I usually drive german routes but I started london commuter today. It see to me that there is not a signal that alerts you of upcoming speed limits like in german routes; besides what I see in the pause menu I usually find myself overspeeding because speed signals are not preceded by anithing that alerts me. I'm doing something wrong? **Links removed by DTG Benjamin**
UK use route signalling instead of speed signalling in Germany. You need to know the speed limit of each route that will be taken. Unless you drive the route daily and learned all the speed limit, the Next Speed Limit HUD will be your best friend in UK route.
Often speed limits are found, next to railway switches on railway lines in England. When the train goes to the turn, it must slow down. How does the driver know that he will turn at the railway switch? I didn't notice any warning.
Look at speed boards for speed limits, watch the signals for authority of movement. Much simpler than Germany
With regards to junctions, there are a few different ways to alert the driver that they will be going across at the junction: 1. Approach Control: You will be checked down to a red signal. As you approach the red signal, it will ‘step up’ to a yellow/green with the junction indicator illuminated. Unfortunately, this is not implemented in the game so you will sometimes get no warning. 2. Flashing yellows: When you see flashing yellows, this means that the route is set for a diverging route. I.e. you will be going across the junction. The sequence is 2 flashing yellows then 1 flashing yellow then steady yellow at junction signal with junction indicator lit. You will get AWS warnings at the flashing yellow signals. This is implemented in the game on some junctions. For example, approaching Redhill in the down direction (going towards Reigate). 3. PRIs + Warning board: You will get a warning board accompanied with an AWS warning if either route is set to go across junction OR if junction is not set (signal is red). It is an upside down triangle with yellow outline and will have an arrow to note that it is a only applicable if going across the junction. You will also get a PRI indicator which shows an arrow in the direction that you will be going. With PRIs, you may also get them at flashing yellows if there are more than one possible diverging route that the flashing yellows are applicable for. A good example could be Redhill. You can get flashing yellows to take you onto p3 or p2. There isn’t a PRI indicator but this is sort of a typical example where you might get a PRI so you know in advance which platform you’ll be going to. 4. Splitting distant signals: Not even going to go into them as they are rare and difficult to explain. But there is one on the GWE just beyond West Drayton. For you to go across a junction with all green signals and no prior warning, the difference between the main route and diverging route must be no more than 10mph. For example, if main route is 60mph and diverging route is 50mph, you could do that in all greens without any prior warning. However, if the diverging route was 45mph, that is a 15mph difference and you would need to get one of the above 4. One thing you’ll notice leaving East Croydon in the Gatwick direction on the slow line is that speed is 50mph. On the reversible slow, it is 60mph. The junction before South Croydon to go from the up slow to the reversible slow is 40mph. I strongly suspect the reason for keeping the up slow at 50mph is so that you don’t have to be checked down to get across the junction as difference in speed is only 10mph. edit: I meant down slow to reversible slow. There’s no reason why that couldn’t be 60mph line speed as well is my point.
As stated, you either have to learn the route or use the HUD. Only issue with the latter in its current implementation is that it only shows the first upcoming restriction. So you can suddenly find yourself uncomfortably close to a much more severe restriction.
There's a good few videos on youtube that teach how to drive without using the HUD if that helps- I don't know about others but once you've learnt a route driving it actually becomes easier as you almost subconsciously accelerate and brake to the speed limit/stopping pattern just by using visual landmarks looking out the window.
