Station building height relative to platform

[juliandee]

Hello - I hope this question is being posted in the correct forum! I'd be grateful for any help over a difficulty I'm experiencing with a UK route I'm creating in Surveyor (TS12). The problem is with the height of station buildings. If I leave the height as zero and move it into the platform so it sits nicely the bottoms of the doors are cut off and the windows look at an odd height. If I raise the height of the building to the same height as the platform there's no problem - but then the rest of the building is floating in mid air! I can't find a way round this but any advice from more experienced Trainz users than me (only been at it a few months) would be most appreciated. Cheers, Julian

 

[Bill69]

Hello - I hope this question is being posted in the correct forum! I'd be grateful for any help over a difficulty I'm experiencing with a UK route I'm creating in Surveyor (TS12). The problem is with the height of station buildings. If I leave the height as zero and move it into the platform so it sits nicely the bottoms of the doors are cut off and the windows look at an odd height. If I raise the height of the building to the same height as the platform there's no problem - but then the rest of the building is floating in mid air! I can't find a way round this but any advice from more experienced Trainz users than me (only been at it a few months) would be most appreciated. Cheers, Julian

Not sure I understand exactly what you mean but if the building is too wide for the platform lay another short length of platform alongside the main one.

Cheers,
Bill69

 

[juliandee]

Thanks Bill69 - I tried inserting pics into this reply but could only see a way of doing that is with a url which I can't do (so a bit frustrating as I'm clearly having difficulty explaining). It's not the width of the building that's the problem, it's the object's height. At zero, when I move the building into the platform any protruding parts of the building are "swallowed up" the platform so the bottoms of the doors are cut off by the platform. If I raise the height of the building so it aligns with the height of the platform the protruding parts are fine and sit neatly on the platform top. However, the object now sits 1cm high so there's a gap between the base of the building and the grid and looked at from behind and the sides it's floating in mid-air! Any thoughts? Cheers, Julian

 

[Vern]

This is a common issue with many of the otherwise excellent station assets available. I believe there are a few which compensate for this by having the road side of the building doors etc. at ground level while platform level has them set higher.

As Bill notes the quick and easy solution is just to line another section of platform where the building hangs off the edge. If you're using a wide platform you might be able to get away with raising the actual terrain around the back of the building, but even with 5m grid hard to avoid overspill on the track. Possible other option is to use a wider section of platform where the buildings are located. As a last resort there may well be ground planes or foundation blocks on the DLS which could be inserted under the building overhang.

 

[stagecoach]

As said your building is made for an entrance to the platform from road level. Only one side of the building should be at ground level while the other side is at platform level. You will need to find platform buildings that are made to sit in the centre of platforms or island buildings.

 

[cyberdongreen]

Have you tried holding down the "Shift" key when you are raising the buildings? This raises the asset in smaller increments.

Dave

 

[clam1952]

To add as well as adding an additional bit of Platform there are various steps or stairs that you can use at the back so the "passengers" can access the entrance / doorways.
Or
Use something like a couple of plain road splines to take platform level down to ground level.

Another way of filling the gap is to use a matching wall spline and lay it along the back and sides of the building and adjust the height so it fits, as in top of wall lines up with base of building.

 

[juliandee]

Many thanks for all your replies (this is indeed a very friendly and helpful community!) I've now placed the building on additional platform and added some stone steps leading towards the door. It's not perfect but I'll try some of the other kind suggestions later. However, I think the comment from Vern is the only real solution in that some of the station building assets available have been made to address this very issue by having the road side elevations at ground level and those that face inwards are at platform height. I've seen a couple like this but they are not ones I wish to use unfortunately. Cheers, Julian

 

[Mick_Berg]

Learn to make your own buildings with Blender! Very satisfying and will keep your brain exercised.
Mick ☺

 

[llebrez]

Most of the solutions are already posted. For me, it depends on the size of the building. If it is small, I use one of these footings (20X20 or like), and insert under the building. There are others in rectangular shape, all buil-ins. If the building is large, use platforms/splines and adjust. Agreed that station buildings should have an extra footing as houses designed to be in step hills. Anyhow it is fun experimenting.

 

[cascaderailroad]

If a station is too long for a place on a DEM, you need to flatten the terrain slightly under the station, and adjust track gradients so that they are on a 0.00% ... either that or add roll tags to the station config file ... and your Trainz passengers can slide downhill on a slick icy day

 

[martinvk]

As others have mentioned, the easy way to resolve the issue is to add a basement under the building. Too bad the creator of the station didn't add it originally. That is mainly the result of designing for perfectly flat terrain. Happens more often than you might think. That basement could be anything that can fill the space. Try a simple wall spline that you sink into the ground until it just fills the gap between the bottom of the station and the ground.

As for adding your own images, you have to save the image to a public image server. Then you put a link to the place on that server where your image is stored into the message here.

 

[ray_whiley]

In the UK it was often normal for platform level to be at road level which would avoid the problem - except of course that the track level would then need to be Lowe - not easy to achieve in Trainz so this is not a helpful comment. Some of the station buildings I have made have steps to the roadside doors included; smaller, rural ones have no doors on the road side and access is via the platform- again quite common. As said already, the best answer is an extra short length of matching platform plus steps. I have at least one "station base with steps" on the DLS and this is a spline so might be useful with different widths of station building.

Ray

 

[GP30Fan]

Having had similar problems, I got a bit creative with alpha files.

Using a image editor, I created an alpha file to completely eliminate the platform.

Then I use a separate asset for the platform which can be set to any height.

Take quite a lot of time fooling around with to make it look natural but it can be done.

-Al

 

[juliandee]

My considerable thanks to all the new posters on this thread for your comments and advice! Ray, I've looked at your web site with interest and will check out your contributions to the DLS. Al, an interesting suggestion but way beyond my capabilities at the moment, I think! Martinvk, very grateful for the info about using a public image server for uploading screenshots - I'm sure this will be very helpful to me in the future! Cheers, Julian

 

[RHKluckhohn]

There are concrete slab splines in various widths that are very useful for building foundations. (Search "slab"). Just adjust the spline height to match the building elevation. I also use a variety of walls -- e.g. brick wall = brick foundation. Some work better than others -- the corners can be tricky. You can also adjust the ground level by small increments using the Up and Down buttons and a light touch on the clicker. Set the radius and sensitivity to their minima and experiment. Clicking a line segment in the middle raises both ends to the same height. Most buildings take their height from around the center of mass so you can bring the ground up around the edges without raising the building -- and if you do, just lower the building again. Somebody mentioned incremental elevation: holding the CTRL key = 0.10M, Shift = 0.05 M. It's finicky work but the results can be satisfying.

Happy Trainzing,
:B~)

Hello - I hope this question is being posted in the correct forum! I'd be grateful for any help over a difficulty I'm experiencing with a UK route I'm creating in Surveyor (TS12). The problem is with the height of station buildings. If I leave the height as zero and move it into the platform so it sits nicely the bottoms of the doors are cut off and the windows look at an odd height. If I raise the height of the building to the same height as the platform there's no problem - but then the rest of the building is floating in mid air! I can't find a way round this but any advice from more experienced Trainz users than me (only been at it a few months) would be most appreciated. Cheers, Julian

 

[juliandee]

Thanks RHKluckohn - I will try out your suggestions later! Cheers, Julian