the bus routes which used to run down High Street (east) no longer run that route as Medway Council closed that road off for busses leaving only local access for cars (stopping problems at the eastern end) As I said initially, 12 car trains... There's also the point of accessibility. The new station is fully wheelchair accessible which the old one wasn't
Just to be clear, it was not intentional to miss-quote yourself - and if I did, apologies. Indeed, but was just pointing out that, in theory, it's countryside as opposed to an urban area etc.
It was literally the line before the one you quoted Yeah, it's integrating timetables and making sure that there aren't conflicts in routing etc that are the hard parts
On the subject of integrating timetables etc, I've often wondered a potential way of having the Wivelsfield branch without all the hassle, could be taking advantage of the modular route style? What if the nine-mile branch, starting at Wivelsfield and ending obviously at Lewes, with Plumpton and Cooksbridge, was sold as standalone, effectively a mini route for a couple of quid. The London services would have to be added to the ECW timetable of course. While not exactly a perfect scenario, having to change TSW 2 three times if you want to drive between Victoria and Eastbourne, I'd rather have this than not at all.
My point is there shouldn't be a huge carpark at a station in a town. They should encourage people to leave the car at home. Every day I see people driving the 5 minute walk to their local train station. Its ridiculous! Faversham, Sittingbourne, Gillingham, chatham and many more stations where inaccessible to wheelchair users but are accessible now. They didn't have to move those stations. Chatham for instance is much further away from the town than Rochester and I don't see any calls to move that. There's 4 lines at the old Rochester station, remove 2 and there's plenty of room for platform extensions. The only real benefit I see was councillors and contractors filling their pockets whilst squandering billions of taxpayers money on something that wasn't needed.
Don't see a reason to do it like this. Make the extension either to the ECW or to the BML and add in a timetable to that DLC which includes the branch Or even better work out how to make dynamic timetables which would automatically terminate at the last available station (or portal out) if the forward DLC isn't on that machine
A question in my mind is why not just make a new timetable for the merged routes? I would happily pay 24.99 to merge 2 routes I own.
There's probably other more complicated technical reasons. Imagine paying that much just for a merge and a new timetable with no other content (lots of backlash). Also it does take out dev time since they are always making new dlc all the time. They have to find a person who is able to do that. Timetables take a few months. Until they figure out how to create a seamless experience or like a dynamic timetable like ARuscoe mentioned, it is what it is.
And the people living in those new developments can do that. Not many other places in Rochester can, mainly due to the town's structure. If they live up by the M2 bridges there are zero busses into town, given Medway Council's want to run everything via Chatham Faversham, Sittingbourne & Gillingham have had lifts installed for years to make all platforms accessible, leaving only boarding requiring assistance. Chatham is having the work done now to make it accessible. Those stations didn't need moving, Rochester would have needed major works Chatham is about 100 yards from the town centre, maybe 150 to the bus station. Not sure these are great points you're making on such a small issue overall They cannot remove the two additional lines... Its not that simple Medway council only made money from the sale of the land out front to form the new station front. The car park remains Medway Council land, and the station itself is up on the viaduct, so Network Rail land. And the total cost to move the station was £26 million, so not "squandering billions"
Well you no I only said its one of the most pointless things I've seen in My lifetime, I didn't ask you to start an argument over it lol. You have your opinion and I have mine. Its clear we are never gonna agree on anything. So that's the end of it.
I'm stating facts. You stated that billions were wasted and the councilors and contractors were reaping benefits. I think it's probably best left there indeed
