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Topic: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail (Read 58327 times) previous topic - next topic

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #70
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.
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Simutrans - the open source Transport Tycoon Deluxe clone.

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #71
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.
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.

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #72
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.


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.


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)

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #73
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.


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.”


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)


Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #74
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 :)

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #75
Interesting! Had you thought of double-tracking your main line?
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Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #76
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?
Regards
Sev.

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #77
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...

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #78
Interesting! Had you thought of double-tracking your main line?

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...

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #79
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...

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...
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Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #80
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.


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.


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)


Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #81
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

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #82
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

My projects... Tools for messing with Simutrans graphics. Graphic archive - templates and some other stuff for painters. Development logs for most recent information on what is going on. And of course pak128!

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #83
hmm.. not really sure if I understand how u think... and wouldn't it be bad to cirle in the city completely?

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #84
Dont think so

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #85
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.
Regards
Sev.

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #86
When you give the Savegame, we could "test" some changes ...
I hope you understand my English

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #87
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:



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.



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)


Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #88
Good to see your network doing well!
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Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #89
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.
Regards
Sev.

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #90
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.

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #91
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.
Regards
Sev.

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #92
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!

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #93
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. 


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%

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #94
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...
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Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #96
thanks... they say that its gonna be a boy :)

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #97
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
Simutrans - Orgulho de desenvolvimento no Brasil.

visit my site:www.andersongama.webs.com

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #98
Wow!That thread is quite long!
anyway,congrats!

__________________________________________________________
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The Green Mage of Darkness living in the summer hell and in the country where it snows till May with -21 *C  ;D

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #99
What is happened to this?

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #100
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

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #101
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...

 

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #102
When is your next update?

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #103
When is your next update?

Re: The story of Big Bucks Bus and Rail

Reply #104
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)