The International Simutrans Forum

1930
The company Big Bucks Bus and Rail was founded with 500.000 in start funds. The major investors in the company were 18 local villages, to ensure growth and development in their region. The idea was that a new transport network would lead the region out of the dark 20's and into times of booming economical growth, and attracting more people to their small villages. All 15 towns had between 700 and 1500 living there, so growth was needed to prevent them from being abandoned.

The strategy of BBBR was to first connect the large northern cluster of cities by bus, before doing the same with the other two clusters. Then a rail network between the clusters will take care of the longer intercity transport. All this has to be done without ever putting the company in debt.

To ensure a rapid growth the region also demanded that a post service was up and running from the start.

Long-Term expectations from the owners:
Start building a p****enger and mail network

Some key numbers:
Largest 5 cites
Brentden    1507
Maliborough    1382
Appington    1185
Oldfield     956
Brentchester 931

Total inhabitants in region: 16 343

Pictures coming soon!

PAK 128 102,0

I like the idea that villages invested the company. It sounds so convincing. :)
One thing is that cities never shrink. I wished some fluctuation but ST is aiming to be
general and all 100% player input dependent so...

City stories were one of the best parts of the SimCity4 community. I look forward to see where you take this. :) (And welcome to the forum!)

Here is a picture of the map, as you see most of the cities are located in the northeast. At the same time two of the largest cities are located in the southwest. Conntecting them is going to be expensive, but important to max the growth of all the cites!

I'll try to post pictures regulary, is it possible to include them in between the text and not ads attachment? And which fileformat and quality is best?

Start of 1931
After one year of operation 13 of the villages were connected to the transportation network, and the region had seen a growth of 437 people (2,6%). Most of this was done by busses, but one major rail line was opened between Brentham and Springborough, but lack of money prevented this form carrying mail. Demanding a minimum load of 75% also made the train wait in the stations for some time, but helped keeping the costs down.

The strategy of connecting the closest cites first were of course not to welcomed by the majors of Appington and Brentden, being two of the largest villages the citizens there felt overlooked. The two villages in the southwest demanded that their cities soon should be connected to the other cites!

On the same time the company had used up almost all their cash, and still generated little profit. Only the last month gave a small profit of 140. Especially the post lines were losing money fast! In total the company lost almost 31k in the first year! At the same time several stations were crowded because of small busses. To solve this, the owners allowed the company to close down some of the smaller postal services for a period of time. By doing this money will be available to invest in larger busses, and hopefully generating some profit over the next year.

Expectations from the owners’ annual meeting:
Get a monthly profit! **URGENT**
Get Appington and Brentden connected.
Get the postal service up to normal standard when possible.

Key numbers:
Proceeds: 90196,54
Operational Profit: -30886,17

Traveled:   24184

41 lines (40 road and 1 rail)
17 RVg-KS 33
7 RVg-KS 45
1 RVg-KS 69
19 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck
1 RVg 2-3-0

5 largest cities:
Brendten      1507 (0)
Maliborough  1439 (+57)
Appington    1185 (0)
Brentchester  967 (+36)
Oldfield         966 (+10)

Total inhabitants in region: 16 780 (+437)

The two southern towns:
(http://img40.imageshack.us/img40/2424/southwest.jpg)

Start of 1932
The annual owners meeting of 1932 was a dramatic one, even though the company managed to deliver promising result both financially and on city growth. The company managed to get a profit of 23647, and no less than 50729 travels were conducted (both persons and mail. Most of the cities could also report of a increase in inhabitants. A surplus of 652 people (3,74%) made most of the majors happy. Most happy of them all were Al Harper, mayor in Brentham, a town which got 76 new people last year, thats 7% growth in one year! 

So why was it such a dramatic meeting? The biggest cause of unrest was the news that one of the company employees managed to withdraw 13580 from the company bank accounts before disapearing.* By writing false bills he was able to steal a sum equal to over half the profit. A heated discussion ended in that half the board had to be exchanged and new financial control systems being installed. As if this wasn’t enough, the mayors of Appington and Brendten demanded to see some returns on the money the villages had invested. This lead to a promise that a local bus service was to be established in the two villages during 1932.

In his speech to the owners the company director told about the successful upgrading of capacity last year, an upgrade which made the company able to move much more people each month. In this way the stations were less crowded and more people chose bus over car! He emphasized the urge to continue this the next year as well. He wanted to wait a bit longer to reopen the four mail lines which were closed last year, but ensured that the reopening of them, and fitting the train between Brentham and Springborugh with a mail wagon were important goals of the company

Expectations from the owners meeting:
Make a local bus-service in Appington and Brendten during 1932
Try to increase the yearly profit
Get the postal service up to normal standard when possible.

Key numbers:
Proceeds: 197494,28
Operational Profit: 23647,47

Traveled:   50729

37 lines (36 road and 1 rail) (+4 inactive mail lines)
12 RVg-KS 33 ( -5)
5 RVg-KS 45 (-2)
14 RVg-KS 69 (+13 (!) )
15 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (-4)
1 RVg 2-3-0

5 largest cities
Brendten      1507 (0)
Maliborough  1507 (+68)
Appington    1185 (0)
Brentham  1037 (+76)
Brentchester 1021 (+54)

Total inhabitants in region: 17 432 (+652)

The map of 1932:
(http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/1685/simscr09croped.jpg)

*To be honest: The missing money is actually my fault when I placed some rails out in nowhere by mistake, but hey, crime is a much more fun excuse :)

**Is there an easy way to post pictures? The screenshots are to big, and seems to be in to bad quality if I resize them enough to fit more than one picture per post.

*** Feel free to give feedback, questions and ideas.

You can upload images practically everywhere.

http://files.simutrans-germany.com/
http://imageshack.us/
http://photobucket.com/
http://tinypic.com/
http://www.picamatic.com/
...

How do I post them in the forum afterwords?

[img]http://vs.simutrans.com/remote_images/avatar.png[/img]

(http://vs.simutrans.com/remote_images/avatar.png)

Updated with some pictures!

Start of 1933
Before the annual owners meeting of 1933 there were many rumors about a new scandal in BBBR. Many still remembered the fraud of last year, and feared that something similar had happened again. But the meeting was a rather dull one, no scandals or controversy. This had been a year of consolidation and a small expansion. Even the mayors of the southwest were happy with the opening of a local line between their two villages. These villages even saw a small growth of 14 people last year. The happiest mayor of the all were of course the major of Maliborough, the new monument had led to an amazing growth of 463 people, making them the largest village of the all. This village alone had over 40% of the total growth of 1021 people, giving the region a total of 18453 inhabitants. Could they reach 20000 before the calendar turned to 1. Jan 1935?
(http://img30.imageshack.us/img30/6232/simscr13croped.jpg)
(The new statue of Malliborough)

The company leaders reported a steady operation, even though the new line in southwest meant that they only could net a profit of 19294, down over 4000 from last year. Even though more people were moving to region, the p****enger numbers increase by just less than 5000 or around 9%. There was a growing number of new buildings not longer covered by a stop or station. To ensure continued growth the mayors demanded that during the next year new stops and stations were built were needed!

(http://img42.imageshack.us/img42/9358/simscr16croped.jpg)
(Brentham is growing, but whats with all those roads?)

Expectations from the owners meeting:
Make sure the villages have adequate stop coverage.
Try to increase the yearly profit
Get the postal service up to normal standard when possible.
20000 people living in the region by 1.jan 1935

Key Numbers:
Proceeds: 203304,03
Operational Profit: 19294,43

Traveled:   55489

38 lines (37 road and 1 rail) (+4 inactive mail lines)
10 RVg-KS 33 ( -2)
3 RVg-KS 45 (-2)
14 RVg-KS 69 (0)
15 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (-4)
1 RVg 2-3-0

5 largest cities
Maliborough  1970 (+463)
Brendten      1514 (+7)
Appington    1192 (+7)
Brentham  1098 (+61)
Brentchester 1073 (+52)

Total inhabitants in region: 18 453 (+1021)

Don't now if anyone is reading and is interested, but here's a new update!

Start of 1934
This year was a slow year, not much new to report. A local bus line in Brentham opened - since the city got a new monument! This got Brentham up to over 1500 inhabitants. Beside that most of the revenue was used to buy new busses, in an atempt to get all p****engers quicker to and from Brentham Train Station. The situation is much better now, but there is an obvious need to get a railroad from Brentham to Springfield.

(http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/4696/simscr14croped.jpg)
(Blue is the two villages I want to connect, the green are the two towns all p****engers now have to travel to from the northern cluster.)

This would make transportation much easier and quicker. To finance this the owners meeting was presented with a new an ambitious plan:
- A wooden rail line form Brentham to Springfield (Around 30000)
- A New train with two Kei Kiha22 (28700 a piece)

The Directors wanted to finance this by doing three things:
- Exchanging the 1 RVg 2-3-0 with a double Kei Kiha22 (around 20 000)
- Selling most of the busses between Heppfield - Hillville - Brentham and some other (20 000-30 000)
- The rest is financed by loans

The discussion was high and loud, not going into debt was one of the important demands in the start! This meant that the villages moneys was even more at risk! The drop in profit the last two years gave even more reasons not to do this! In the end the company was allowed to do this, but the mayors demanded that this should be for as short period of time as possible!

Expectations from the owners meeting:
Build the new rail line as planned, but under strict financially control!
Increase the yearly profit *URGENT*
20000 by 1. jan 1935 (only 619 more needed!)
Get the postal service up to normal standard when possible.

Key Numbers:
Proceeds: 213524,39
Operational Profit: 17828,6

Traveled:  61392

39 lines (38 road and 1 rail) (+4 inactive mail lines)
10 RVg-KS 33 ( 0)
4 RVg-KS 45 (+1)
20 RVg-KS 69 (+6)
15 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (-4)
1 RVg 2-3-0

5 largest cities:
Maliborough  2082 (+112)
Brendten      1531 (+17)
Brentham  1520 (+422)
Appington    1204 (+12)
Brentchester 1112 (+39)

Total inhabitants in region: 19381

I've enjoyed reding it so far. And the topic has 248 views, so there seem to be some peope who read it.

But i don't really have proposals. Or some other clever answer.

Just wanted to say I've been following along too.  Please keep it going!

Start of 1935
The meeting started with a nervous crowd eager to hear the newest numbers, had the profit increased? Do we have over 20000 people in the region now? Is the company in debt, or did they manage to get in enough cash to end the year with money in the bank account? When the company CEO walked up on the podium, all eyes and ear were following him. He put up a big smile and started by saying: "Friends! I've got good news to you all! The Region now has 20427 people living here! This means that since we started with a dream five years ago, 4084 People have moved here... An increase in the population by 24,3%!" The crowed step up on their chairs and gave him a loud applause. "And we're no stopping there! Today I will present to you calculation that shows that this region could become much bigger in the years to come!" He then presented a graph showing different scenarios about how much the region would grow. In ten years the region could have between 30000 and 36500 inhabitants!

(http://img527.imageshack.us/img527/7494/growthc.jpg)
(expected population with 4, 5 and 6% growth)

He then continued to tell the regions mayors how great a success the new rail line had been! By opening it the profit increased by over 14000, with expectations that it would go even higher next year. Finally the company was starting to see a better economical foundation! The building cost had been a bit higher than expected. Since the owners meeting demanded that the company should try to stay out of debt, the board had decided to close down all postal service in the southern cluster. The new train type prevented that mail could be carried between the clusters in the near future, leaving the southern cluster isolated and out of profit. The board did promise that an alternative mail service should be opened in the south, with much lower capacity.

(http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/8796/simscr21croped.jpg)
(Brentham with a the expanded train station, and now three stops to cover the whole city)

The new rail line alters peoples travel pattern so now the transport network needs some capacity adjustments, so the next year will be a year without much new, but the board promised that they would work on new plans. The mayors of the south west, seeing their towns growing slower that the rest of the region, once more demanded that they should be connected to the rest of the region. One small bus line between the two villages wasn't enough for them anymore.

Expectations from the owners meeting:
Keep the villages growing!
Get some mailservice in the southern cluster!
Start to work on plans to connect the southwestern towns to the rest


Key Numbers:
Proceeds: 233669,67
Operational Profit: 32113

Traveled:  63869

35 lines (33 road and 2 rail) (+8 inactive mail lines)
10 RVg-KS 33 ( 0)
3 RVg-KS 45 (-1)
15 RVg-KS 69 (-5)
11 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (-4)
0 RVg 2-3-0 (-1)
2 (x2) Kei Kiha 22 (+2)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough  2180 (+98)
Brentham     1578 (+58)
Brendten      1537 (+6)
Oldfield        1514 (+421)
Appington    1207 (+3)

Total innhabitants: 20427 (+1046)

Second update in a short time, but hope to get some feedback on future strategy in this!

Start of 1936
After the last triumphant meeting, this year was much quitter. Not because it had been a bad years, it was just not so much new to announce. The profit had risen to almost 42000, the region saw 1425 new people coming. the almost 7% growth in population was a new record, after monuments were built in Brentton an Appingmouth. All in all a good year it was a good year, but with not much new. BBBR built some new bus stops, to ensure good coverage, opened a new post line covering all of the south cluster and bought some new busses to prevent crowed stations, but besides that there was not much new.

For the future the board presented three possible solutions for going southwest, all of the starting from Springborough:
alt A: Building a railroad directly to Brendten
alt B: Building a railroad to Brendten via Springden
alt C: Building a railroad to Springden, then set up a boat from there to Appington
The board comment that all these alternatives would be rather expensive. So it would still be some years before they could be realized. The reason for presenting them now was to get inputs on which alternative to choose.
(Hoping to get some feedback from all you experienced players on the ST-forum! Which alternative and maybe why you would go for it...)

(http://img188.imageshack.us/img188/9711/goingsouthwest.jpg)
(The three alterntives highlighted, red(pink?) is ship, purple, blue and dark red is railroad)

The next year was expected to be another quiet year. Some of the tows might get some new stops, and some other minor adjustment. There board also wanted to build up some capital, for the future railroad southwest.

Expectations from the board:
Keep the existing network working well
Continue working on the plans for going southwest
Start to save up some money for future investments.

Key Numbers:
Proceeds: 251747,33
Operational Profit: 41877,54

Traveled:  71560

37 lines (35 road and 2 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
10 RVg-KS 33 ( 0)
4 RVg-KS 45 (+2)
18 RVg-KS 69 (+3)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (+1)
2 (x2) Kei Kiha 22 (+2)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough  2317 (+137)
Brentham     1655 (+77)
Oldfield        1556 (+42)
Brendten      1541 (+4)
Appingmouth 1513 (+433)

Total innhabitants: 21852 (+1425)

I love the story. Keep going! ;D

Looks like I'm not good enough at storytelling :P.

The difficulty with the proposed rail routes is that they seem to cross very mountainous terrain: your trains will suffer a performance penalty (and will therefore be less efficient at transporting p****engers) as a result, and/or the line will be more expensive to construct and maintain. An alternative might be from Hillville through Ashmouth to Springden, then on to Brentden and Appington later.

In the meantime, a boat service might be very sensible, as boats require little infrastructure. A service could run from Springden to Appington and Brentden (the city could be linked from the docks to the town by a 'bus service). Springden could then be connected by rail with Hillville or Brentham.

There is allready a busservice between Brendten and Appington. (A demand from the majors of those two villages!)

Ahh, sorry, missed that: it was not clear on the map. Even so, however, there would be no harm in having boats serving both towns.

The question is if it is possible to make a profit on the boat without building the railroad from Springden to Brentham too.

Here is some key numbers:
Railroad from Brentham to Springden 30000+ (With wood) + a new station (5200)
Docks: 7500 each
Shipyard: 9000

And then the boat and train still is "missing"

Spingden is 847 people
Appington is 1216
Brendten 1541

There is also a House Ruins in the southwest.

I would say: train from Springborough to Springden, boat from Springden to Appington. The train might be slow due to mountaineous terrain, but that won't have any effect on the speedbonus. Boat is better because there is no infrastructure involved (as jamespetts already mentioned).

Connecting the House Ruins might be a good idea as this tends to generate more p****engers (Bus from Appington or Brentden?)

But whatever your company decides, I love to read the story.

airplanes! Who needs profit when you can be the envy of the nation!
(I am enjoying your story, so +1 support)

Asterix909,

welcome to the forums!

Welcome to the forum! The owners wouldn't allow me to do that... Far to expensive... Need to stick to the story!

Start of 1937
On the meeting of 1937 the CEO could report a steady operation. Profit increased some thousands, 10000 more traveled and everything is working well. The company was still working on the strategy for expanding southwest. Without concluding, they could report that the expansion would demand quite a big sum of money. The plan was to save up some money last year, but the demand for a bigger train between Springborough and Brentham took most of the profit. There was also some new busses which had to be bought to remain a good service. This means that the expansion will be delayed even longer, but the CEO said that they had little choice. Of course the southwestern mayors complained on this, but got little response from the rest.

The other important case at the meeting was the region growth, for the second year in a row growth exceeded even the most optimistic scenario. Maliboruogh and Springfield got new monuments, and 1357 moved to the region. Like last year the growth were over 6%. This means that the region had a growth in the last two years of almost 2800 people!

Key numbers
Proceeds: 272089
Operational Profit: 46349

Traveled:  82667

42 lines (40 road and 2 rail) (+4 inactive mail lines)
13 RVg-KS 33 (+3)
3 RVg-KS 45 (-1)
19 RVg-KS 69 (+1)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (0)
2 (x2 and x3) Kei Kiha 22 (+2)


5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough  2817 (+500)
Brentham     1729 (+74)
Oldfield        1590 (+34)
Appingmouth 1573 (+60)
Brentton      1551 (+50)

Total innhabitants: 23209 (+1357)

I'm gonna be away for the weekend, so no new updates for som days now...
feel free to comment and/or ask question though :)

This is cool as!!!

Hi Liefinge, I'm reading your stories too. I find them absorbing. One thing though, when you refer to town 'Majors' do you really mean 'Mayors"?

Keep 'em comming.

In 99.17.1 pak128, my ferries always suffer a deficit, even when they are full of p****engers. They are only profitable if used as shuttle services for other transport. I don't know if it is the same with 102.0.

I suggest the following: Connect Hillville to Ashmouth, then to Springden by bus. Then use ferry service to connect Appington to a dock near Ashmouth, and connect the dock to Ashmouth by bus. The idea is to use the shortest shipping distance, because ships are not profitable (in 99.17.1) and slower.

(http://i75.photobucket.com/albums/i285/keithorz/simutrans/20090524/Simusuggestion.png)

I enjoyed reading your story too :)

Colin: First of all, it's LeifInge, not LiefInge :) And yes, its MaYors not majors, HEHE, thanks to Microsorf Word for not correcting it... :p Anyway, thanks for the tip! I'll try to fix my old posts!

v813: Why bus? It's gonna be wuite expensive to build and pay for the upkeep of all those roads! I see your point with the ferry, but is it not possible to to earn money on them?

The problem is that I need to find a cheap way to do this, since they don't allow me to go into red :(

 Sorry for the typo on your name, put it down to big fingers or short sight LOL.(Incidentally I knew that it was spelt wrong when read my post after posting it, but I thought what the hell it's only one letter. But! not withstanding, once again SORRY>

I would never presume to corect someone elses spelling. This was a subject for discussion on the old forum and was considered a no no. Anyway who knows what mayors are called in other countries

After a great weekend as a leader on youth camp, here's a new update. I would love to get some feedback on the story. Do I tell enough? Is there some information you are missing? A presentation of the villages? More statistics? More pictures? Savegames?

Start of 1938
After two years of sensational growth, 1937 was a much worse year! 702 new people gave only a 3% growth. Luckily for the company directors the company profit increased to a record high 65000. In theory this should have meant lots of cash saved up, but most of the were used to buy new busses. Only 14500 were saved, leaving the account balance at around 26600. But these good news couldn’t prevent the mayors from beeing concerned about the reduced growth. There was a large discussion about the future strategy. Some wanted to focus on the existing network, while others wanted to start the long planned expansion southwest. Several options were discussed, but the mayor of Brentham were able to gather sufficient support for making his town a main hub and starting point for the expansion.

(http://img211.imageshack.us/img211/5583/simscr23croped.jpg)
Brentham is growing! With their new status as Hub, the trainstation is going to be crowded! Need to think of a new design for it.

The CEO was asked to present a plan based on this. From his suitcase, filled with alternative plans, he pulled up a plan with three parts:
- A railroad to Springden
- A boat from Springden to Appington
- Some new bus lines.
The plan in itself were popular, but there were some concerns about the financial part. This made the mayor decide that only the railroad should be built the next year, but with the future expansions in mind.

Expectations from the board:
Build railroad from Springden to Brendten
Watch the economy closely to prevent going into debt.
 
Key Numbers:
Proceeds: 301773,47
Operational Profit: 65023,46

Traveled:  93441

42 lines (40 road and 2 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
11 RVg-KS 33 (+3)
4 RVg-KS 45 (+1)
28 RVg-KS 69 (+9)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (0)
2 (x2 and x3) Kei Kiha 22 (+2)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough  2947 (+130)
Brentham     1795 (+66)
Oldfield        1638 (+48)
Appingmouth 1632 (+59)
Brentton      1612 (+61)

Total innhabitants: 23911 (+702)

Well done so far! As to feedback, more pictures might help to make your story more engaging. Glad that your network is going well!

Start of 1939
After some years with little new, finally the new railroad between Brentham and Springden was opened for service. Even though the train itself were able to make a profit,the increased maintenance cost cut the profit with almost 20000. This was of course disappointing, but the CEO made sure that this was expected. The new line wasn't a moneymaker, just yet, but with future expansion southwest the investment would pay off.

(http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/7978/simscr26croped.jpg)
The new town in the network, Springden. Need to build up some bus service, but didn't have enough money in 1938)[/]

(http://img177.imageshack.us/img177/96/simscr25croped.jpg)
(Brentham is starting to get the most important town in the network, The train station is not very beautiful, will try to do something with it some year soon)

For the second year in a row growth was rather slow, with 3% up to 24653 people. In order to increase growth more expansion was needed. Some of the mayors did also speak warmly about building railroads to exchange several the existing bus lines. The owners’ meeting asked that the CEO next year, on the company’s 10th anniversary, presented a vision for the future. They wanted different alternatives concerning the company strategy for the next five to ten years.

(http://img2.imageshack.us/img2/687/simscr28croped.jpg)
Finaly the network is starting to expand! When we get a ship from Springden to Appingmouth, then only two small villages is left.

Expectations from the board:
Continue to expand southwest, by building a ship line between Springden and Appington
Develop different alternative strategies to be presented next year.
Try to increase growth.

Key Numbers:
Proceeds: 308646,66
Operational Profit: 46429,36

Traveled:  98049

43 lines (40 road and 3 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
11 RVg-KS 33 (0)
4 RVg-KS 45 (0)
28 RVg-KS 69 (0)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (0)
3 (x1,x2 and x3) Kei Kiha 22 (+1)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough  3102 (+155)
Brentham     1876 (+81)
Appingmouth 1695 (+63)
Oldfield        1680 (+42)
Brentton      1680 (+68)

Total innhabitants: 24653 (+742)

As someone else mentioned, I think the more pictures you show, the better. They are not only entertaining but informative too.

I have some questions about your bus lines:
Do each of the cities have internal bus routes, with trans-city routes between them?
Do you run buses between just two cities, or do you string them? for example, if you have three cities, A, B, and C, do you have a bus line that goes A->B->C->A or do you have multiple lines A<->B, B<->C or A<->B, B<->C, C<->A?
Hopefully all that makes sense.

I am relatively new to the game, so I am curious how other people run their bus lines... I tend to run local circuits within each city (in a 'circle' within the city) then regional circuits in the A->B->C->A style, then larger circuits between regional circuits... I feel as though my lines are not very efficient though... buses fill up too early in the circuits.

Thanks for the feedback, i'll try to upload more pictures in my future posts. Feel free to request pictures of different things you want to see!

Let my try how the BBBR network is built up. I have in many ways three layers.
- First there is the local busses, I'm trying to have a local busnetwork to ensure that the whole village is covered stations. These lines offen have a maximum off 4 or 5 stops. If they get much bigger I'll split them. The layout is varying, either circular or linear, depending on the form of the city. In each city I got one Main Stop, which is the startingpoint for my next "layer" From the main stop I also have tourism and commute busses to nearby industries and attractions.

- Second I've got intercity buslines, I allways make these between two cities, never more than that. These goes between each city main stop. Like in the north I have these intercitylines, all moving people down to the regional hub, Springfield:
* Springfield - Hillfield
* Springfield - Heppfield
* Springfield - Brentchester
* Brentchester - Hillfield
* Hillfield - Maliborough
* Heppfield - Maliborough
Springfield and Springborough are the two regional hubs, serving an area each. Brentham does the same, but have on even more important role in my network.

- Third I have the main lines, these are offen railroads.  These are key lines which moves large numbers of people between regions. All these main lines meet in the main hub, in this case Brentham. At the moment I have two main lines:
* Brentham - Springfield
* Brentham - Springborough
When I continue the expansion southwest and also connect Ashmouth, then Brentham - Springden will be my third main line

When the region grows I'll might use several main hubs and regional hubs. There is a limit for how many people you can move through one station :)

Hope this overview were informative and answered your question.

One last tip is to rename all your line to the name of the destinations. Then it is so much quicker to find them keep a good overview! :)

Thanks for the info on your lines! I just went into one of my saves now and modified some of my lines to be more like yours... got to give it some time to see how it pans out though.

I'll also take a moment to mention that I really like how you handled that situation. I used to micromanage things hardcore, but recently started playing games a bit more hands off- and I find it to be much more fun.

In a game like Simutrans, when you accidentally place some track wasting a bunch of money, delete it and chalk it up to corporate scandal!
In a game like xcom, when your guy gets blasted and killed in an ambush, play it out, people are not invincible!
just letting things go with the flow even at your own expense because of mistakes or random luck tends to be so much more fun in its own way than controlling every last little detail and outcome.

Hi.

I just found this account and am following it with interest.

My experience with this game is limited to Pak64 and money is easy to make (in 1800 when I started). So my advice may not be relevant to your version and era.  But here goes.

Why not build a ship service to connect the two south west towns. 
-Port (and ship yard) in the most southerly part of the bay equal distant between Appington and Brentden. Add bus stop and sufficient buses to transport p****engers from both towns to/from the port. You have a bus route there already.
- Port on the coast half way between Springden and Ashmouth. So ferry has perfect east/west journey after headland off Brentden
- Ferry service between the two ports.
- Rail line directly north through easy terrain to Hillville. Hillville becomes the hub.
- latter, branch lines to Springden and Ashmouth.

My thought process was that this set up means no single journey has elements of both north & south travel (cancelling out income earning) , plus uses just two ports. It connects large numbers of long distance p****engers.

Sorry its a bit late, its the poor transport service down here in the south west you know.  Which ever way you go..perhaps you will connect us soon.

Asterix909: Cool that like my way of playing. There is of course some times when I reload. If i have an idea I'll save, try it and if it works really bad, then I'll reload. Anyway, having fun is always my main focus. Its not a goal for me to do everything perfect. 

Severous: Your idea is good, and to some excent it has allready been discused... It is company strategy to expand southwest by boat, but I can allready tell you that there is one major problem. More info will come in my next update.

Sorry to keep you waiting, but the next update is the 10th, so it will be long and important. (hopefully not too long, but there is much to say and celebrate)

what bus stop is that (with the yellow squiggles) and how is the non-adjacent stop sharing with the train station?

You can make non-adjacent stations/bus stops by building a continuous station and then deleting the parts in-between. You can completely cover an entire city with one stop by this method (so one station can cover a large city) meaning no problems of inner-city congestion/running buses etc. It's a cheat though :)

Ok. So I knew about the 'cheat' way to do it... I guess I was wondering if there was any other way, especially since in the pic, it appears he actuall has three stations placed (just noticed one, actually) and they are separated by a 4-way intersection... which means (****uming he did it like you say) he would need to have placed...3 extra station tiles then deleted them, and had two re-built on by NPC buildings.

B=npc building
S=station
+, -, | = roads

BSBB
S+--
B|BS
B|BS
B| S

All three of the stations are under one name... so he would have at one time had this:
X=temp station

XSBB
S+--
XXXS
B|BS
B| S

Oiy, good luck to the non-native English speakers reading the gibberish I just wrote - I barely understand what I'm saying! ;D


I occasionally use the 'cheat method' in order to put two stations with maybe a road between them under one name- or stations separated by landscape problems... But I've never done so to the extreme (what I'd label as maliciously).

The problem with using the separate stops as one station cheat is that you WON'T get the traffic and income from intra-city (within the same city) demand, so it's harder to make a profit, since intra-city transit in dense urban areas is one of the easiest ways to make money.

Actually the stops only need to be next to each other diagonally, so I haven't deleted a singel station :) No cheat, no building and deleting. Just placing them normaly...

Anyway, cool to have some discussion. I'll try to give you guys more to discuss with my next post. BBBR needs to take som strategic choices.

If you look really close, there is a "parking"-type bus stop between the rail platforms and the simple bus stop. 

Here comes, by far, my longest post ever on this forum, this year there were just too much to tell. I hope its not to overwhelming, and that you give me some feedback on the four different strategic areas. I promise you that I'll not make this a habit, and try to keep the post shorter than this one.

Start of 1940
This meeting was planned to be a huge celebration. There were two great things to celebrate: 10 years of operation and the completion of the southwestern expansion. A huge dinner was arranged with the finest food the region could offer.  Three local Chinese professional had been hired to launch a huge firework at midnight.

One after one the mayors arrived, by bus or train - most of them with huge, happy smiles. But slowly a rumor started to spread; something had gone wrong in the southwest! Suddenly a press conference was arranged, and a clearly concerned CEO arrived. Then the shocking news was told, new demands from the government lead to a crisis in the ship building industry. At the moment there were only two large ships available. Both ships had a prize over 200000, much more than the company was able to use in the nearest years. This meant that the final expansion southwest were delayed for several new years.

(http://img2.imageshack.us/img2/5133/expensiveferry.jpg)
(This one was the cheapest of the two :( )

After some critical question from the press, the CEO admitted that his staff had made a mistake, and promised to work hard to find the quickest possible solution. At the same time he pointed out that the company had several important and expensive challenges in the near future, so he said it was up to the owners to decide. At the meeting he planned to point out four strategic areas, and let the owners decide which strategy the company should follow.

When the owners meeting started the CEO decided to let the ship scandal rest until the announced scenario presentation. Instead he started to present where BBBR was after 10 years of operation, and pointed out three success stories:
- First he talked about Maliborough, once a small village with 1382 people living there, now it has three new monuments one Russian Church and 3590 people living there.  I 1939 they built a new monument and also provided a new church to the growing Russian minority. The church will surely provide lots of new tourist to the town in the future!

(http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/3990/maliborough1943.jpg)
(The graph shows the growth, it's easy to see when the three monuments were built. Also you can see the new Russian church

- The second success was the fact that during the last ten years over 705000 travels have been bought from BBBR in the first 10 years, growing from 24184 the first year, to 104282 in 1939.

(http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/4427/traveled19301939.jpg)

- And finally, the region has grown from a collection of small villages to a region which is growing larger every day.  9748 more people is living in the region now, than in 1930. From 16343 to 26091 gives a growth of 59,6% an average of 4,79% each year.

(http://img192.imageshack.us/img192/6223/population19301939.jpg)

He also told how 1939 had been a good year, with the highest number ever to come in one year, 1438, but at 5,83% it is over 1% lower than the record in percent. The operational profit was around 50000. Most of it was used to buy one new Kei Kiha on the line from Brentham to Springfield, increasing it to three. There were also some new local lines started, to ensure good coverage.

The CEO then started to focus on the future for the region and BBBR. He pointed out several challenges that had to be dealt with in the next decade:
-   The fact that not all cities in the  had a connection to the transport network, and the problem with the overpriced ships
-   The rapid population growth meaning that several of the bus stations get overcrowded on regularly basis. In the future some cities also might need a more efficient local service.
-   The need to renovate and upgrade the existing train stations, especially Brentham

(http://img192.imageshack.us/img192/3503/brenthamstation1940.jpg)

-   New technology means new demands from p****engers concerning travel time, so the trains and railroad tracks might need an upgrade to remain as profitable.
-   The need to increase profit to make money available for investments.

Based on this the CEO presented four strategic areas:

-   Expansion first, this means that the company should try to connect the remaining villages as quick as possible. This should be prioritized over investments on the existing network.
PROS: All villages in the region get to take part in the growth. More potential p****engers are brought into the network.
CONS: Some of the villages could be hard to connect to, making the price high.  Also the profit might not increase because of expensive maintenance.

-  Local focus, by focusing on giving every village in the network excellent coverage. At the same time the company can save up some money to future investments.
PROS:  maxing growth within the villages connected. Not too expensive, only time consuming.
CONS: The profit will not increase by much and some villages stay unconnected.

-   Renovation, upgrading existing lines and stations, in order to make especially the trains go faster and to start carrying mail. This also means that some of the stations get a facelift.
PROS: Faster transport means that more people can travel, and also more mail. It also ensures that the travelers continue to pay extra for speed.
CONS: The towns far away from the railroad will still need to use slow buses. None new villages get connected.

-   Railroad instead of buses, by building new railroads to replace some of the slow bus lines. One priority should perhaps be Springfield to Maliborough, but also building a line to the towns east for Brentham.
PROS: Profit might increase, possible to finance parts of it by selling buses. More people will be moved faster, and only have to wait at spacious train stations, instead of small bus stops.
CONS: Again, no new villages get connected by this. It would also be expensive, leaving little to other investments.

The CEO then challenged the owners to discuss what the company should focus on. After a heated debate, where the mayors of Appington and Brendten of course talked enthusiastic about the benefits of expansion, while the mayor of Maliborough wanted a new railroad to his town, the owners decided that they needed some more time. They also wanted some external consultants opinion. They therefore decided that the next years should be used to do only some minor adjustments, before the next year decided on a long-term plan.

Key Numbers:
Proceeds: 337398,66
Operational Profit: 50036,08

Traveled:  104282

47 lines (48 road and 3 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
11 RVg-KS 33 (0)
4 RVg-KS 45 (0)
27 RVg-KS 69 (-1)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (0)
3 (1 x1 and 2 x3) Kei Kiha 22 (+1)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough  3590 (+488)
Brentham     2293 (+417)
Appingmouth 1769 (+74)
Oldfield        1736 (+56)
Brentton      1714 (+34)

Total inhabitants: 26091 (+1438)

Very interesting! If you're looking for advice, you could do a lot worse than prioritise having a direct rail line between Oldfield and Malliborough.

Great post LeifInge!.  Must have taken a while to put that together.

Might an investment in old technology be allowed?  'Show obsolete too' in the shipyard ferry tab might reveal some cheaper options (it does on Pak64 which is all I have). Whilst the slow speed may reduce income per p****enger, on the ship journey, the additional p****engers will pay top dollar on the other legs on their onward journeys.  The smaller loads on earlier ferries may allow higher % loadings and be easier to deal with the fewer p****engers once they disembark and want alternative transport.

Go for profit..not town growth. Aim for vehicles 100% full on all legs of all journeys.  No worry about speed and quality. Fewer lines that force p****engers have longer convoluted journeys to get anywhere. Add capacity to existing routes if there is clearly a demand.  I found mail to be a big loss maker.

The mayor of Combuijs City (just outside the borders...) advises to build roads from Springden to Ashmouth and Brentden (unless you can find some old secondhand boat of course  ;)) to get every village growing. Profit and traffic growth will raise from then on.

Ah, lack of small ships strikes again :(

I would focus on consolidating a railroad backbone. No idea what you did with traffic, but it always keeps me from using buses. Might be different for you though ;)

Have you considered building a railroad to these 2 cities in the southwest? With a little bridge across the water (in the south where it is narrow)? You hae to invest in the rails of course, but you can use the train that already runs to uhmm.. Springden?! (the city at the eastern shore of that lake) and make it travel a bit longer.

One more about the cheating: If you build some adjacent stops and remove the middle ones so you get non adjacent but "combined" stops this is an usual method in simutrans. Might seem a bit awkward but there is no other way AFAIK.

If you use this method to spread one stop all aross a bigger city this is called cheating by some players (or maybe exploiting would be the correct term). However this isn't a big problem, you can adjust so many parameters (like starting money e.g.) that everyone plays it a little different anyway. And as long as you play alone you only cheat yourself.

 

I have not read past this quote yet, but I just want to say: long posts are not bad! I am really enjoying your story, so the longer the post, the more content it has which means more fun for me! ...ok, now to read the rest:-)

By the way, I would love to see a save... please? :)

If you continue adding villages to the network, you will increase p****enger loads. If your current capacity is near full, I'd suggest focusing on the renovation option. This will let you benefit from the added p****engers from any newly connected cities.

First of all, cool to see all the replies. Glad to see that there is some people reading this. Nice to get different ideas on how to go from here.

At the start of 1940 BBBR only had 2633 cash, so any investment(s) is a bit restricted by this, since the owners expect a surplus, at least at the end of each year....

Jamespetts: I think it could generate more profit if I get more people over on rails. But why Maliborough to Oldfield? It would take some years to get enough money to build it.

Severous: Took quite some time to get that post finished :) But my excellent excelsheet made it easier. Got the growth of all villages + the economy at the end of each year registered there. Of course it would be tempting to use old technology, but new goverment regulations make this impossible... So BBBR need to come up with a new solution! I'm just glad they discovered the problem before they built any docks. It is tempting to go for max profit, but in the long term the mayors expect that the region continue growing as much as possible.

Combuijs: Why roads? Wouldn't the maintaince be quite high, rails are more expensive to build, but profit vs. maintaince is much higher because of the speed and capacity.

VS: It really is a problem, there should be a smaller ship in this time period :( Traffic isn't a problem at the moment. Trafic density is set at 7, and I'm able to transport enough p****engers to keep the cars (mostly) away.

mobo: Building a southwestern railroad is an option, but if I do, then I need a new train as well. The one I have one barely is big enough for Brendten. Of course I could just let the stations be crowded, but that wouldn't be in the spirit of the game. The mayors don't like crowded stations.
About the station placement, as I've said before, all my stations are adjacent. There is no holes or deleted stations. I even try not to use parkinglots to much, I rather start a local line to make sure all the houses are covered. What might confuse some of you is perharps that I use one busstop and one postbox stop, since the combined stop isn't possible to build yet, and I try to have at leaste some post service. (Need to do something about is soon, since none of the train is carrying mail atm...)

Asterix909: Nice to hear that you like long posts, I'm just afraid to make the to long and boring without any progress.

VS (2): I'll got the save for each year except the start. I persume that start of 1940 is most interesting. Just tell me where and how to post it, and I'll try to get it out soon...

Asterix909 (2): Some parts of the network have more capacity, at least the busses are flexible - since I just can and another bus. The railroad backbone is more crowded, with little extra space.

Thanks for all the comments, please keep posting, and I'll try to give you the next update soon.

In that neighbouring country the central government pays for some of the roads, as it is in anybody's interest to have a connection between villages. The inhabitants then can cycle or drive to other villages. Where did your original roads come from? Who laid them? Well, that same institution can build additional roads to open up remaining villages.

In absolute sense roads are cheaper in maintenance. But when the villages are growing you get in capacity trouble, you need too many busses. So you have to build that railway connection in the end anyway (certainly in pak128). I guess the Brentham - Springden line is not doing too well at the moment in terms of profit. To boost that line you need to connect at least the South West as early as possible. The Springden - South West connection may start out with a loss, but an improved Brentham-Springden line will compensate.

But this is of course just a foreign mayor talking...

Saves - more or less like the images.

Pick your favourite.
http://files.simutrans-germany.com
http://www.esnips.com
http://www.rapidshare.com/
http://www.filehosting.org/
http://www.filefactory.com/
http://www.mediafire.com/
http://www.filehosting.com/
http://www.easy-share.com/
More: http://www.google.com/search?q=filehosting

Well, here is the savegame for 1940 :)

http://simutrans-germany.com/files/upload/1940.sve

Thanks!

I guess you decided to focus on moving people, because these industries are practically screaming for service. Too bad... you could have told the mayors additional funding would allow faster growth later :)

Anyway, forget what I said about rail backbone, you don't have (yet) anywhere near enough need for that. Rather you already have it. What is already built seems to be enough, in fact more of a future investment than used ****et. If you are "roleplaying", don't forget that tracks are made for denser traffic than the one train you currently have there. Don't let them nasty mayors push you into bankruptcy with dreams :D

Anyway, great! I like watching games like this, and learning from that.

this is a story about a savegame of simutrans pak 128?
 :o
wow, quite interesting!!!

VS: Some interesting observations, I'm aware of the lack of industryservice, but wanted to have growth in many cities from the start. Because I'm doing this as a story there is some choice which is different from a normal game, i think (hope) that the roleplay makes the story more interesting to follow :)

Based on your obeservations, what would, in your opinion, the next logical step? Going southwest? Expanding the railroad to Maliborough? Perharps just save up some cash?

Silver: Is pak 128 so rare? :) I've just always used it... hope you enjoy my story, nice to have one more reader.

If I took over the game right now, I would...

a) Save some cash, let the cities grow and maybe start moving some coal to power plant using already existing roads - the mine to the south maybe? I play in a very different style, first get some money-making industry chains and then start expanding a well-covered p****enger service, typically with train loops so that I don't have to care about p****ing. Actually, that brings me to the second point.

b) Think hard about bulldozing some of the not-yet-used mail stops which surely eat some money.

c) Weep about trains. An observation that is interesting to me (and I missed that at first sight) is that you treat trains like point to point connections. One connection, one train, one track.

First, that's rather suboptimal, you could do a lot better. Simply put one has vehicles which make money and infrastructure that loses money. So you want to maximize ratio of vehicle / (station & way). As short (straight) ways as possible, small stations, lots of vehicles. It works great with buses. Splitting the three coach trains might improve a lot rail & station usage and then, your stations will be unnecessarily long to hold them, so you could save something on that. I guess a hundred simu-euro each month. Not much, but if you had more stations - I'll get there in a moment. Introducing some places for p****ing on rails would be a must so that these many little trains can all go at once.

Secondly and mainly - you miss too much interconnectivity. You fanned out the rails, and wasted a lot of money by going straight to some places, while trains are (in my personal opinion) absolutely great for routes that connect lots of places. On the way to Springden you missed Hillville and Ashmouth, which could bring to network more p****engers and reduce number of buses needed there. Same for Springborough, you could have gone all the way to Oldfield. Actually looking at the map, there is a "strong axis" which might be a good idea to connect with train:
(http://vs.simutrans.com/remote_images/leif/leif05.png)

More possible ways to connect the cities here (http://vs.simutrans.com/remote_images/leif/), keep in mind that these are not city to city, but rather long lines or loops.

If you want to do that, reserve some land so that you can expand stations when the time comes...

Thanks for the advice, I see that we have quite a different playingstyle :) It would be fun to play the same map some time for like 15 years, just to compare what we do different.

I know that get as good coverage as possible perharps isn't the most profitable - but in this story I think it's most realistic.

Atm all post stops are used, but especcialy those in the southeast isn't very efficent. I want to keep them anyway... Hopefully it would help when I get a train carrying mail between Brentham and Springborough. Moving mail helps the villages grow.

When it comes to train, I do have a preference for using point to point. Might not be the smartest but I really dont like the issues of crowded stations, which I feel that a line with several stop easily gets. At the moment I see that the one train per line isn't very profitable, but as the villages grows, I plan to get more trains going. Hopefully it isn't to many years before I need to get another Kiha, and I will then split it into two sets. I also hope to buld railroads to more villages in the future, keeping Bretham as a main hub.

Conserning goods: It might be profitable - but the low village growth it gives makes it hard for the mayors to accept.

Hi LeifInge,

first of all it want to say that I like your story, I´ve downloaded 1940.sve to what can be done, atm I would say that your buses need to be modernised to keep profit, because of the raising speed of new vehicles.
I also would like play the game from the beginning to see would could be made with my style of playing out of this game. It would be nice if you could upload your very first savegame.
Continue with your good work.

Greets

Rohal

Hi Rohal, my first savegame is from 1931, but I'm not sure if I want to give all of them out. I kinda want this game to be the story of BBBR, with the roleplaying element. This means that the saves should be used mainly as a second source of information.

What I plan instead, and that I hope you will participate is to start a new thread were I will post a map, and let everyone start and see what they can do of it. I'll try to make that post after I've updated the story with the end of 1940.

UPDATE: Here is the Rogaland Challenge: http://forum.simutrans.com/index.php?topic=2384.0

Start of 1941
As predicted 1940 were a quiet year, not much new happened, except that the company started to buy some new, quicker and more expensive busses. One bus line was closed down to streamline the travel between Malliborough and Springfield. Until now the p****engers used different routes each way, causing many empty seats. With the closing of the line between Heppfield and Malliborough, the company was able to fill up the busses in both directions. By this it also became obvious that quite at lot of people is going from Malliborough to Springfield to use the railroad.

(http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/6263/1941twostops.jpg)
The circle of chaos, two stops both ways make the p****engers move to much in a cirle.

The CEO reported in his speech that it had been a good year. Almost 60000 in profit left the company with 13420 in cash after the purchases of the new busses. 10000 more travels made the new record 115472. The population continued to grow in the region, 843 new people is not as good as last year, with only 3,23% - The monuments is major people contributors and in 1940 the villages didn’t build any new one. While Malliborough by far is the largest village, Brentham were this year fastest grower, with 150 people.

In last year meeting the owners decided to use one year to decide the future strategy. This discussion did take up much of the meeting, and were quite interesting, but it became soon obvious that more railroads, trains and busses were the main focus of most of the majors. The pointed out that the growth of the villages demanded more capacity on the existing network. Both from Springfield and north towards Malliborough and east from Brenthan to Brentton the number of busses is getting quite high. The Mayors therefore decided that two new railroads should be built the next years, to move more people quicker. At the same time they hope that this would mean increased profit, by making people pay more for their tickets when the speed increased. The company was instructed by the owners to do the following the next years in the following order:

(http://img151.imageshack.us/img151/7251/1941newroutes.jpg)
(The two planed routes, the northern to Malliborough, and the eastern - with two optional ways to build it, one is shortest, the other include Heppcross)


1)   Expand the Brentham – Springfield railroad north to Malliborough. The new line should in the start use the existing train as an three stop line. In the future it has to be decided how this line could be served best.
2)   Build a new line from Brentham to Brentton, either direct or via Heppcross.

The owners also asked the board to look into the possibility to expand the Springden line southwest, and also to Ashmouth.

Key numbers:
Proceeds: 357164,09
Operational Profit: 59244,07
Cash: 13420,17

Traveled:  115472

46 lines (43 road and 3 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
9 RVg-KS 33 (-2)
4 RVg-KS 45 (0)
24 RVg-KS 69 (-3)
8 Gaz-4 (+8)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (0)
3 (1 x1 and 2 x3) Kei Kiha 22 (+1)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough  3719 (+129)
Brentham     2443 (+150)
Appingmouth 1828 (+59)
Brentton      1795 (+59)
Oldfield        1751 (+37)


Total inhabitants: 26934 (+843)

It is of course interesting and exciting read your story development, ¡¡¡Congratulations!!! ;)

I've got a question:
How did you start with all cities the same(ish) small size? No matter what I set my median city size to be, I get one HUGE city in comparison to the others.
Like suppose I set the median to be 1500; I will get a lot of cities ranging in size from 500-1000, and then one huge city with over 10000 population.

Asterix909: Starting new maps until I'm happy with the town sizes... The only way I know!
IMO there should be some how to set max and min size of town, I like them to be fairly same sized.

If I'm the CEO, I would plan to build another line from Brentham to Springden (That is for express line ;)). The rail you have built from Brentham to Springden could be used as a local line from Brentham to Hillville, and to Ashmouth.

BTW, great story ;D.

doh... ok. thanks:-)

It bugs me when I generate a map and get some really sweet city locations, but one city is like a mega-metropolis (in comparison to the others)...

I want to try a game like yours, with the goal of growing the region, but when I start with some already huge cities it is less interesting to me.

Start of 1942
It was quite an optimistic group of mayors which attended the annual owners meeting of 1942, after the big strategy debate last year, now everyone was eager to know how long the planning had come. When the CEO walked up on the podium, the crowd all listened carefully – what would he tell them this year?

He started by giving an overview of 1941. The numbers were rather ordinary with a people growth of 3,12% ( 839 people). This percentance of growth seems to be the normal, when no new monuments are built. (An increase in the growth up to 4% annual would in a five year periode mean 1000 more inhabitants, so an increased growth should be a goal.) The profit were around two thousand less than the year before, ending at 56921,39. But the CEO expected this to increase next year, because of the new investments done in the last months of 1941. The number of travels also increased to over 128000, around 13000 more than last year.

Then he started to talk about the new strategy. The company had this year started to calculate the price of the new railroad and also the potential for traffic. When it came to traffic the CEO pointed out that the Brentham – Springfield already transported around 1000 people each month. The bus service from Springfield to Hillfield and the one from Hillfield to Malliborough had around 700-800 p****engesrs each, indicating that many of the p****engers on the existing railroad traveled all the way to Malliborough. So a new railroad expansion would have to transport the same amount of people over the double distance. An investment between 100000 and 150000 would be necessary, to get sufficient capacity. Even though some could be financed by selling buses, the CEO recommended delaying the investment some years, while building up some capital (either in cash or in more busses) and getting an even higher number of travelers.

Then he continued to tell about a shocking discovery they did while working with the new lines. Several of the stations were so crowded that many people in several villages therefore choose not to go on their planned travels. When BBBR was started in 1930, several of the villages only needed one stop. This stop were used both for picking up p****engers from the town and for people just traveling through the village. While it work okay in the start, now these villages have grown and these stops is getting so crowded that many people choose not to travel.

(http://img155.imageshack.us/img155/7452/1942crowded.jpg)
Two of the crowded stations, note the high number of unhappy p****engers! New bus terminals will perhaps make them choose to use BBBR next time :)

To solve this, four bus terminals were established in the oustskirts of Malliborough, Hillfield, Heppcross and Brentton. The train station in Brentham was also expanded. Suddenly much more people were happy and wanted to travel – therefore the CEO recommended investing in more buses on some of the lines, instead of the planned expansions. This way, when the railroads are built, the buses can be sold to finance new trains.

(http://img211.imageshack.us/img211/1731/1942heppcrossterminal.jpg)
The new Bus Terminal of Heppcross.

Key numbers:
Proceeds: 374834,61
Operational Profit: 56921,39
Cash: 6184,17

Traveled:  128398

48 lines (45 road and 3 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
10 RVg-KS 33 (+1)
4 RVg-KS 45 (0)
23 RVg-KS 69 (-1)
15 Gaz-4 (+7)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (0)
3 (1 x1 and 2 x3) Kei Kiha 22 (+1)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough  3838 (+119)
Brentham     2573 (+130)
Appingmouth 1880 (+52)
Brentton      1855 (+60)
Oldfield        1782 (+31)

Total inhabitants: 27773 (+839)

This game is just geting more and more fun to play, so here's the second update of the day. Also just want to say that I'm amazed that there has been over 2000 views of this thread, WOW! Didn't expect that when I started this story...

Start of 1943
Once again it was time to sum up the year. The mayors were this year gathered in the town of Brentton.  The local Mayor was proud to show all the other mayors the new town monument, built in the memory of all the people working with the wiki.

(http://img81.imageshack.us/img81/6850/1943brentton.jpg)
The town of Brentton, with its new monunument, and the Bus Terminal

After the guided tour around the city, and a excellent dinner in the town hall, the CEO started his annual speech.  “Friends, the year of 1942 was a year to remember.  Several new records were made, let me show you!” He then presented a list over new records:
-   Highest annual profit: 62152,19 (Beating the old record by 130)

-      Largest proceed: 405715,64, first time over 400000.

-   Most people transported: 156558, for the first time over 150000(!) and almost 30000 more than last years

-   Highest growth in number: 1671 new people moved to the region. Also the third highest growth in percent.

-   Also two new cities crossed the 2000 people barrier, making it four in total

After presenting the list, the applause never seem to end. When it finally ended the CEO became serious: “In all these records, we also have one big challenge my friends: Brentham Train Station. The station is getting more and more crowded, and we’ve arrived at a point where there are no new p****engers to this station from Brentham. This effectively stalls all transport going out from the region second largest village! At the start of 1943 1400 people is waiting at Brentham Station, and half of them want to go to Springborough.”

(http://img81.imageshack.us/img81/7586/1943brentham.jpg)
The biggest problem for BBBR at the moment: to many people and not enough trains.

He then suggested expanding the line by buying one more Kiha, and having a two pairs of Kiha serving the line. This would expand the line capacity by around 300 per month, hopefully enough to lower the number of people waiting.
Seldom have there been less discussion about a proposal from the CEO. Of course someone pointed out that this would delay the expansion even further, but almost every one of the mayors quickly voted yes. The CEO ended the day by telling that three more bus terminals had been built in the south west, and only a few cities now was missing one.

Key numbers:
Proceeds: 405715,64
Operational Profit: 62152,19
Cash: 8542

Traveled:  156558

50 lines (47 road and 3 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
8 RVg-KS 33 (-2)
4 RVg-KS 45 (0)
23 RVg-KS 69 (-1)
20 Gaz-4 (-4)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (0)
3 (1 x1 and 2 x3) Kei Kiha 22 (+1)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough   3974 (+136)
Brentham      2660 (+87)
Brentton       2339 (+484)
Appingmouth 2326 (+446)
Oldfield        1812 (+30)

Total inhabitants: 29446 (+1671)

I'm reading this thread everytime I come to the forum and see it with updates :) Very nice and interesting.

A quick tip for those that were wanting cities of the same size: reduce the citysize in the map window when you start a new map -- then switch to public service to increase the sizes of them all to the size you want. If you make the initial sizes 100 or so, you should just basically get townhalls that you can then increase to whatever you want :)

Interesting! Had you thought of double-tracking your main line?

Hi

May I question the CEO on his understanding of customer satisfaction.

- Will adding more stops reduce or increase unhappiness?

Its my theory, as a new player, that a bigger catchment area means more p****engers.  Already facing overcrowding you will have more unhappy.

If they cant connect (Mainland to the two towns in South West) then they will have 'no route' angry faces irrespective of the length of wait.

Does anyone know if the first p****enger to arrive in a crowded station is the first to be transported away when suitable transport arrives?

Bigger catchment area for a single station means that all the p****engers that would travel between tiles within that station will not be available. The best, in a theoretically perfect map/world, would be to have each tile covered once, by a single-tile station. That way, you maximise the intra-city p****engers/mail. So even better would be to make the catchment size from 2 to 1 tile, and place stations even more frequently -- well, that's not actual advice, but it would work to get you more p****engers to transport.

I believe that's one of the reasons the default catchment was changed from 3 to 2 a while ago...

I had thought about it, but untill I started to build the Bus Termials, there wasn't enough p****engers. With the bus terminals the number of p****engers rapidly incre****ed, and I had little choice. The next update (coming soon) will show what consequenses it had.

The number of p****engers at Brentham is a challenge, and I might be forced to expand it. It also loos awfull, so thats another reason for doing it...

If the catchment area was set to 1, you'd have a station every 2 tiles :) Best way to attain "perfect" coverage would be to build all your transport underground, with coverage set to "0" (e.g. only the tile the station is on). The vertical effect of the coverage would then allow every tile on the map to have its own station...

Reply 80 (!) and still counting... Plan to play this game for a long time still, there is a lot more to do! It also becomes more and more fun to play! Hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy playing it! This post have some stuff for you guys to discuss.

Start of 1944
At the annual meeting of 1944, the CEO arrived with a big happy smile. 1943 had turned out to be a even bigger success than 1942. The increased capacity on the Brentham – Springborough line had turned out to come not a second to early, after a year there still is lots of p****engers waiting. At the same time the expansion didn’t have the expected effect on the crowd at Brentham Train Station. The result was that the people waiting for other lines increased, especially for Springfield.

(http://img410.imageshack.us/img410/4638/1944brenthamstation.jpg)
Still a lot of people is waiting at Brentham Station.

The CEO expressed concern about this, since all the p****engers waiting made the people of Brentham stay at home instead of traveling.  “In my opinion we need to solve this situation both on a short and long basis. We need to increase both the capacity on the connected lines and on the station if self.” He then suggested to immediately increase the capacity on the Springfield line with a forth Kiha, and using two sets of two Kihas. On a longer basis he expressed the need to renovate and expand Brentham Station. “We need to prepare our most important hub for the future. If the increase in p****engers continues, then it is not unrealistic to expect the station to have four double-track lines connected to it.” (From Springfield, Springborough, Springden and a new line from Brentton/Heppcross). He then showed the mayors a map over Brentham.

(http://img410.imageshack.us/img410/6366/1944brenthamcity.png)
The city of Brentham, need some feedback on what to do with the station. You see the three existing lines on the picture, but in the future one line also will go east to brentton/heppcross. What should the new Brentham Station look like?

“In my opinion we have two choices, either to expand the existing station or building a new one outside the city. Building a new one would be the most expensive, but both choices will be expensive” After some debate two things were decided: The capacity expansion of the Springfield line was much needed and should be done in the following year and the mayors wanted  some expert advice on what to do with Brentham Train Station. They established some demands for the new station:

-   Higher p****enger capacity
-   An effective way to handle four lines with double track
-   An esthetic look
-   Maximized efficiency for the maintenance sum paid.
-   Possibility to expand would also be a plus

Before the meeting ended the CEO also presented some really good numbers. Finally the region had over 30000 (30790 to be precise) inhabitants! After 14 years of operation the region now only lacked around 1800 people to double its size, the CEO hoped that this maybe could happen next year. What a way to celebrate 15 years of operation that could be! He also commented that Malliborough now had over 4000 inhabitants (maybe it is time to start calling it a town, and not a village???). The operating profit had also been surprisingly good – the new line help a lot! This year it was up over 30000, to a total of 94727.

Key numbers:
Proceeds: 451543,05
Operational Profit: 94727
Cash: 3068,73

Traveled:  177370

50 lines (47 road and 3 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
8 RVg-KS 33 (-2)
4 RVg-KS 45 (0)
19 RVg-KS 69 (-4)
33 Gaz-4 (+13)
12 RVg-KS 4051 Post Truck (0)
4 (1 x1 and 2 x2 and 1 x3) Kei Kiha 22 (+1)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough   4483 (+509)
Brentham      2732 (+72)
Brentton       2502 (+163)
Appingmouth 2444 (+118)
Oldfield        1856 (+44)

Total inhabitants: 30790 (+1346)

Hi LeifInge,

1. if you use the 100% load, I would extend the station to 4 Plattforms and seperate the lines from eachother, this will give you max flexibilety for the lines.
2. If you dont use 100% load then also 3 Plattforms can be enough if you use choose signal for incoming trains, because then they can choose the free plattform.
I would prefer the first option, also if it has higher maintenance cost.

Greets

Rohal

There are several options. First, what Rohal said. As it is now, the station is too tightly stuck in the city. Well, that's life :) It may be enough for a while and then you will have enough to afford changes.

If you want to expand the Springfield line, you could loop it around the whole city. That is, keep the nearer part (2 tiles) of roofed platform, bulldoze its end + the useless road behind, add two slopes and build a bridge over road next to monument. Then you have a loop and can turn around. Later, after some rebuilding you could enlarge the platform to even 4 tiles still in that place which is enough for most local kinds of transport. (Not bullet trains though... but even then there are alternativer that fit into that length)

Whatever; if you keep the plain to the south empty, there is always plenty of room for maneuvering.

If you do not want to lose coverage when retreating from city center, consider our wide (two?) range of fine station buildings ;D

hmm.. not really sure if I understand how u think... and wouldn't it be bad to cirle in the city completely?

Dont think so

Hi

Re Brentham. 

Why not make 'Brentham stop' into a railway station where the line currently cuts through the suburbs.? 

Two lines from the top/left could use this. The adjacent roads offer a cheap future expansion to double tracked platform. The line from below and the new one to the east use the existing platforms.  This has very low costs of set up. 

Local bus services are very efficient as there are very few locals waiting. The buses will take on the new task of p****enger transfer between the two railway stations.

When you give the Savegame, we could "test" some changes ...

Start of 1945
When the calendar started to show 1945, it was once more time for celebration. This year the meeting was held in Springfield. To celebrate 15 years of operation the CEO had planned to use most of this year to look back in what the company had achieved, and also looking ahead with some new estimates on population growth.

But first he gave the meeting some key numbers from 1944. Thanks to the increased capacity on the Springfield line, and also other investments in new busses, the profit had increased one more: “I’m proud to announce that the company for the first time has made an annual profit over 100000! This means that we can by more busses, trains and track, so that even more people can use our excellent service and leave their car rusting in their carport.” Traveled p****engers just missed the 200000 mark by a little over 5000.

With 1451 new inhabitants, the growth of 1945 ended at 4,7%. After 15 years 15898 more people had moved to the region, a total growth of 97,3% - 4,63% per year!  For the last five year period the growth had been 6150 people, an annual growth of 4,33, a bit less than for the 15 years in total. The CEO commented on this by showing to the increased growth the last three years. He also pointed out that monument building still was a key factor in population growth. He then presented some estimates for population growth in the future:

(http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/8951/1945growth.jpg)

While the growth might have decreased a little in percents, the CEO told the mayors that this five year period was the best in BBBR history. He illustrated this by showing a graph over the three five year periods of the company.

(http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/4650/1945femaars.jpg)

He then continued to present his goals for the next period in the three factors revenue, profit and travels:
Proceeds: 3.000.000, this period: 2.079.282
Profit: 600.000, this period: 381300
Traveled: 1.250.000 this period: 772561

After this the CEO reported to the meeting that they still worked on the new plans for Brentham Station and that they hoped to start building the lines to Malliborough and Brentton in the next five year period.

Key numbers:
Proceeds: 490024,91
Operational Profit: 108255,67
Cash: 3841,28

Traveled:  194763

50 lines (47 road and 3 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
7 RVg-KS 33 (-1)
4 RVg-KS 45 (0)
17 RVg-KS 69 (-2)
43 Gaz-4 (+10)
5 (1 x1 and 4 x2) Kei Kiha 22 (+1)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough   4612 (+129)
Brentham      2842 (+110)
Brentton       2630 (+128)
Appingmouth 2574 (+130)
Springborough 1991 (+444) (NEW)

Total inhabitants: 32241 (+1451)

Good to see your network doing well!

Hello LeifInge.

Nice Public Relations and empire progression.  :-)

A few pages ago we talked of connecting the south west. Ships and rails were ruled out as too expensive. 

Did we ever consider aircraft?

Not a big fleet. Just one. Lowest price plane on a tiny airstrip with low maintenance.  Loss making maybe and inadequate.  Its for the growth impact it will have on all cities.  By making a transport connection, any connection, you promote city growth, everywhere, via the p****engers who can suddenly find a route to/from those two towns (and any attractions etc you also have connected down there). 

Your network can move them to the airports where they will wait almost indefinitely (because capacity is not high enough).  If the airports are on the coast located where a future port can go then you have p****engers waiting for those first ships if and when the time comes to get serious about moving the people across the sea. The plane, if loss making, can be scraped once ships are in place.

Airplanes, there is some problem. The only airplane which could bring a profit is the big airplane which is so expensive. So I think, it's better to build a rail for 110 km/h which could bring much more profit and is much more cheaper.

The air connection is not about profit. 

It is about stimulating growth.  This is clearly the companies main objective. 

A connection via a loss making aircraft (small loss?) can achieve so much growth for so little initial outlay.  Surly that loss can be recouped many times over via increased revenues on all other transport lines.

It was initial outlay which had scupperred the alternatives of rail and ship. I was surprised how cheap the early German designed planes are..so hence I profer the suggestion for the bosses consideration.

Hi there, I see your point, but there is one thing you forget - what happens needs to be in the spirit of the history.
If I played this without the story there is several things i would have done different... But this is first of all a story!

Hi there, finally a new update is ready. From now on there might be some time between updates since my first child might be born any day now (ETA is in two weeks) I will try to make an update now and then, but I can't promise to do it as often as now.

Maybe this is the perfect time for someone else to start a story, I would f.ex love to read a story from Simutrans Experimental.

Start of 1946
This annual meeting followed the pattern of the last years. To important milestone were crossed, over 500000 in proceeds and over 200000 travels. The overall status was great, but still Brentham Station had a problem. The CEO told how they started this year by expanding the capacity on the Springden line, in an effort to reduce the p****engers waiting on this line. After some month with double capacity this problem was solved, but it only moved the problem. Once again lots of people were waiting on the Spingborough line.

To solve this, the company decided to move the extra Kiha from the Springden line to Springborugh line and also adding one extra kiha. Now three sets of two kihas is serving the line. With three sets the service is more frequent and keeps waiting time and number down. 

(http://img265.imageshack.us/img265/6370/1946brenthamstation.jpg)
Brentham Station in the end of August 1945, note all unhappy people! The new station will be built on the open field behind the depot.

Several years now BBBR have tried to reduce the number of people waiting, but without luck. Therefore the CEO presented the plans for a new Brentham Station: “The train station in Bretham is by far our most important station, and it is important that it works a good as possible. We have seen over the last years that all the people moving through the stations keep the people of Brentham from using it. Therefore we have decided to move the station outside the city centre.” He them continued by promising that during 1946 a new station would be built south of the city.

After this speech big discussion was started. Some majors said that it would be to expensive, while other were worried about the transport service in the building period. The CEO answered this by first of all pointing to the fact that Brentham Station wasn’t working well. He also promised that enough busses would be provided to quickly move the p****engers to the new stations when it was finished!

Key Numbers:
Proceeds: 520338,68
Operational Profit: 117824,72
Cash: 6259,71

Traveled:  208584

50 lines (47 road and 3 rail) (+4 inactive maillines)
6 RVg-KS 33 (-1)
4 RVg-KS 45 (0)
15 RVg-KS 69 (-2)
49 Gaz-4 (+6)
6 (1 x1 and 5 x2) Kei Kiha 22 (+1)

5 Largest Cities:
Maliborough   4752 (+140)
Brentham      2965 (+123)
Brentton       2791 (+161)
Appingmouth 2673 (+99)
Springborough 2124 (+133)

Total inhabitants: 33601 (+1360) - 4,22%

Very nice - good to see your double track mainline! As to building a new, larger station: good idea. Perhaps, however, it's also a good idea to leave the old track and station in tact - you never know when a local service, or a tram line, might find it useful ;-)

And I'd also love to see some journals with Simutrans-Experimental games! Best wishes, incidentally, for your wife...

Congrats!!!
Do you know if it is boy or girl or surprise?

thanks... they say that its gonna be a boy :)

hello, I'm Anderson of Brazil and walks the forum
I found this topic, I want to congratulate the
history and you continue to post more, more
photos. when I started reading but did not stop. Tells
Indeed, you are professional writer right? but not
it is the story this good. I'm waiting
more. I am from El Salvador in the state of Bahia in Brazil and
post it here by google rsrsrs

Wow!That thread is quite long!
anyway,congrats!

__________________________________________________________
Is this discontinued?

What is happened to this?

I hope all is well with your new baby..!  Congratulations..!  This post is just excellent, thank you so much for putting the creative effort into this..!

Lemans

Thanks for all postive feedback :) My son is now 13 day old, and is keeping his old man busy, so at the moment I'm to busy to update this story.

BUT, I plan on doing it when the days get more back to normal...

When is your next update?

When is your next update?

Great Story, i just read the whole thing. Making the trains is a good alternative to air or road. But when you make the lines it may cost a little more to make it more straight but the speedbonus could get you more money from p****engers to compensate for that and make more money than a "shortest route" line.

(PS: The train speedbonus in pak128 is 60km/h and going up and down hills and around corners could reduce the average speed)

For the speedbonus the theoretical maximum speed of the convoi is considered, not the average speed. In Simutrans Experimental/Extended/JamesPetts (whatever it is called  ;) ) average speed is (or will be?) taken into account.

LeifInge when are you going to update us with the next installment of this?

In Simutrans-Experimental, the line's or (if there is no line) convoy's average speed for the last month is used instead of the convoy's maximum speed when calculating the speed bonus.