Can anyone create St. Louis Union Station for Trainz 12?

AppleDash22 · Apr 28, 2014

I'm about embark on my first route building experience and I wanted to focus on where me and my dad grew up. I've already got the Eads Bridge and the Merchants Bridge and it's going to modeled in the steam diesel transition era so I need St. Louis Union Station. Can Anyone help me?

bendorsey · Apr 28, 2014

Possibly - - - Could you post a photo or two so I have some idea what I'm getting myself into.

Ben

AppleDash22 · Apr 28, 2014

Sure...

It had 42 tracks just to let you know.

gfisher · Apr 28, 2014

LOL Have fun Ben.

bendorsey · Apr 29, 2014

O-yeah - loads of fun (I'm a glutton for punishment. lol).

I can probably make it as long as you realize a lot of the intricate details will have to be left off. That doesn't mean it won't have all those spires and so on. They just won't be super fancy. Poly count ya know.

I need:
1. Photos of all sides plus a few from somewhat overhead (don't get carried away, lol). This should include the platforms.
2. A color photo or two of the real station so I can get some ideas as to the textures.
3. Number of tracks and how they are arranged.
4. Basic (overall and sub-section) dimensions.

The way I work on something this big is to work on it until I get tired or stuck at which point I work on something a heck of a lot smaller and different to get my eyeballs uncrossed then I go back to it. You won't get it over night but you will get it. If that is acceptable then let the research begin.

Ben

mp202 · Apr 29, 2014

Neat and ambitious idea. I am currently making the Illinois side of the TRRA in Granite City. Madison, IL classification yard is halfway done.

jacksonbarno · Apr 29, 2014

St. Louis Union Station had (and I think still has) the largest trainshed in the world, housing 42 tracks and serving as a terminal for 22 railroads. It was a really busy place in it's heyday, being located at the end of a wye, there were always trains arriving, departing, engine moves, switching moves, trains being assembled or taken apart, the works.

bendorsey · Apr 29, 2014

I've made a number of passenger stations in the past so know there is a limit to the number of interactive tracks that can be part of the station (8 I think). However - - - there is a way around this limitation. Make the platforms as separate interactive (passenger enabled) items and have downloaders assemble the complete item in surveyor. Might take a bit of fitting and adjusting but it does work and it may be the only way to get a very large station with all tracks passenger enabled.

With that many tracks I definitely need some good photos of the platform area.

Ben

KenRuof · Apr 29, 2014

User Jamesfaa would be interested in this station since he has a DEM of the area and probably has some pictures etc...

gfisher · Apr 29, 2014

Since it was renovated in the 1980's it is now a hotel and shopping center. It has four tracks remaining in service presently, so the question would be what period to model? It is a beautiful and historic building and would be well worth it to model. The plans must be out there somewhere, maybe at the architects office? (the guy who did the renovation)

jacksonbarno · Apr 29, 2014

I got some pictures of the platform area:
http://thelibrary.org/lochist/frisco/postcards/images/photos/pc01053.jpg
https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/43/74312403_1a1487a2a1.jpg
http://photos.mycapture.com/STLT/824804/25306017E.jpg
https://c2.staticflickr.com/4/3571/3404982618_6d99a76947_z.jpg
https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2660/4115279952_23f65063b3_z.jpg?zz=1

I think that the heyday of passenger travel (immediately prewar, so 1935 - 1941) would be a great period to model the station. Who knows, a St. Louis Union Station route might pop up somewhere. Trainz is really lacking good Steam era passenger terminals and routes.

bendorsey · Apr 29, 2014

Printed them out. They will help.

Thanks,

Ben

Jerker · Apr 30, 2014

G'day bendorsey,

...and I thought I had my hands full with this (relatively) "little" project...

...still a W.I.P. some two years after commencement..

...if you need any 'moral' support, Ben, give me a yell...

Jerker {

}

jacksonbarno · Apr 30, 2014

What station is that? It looks like Melbourne.

Bendorsey, are there any other pictures that you need?

Jerker · Apr 30, 2014

G'day jacksonbarno,

...it is, indeed, Flinders Street Station, located in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia (which should never be confiused with the more locally situated - to you - Melbourne, Florida, USA). Might I enquire how someone from Massachusetts is so 'observant'?...

Jerker {

}

jacksonbarno · Apr 30, 2014

I am very interested in architecture, and I find that train stations almost always represent a specific form of it, be it art deco, gothic, beaux arts, etc, so I spend lots of time looking at different train stations from around the world. I was actually looking at that station the other day. It looks a lot like Columbus Union Station in how it is just one long facade and not a large building situated over the tracks.

Well that... and the fact that you are from Melbourne, so... that kinda narrows it down a bit. :hehe:

bendorsey · Apr 30, 2014

I've made several large stations in the past but admittedly none as big as this. On the other hand I did make the Tay River Bridge and its 3 miles long. So long Trainz has a hard time rendering one end (it tends to disappear, lol).

Photo-wise it would appear I need a lot more then I first thought.
Close up photos of the various sections across the front and rear.
Ditto both sides.
Overall photos of the canopy preferably one or two from above.

And a bunch of dimensions.

Ben

jacksonbarno · Apr 30, 2014

bendorsey · Apr 30, 2014

Printed most of them out. Good shots of the front and the canopy but none show the left side or the rear. I would assume the rear uses the same basic motif as the front but without all the fancy doodads and geegaws. The one shot of the right end doesn't show all of it.

I love the shot with the steam loco in it (a 4-4-2 think).

Need:
1. Shots of the rear.
2. Shots showing all of both ends..
3. Shots of the individual canopies added in 1928 (if wanted).
4. Shots of the concourse.
5. Dimensions of the building. I can interpolate from a known datum to some extent but I need the known datum to start with, lol.

Questions:
1. Do you want the original canopy or the extend length canopy?
2. Do you want the canopies added in 1929? If so where do they go?

Considerations:
1. Obviously this could be poly-count monster so some details must be omitted and others done in a lo-poly manner.
2. Widows are a prime source of polys. Normally I make them out of real parts and use transparent window glass. I might do that in some locations but most will have to be made as textures (I make the window out of real parts, take a screenie of it, convert that to a texture, and apply that to a plane). 2 polys compared to several hundred per window (and this has a heck of a lot of windows, lol).
3. I can include track but not switches. The track diagram seems to show a lot of switches under he canopy. I will have to make the tracks pairs in different lengths unless told otherwise (all the same length).
4. The large canopy will be made as a separate item. Downloaders will have to add and position it as necessary in Surveyor.
5. Ditto the individual canopies added in 1929 if wanted.
6. All tracks will be made passenger enabled but some slight-of-hand will be required to get around he 8 track limit in Trainz (if that still applies to items made for TS2009 and up).

In conclusion this tem will include a fathers 3 most hated words" Some Assembly Required", lol.

Ben

jacksonbarno · Apr 30, 2014

Some more pictures:
http://dummidumbwit.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/ja-r291.jpg
http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth28757/m1/1/med_res/
http://www.billspennsyphotos.com/photos/Locomotives/PRR K4s Train and St. Louis Yard 800x641.jpg
http://home.comcast.net/~wabashrr/images/cofkc1.jpg
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/38/74312407_a118390fe9.jpg?v=1139133287
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/37/74312404_feef643d8c.jpg?v=1139132705

Can anyone create St. Louis Union Station for Trainz 12?

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