[reposted from another thread] It seems to me, especially now that guard mode is a thing, that NPC programming should be "destination oriented", in other words, when a passenger spawns he is given a goal, say "Bletchley", and on that basis should make his way to the platform where the next train that calls at Bletchley is going to arrive, boards that train (with a ticket which should be for Bletchley on that day, except for a ~15% "invalid ticket" randomizer), and get off when he gets to Bletchley. From there he should head for the exit. This also would ensure empty depot moves, since all passengers will have reached their destinations and debarked by that point. To create station interest, passengers could be given a secondary objective, to visit the ticket counter or the coffee bar or whatever before heading to the platform.
Go one step further and on routes with branches or networks they will change trains to reach their destination. This isn't new tech as some of the strategy games with passenger transportation have/had that type of goal seeking algorithm years ago. DTG are part of a multi £million business/software group. They ought to be doing stuff like that in their sleep.
It just occurred to me that what I have proposed is sort of the philosophy of Simugraph, implemented in a rudimentary form.
