Red Signal - no train approaching

A signal showing red has a "mouse over" text of "No Train Approaching" - driver mode. I would expect it to show green since no trains are on the route. Preceding signals show green, green, and yellow just before thered. Simple USA 04 signals.

Another question, do signals have any effect on AI train decisions or are they basically for human game drivers?

Sounds like the signal triggers are not working properly - are your signals too close together?

Shane

I haven't really studied No Train Approaching since the other two have the same thing, but my guess is it comes down to scripting. In MSTS there were two types of signals, the kind that were normally active and always displayed whatever block information existed, and the "nevergreen tree" signals that displayed only red unless there was an active path triggering them awake. In MSTS that was governed by the "Signalnumberclearahead" data in the signal scripts, if the signal script had the "ifEnabled!" statement in the code then it "woke up" as soon as the projected path ahead of the approaching train was within the specified number of signals. After the train passed they "went back to sleep" and displayed red until another projected path advanced to trigger them "awake" again.

My guess is some/most/all Trainz signals have similar scripting so they display red unless there is a train approaching that would need the information. Main trouble is most programmers and game designers were born in the era of CTC, for the last 40 years most mainline signals in the US work exactly that way - signal displays red until a dispatcher or CTC computer activates the signal. If that track isn't being used that day all the signals will be red all day.

As for the AI obeying signals, I've found it does it correctly for the most part, if you have one that stops at a green signal with no obvious reason, select that train, open the message window, and right click the F6 window to give him the "continue schedule" order.



This one isn't moving because I gave him an impossible command, the track to that portal isn't connected. Last night I was testing my latest and started adding wrong way markers to the center express track since the AI kept insisting on crossing to that track - and discovered the reason why they insisted on it, I had the track direction markers on the outer tracks in that section facing the wrong way. Trainz AI is intelligent but psychotic, drive via makes it less screwy than navigate via, and I've always found that if I order it to drive from Chicago to New York via Hong Kong it will manfully attempt to carry out those instructions until it drowns in the ocean.

boleyd said:

A signal showing red has a "mouse over" text of "No Train Approaching" - driver mode. I would expect it to show green since no trains are on the route. Preceding signals show green, green, and yellow just before thered. Simple USA 04 signals.

Another question, do signals have any effect on AI train decisions or are they basically for human game drivers?

Click to expand...

that all right,,,,, it show thsi on my map and ai drives right

Found Problem

With the signals as I described I just went ahead and ran a train in from a portal through those signals. No problem until the train arrived at a red signal farther down the track. It sat there way beyond the artificial pause you see while it creeps forward toward a red signal. So, I killed the session and made sure no other trains were running due to the "normal" Train Setup. Ran the session again the train from the portal stopped at a red signal for about 1 minute. While I was waiting and "pondering" a train whizzed by and the signal went to green and the portal train went on. I was puzzled since I had no trains in the Train Setup list.

Then it dawned on me that maybe there was a "super session" that always ran as well as the individually defined sessions. Well, there was. Clicking on Edit Session at the route level there were some trains I had scheduled awhile ago and forgot about. Clearing that list allowed my portal emitted train to run as expected. So, a route based session always runs and individually defined sessions must recognize what it does.

Yeah, I forget which one, but one of the built in routes has a bunch of streetcars ("trams") in the route layer, so any session you create for that route has those in it. Don't want that type of thing keep route and sessions separate, never ever ever click the trains tab while editing the route.

only automatic signals show green when nothing is around. any other type would be controlled signals and display red as the default. its this way in real life too.

norfolksouthern37 said:

only automatic signals show green when nothing is around. any other type would be controlled signals and display red as the default. its this way in real life too.

Click to expand...

That is interesting. All manual signals would then be red regardless of the switch's settings in the path of the signal. I guess that the automatic variety are set by the control room or tower and thus deemed reliable. Others could be set to anything by anyone.

A question might be, if a train was on a path that was manually signaled, and the observer was several signals away, we would see red from the occupied block and all greens up to the observer. Or, is there a limit on the number of greens, or their distance from the train?

It is interesting that a casual read of some of the rules of railroads seems illogical but with a proper context their meanings become clear.

it has a lot to do with what type of signal control a line has.

a fairly typical CTC set-up:

manually controlled signals - those controlled from the tower or control center, are obviously lit by the path the dispatcher has chosen. these will be red until there is a need for them to allow a train to pass. these are normally found at control points like sidings and other interlocking plants like crossovers and are absolute signals.

automatic signals are not remotely controlled, and only display their aspects based on the block they protect or the state of the controlled signals. some of them display green when no trains are around or routed through, others will show red as their idle state. that all depends on other factors.

where i used to live the NS used TWC with ABS on the line, and all of the signals were automatic. both the absolute and the intermediate line signals showed green when no trains were approaching and the block was clear.

its worth reading up on these if you really are interested in the different systems. Trainz kindof has to have a hybrid of these, as obviously there is no dispatcher to set signals for us, so in a technical sense all of the signals have to be automatic. what i meant in my previous post is that in trainz, there is a way to set signals so they are green when no trains are approaching, but it requires changing the asset config. probably not something you want to do unless you are making new signals.

Got it. Need to re-read signal stuff. I "self-confuse" by messing with the other product. Since it now has more crashes than Amtrak I can focus on Trainz.