Snow High Valley Distr Ctr (High Resolution 950x532) Approx

Yeah, it wasn't easy for me to switch from TS12 to TANE either, simply because of the performance and bugs was terrible!
As for the 64K question... as far as Trainz v1! That's just my guess anyway.. I'm not completely sure, but you can only go so far before you hit a brick wall:hehe:
And I can agree with the assets, it has came a long way! When I had UTC and TRS2006, I used only the built-ins as I had no idea on how to work the DLS back in the days.. TS2010 I started to use the DLS as I finally started to figure it out (that's when I created my Trainz account back then).. Their assets really helps to make route / session building fun!


Peace

Evening Sir,

From the Trainz history, and your acquired timeline, you have really been thru the Mill of Experience, the hardest, most cruelest, and I guess one very effective teacher.........I wish and this is in retrospect, that I had found Trainz long ago, I think it would have been really good for me as a primer for say TS-12......But that is spelt milk and not worth it at this point. What I try to do now is learn as much as I can when I come into situations I don't understand completely, such as Faulty Assets. Which I am learning to do better now with the help of PEV's Tools......

Now to continue, that 64K question in regard to Backward Compatibility, it is very hard for Software Companies to draw the compatibility line! Both in Cost of investment, versus the potential loss of previous Customers over Version incompatible form of function etc. Ask any Word Perfect, Excel, or Game users what they dread the most on updates, and or new Versions?

Unfortunately it is like a Weight on your back that gets heavier on each new release of Software, and at some point. The line has to come into play, and find out your Old Items, Rules Etc cannot co exist for any number of reasons. I think the word Evolution comes to mind, as we evolve and mature, we have to use different tools to accomplish the change in the playing field, the Game.

I know for you as Builder/Session creator it causes problems when your items our loaded into a newer version........

For precisely that reason, I have elected to stay put in T:ANE, and I do know one day, I have to make the Change or Not......I have seen others in the Forum who still use multiple Versions or Older Versions depending on what they elect to accomplish in the Game. And I truly respect that, more now, than ever before as I have used a few versions of Trainz all unique in there own way.

So will see how new Trainz evolves over the next year............

You laugh at this, the other more serious reason, I wont upgrade because, I would want both T:ANE and TRS19 on the same Drive, and I find now after upgrading to one Gig SSD it is not enough for that.......My next laptop will have a minimum of 2 Gigs Hard Drive plus SSD........I hope a larger SSD is on the horizon, we sure need it.........

Thanks for coming by.
 
Timber Ridge/ Aussie Merge

Evening All,

Been working steadily on Timber Ridge Line, lots changes going on as I make progress with it........And I was able find some D&RGW Locos by Prowler901, and they are swell looking Loco's had to do some repair on Textures and some other few things, but I got it squared up with PEV's Tools, than you very much.

Over to Aussie Route,

Another Late night run in Aussie Desert, very cold temps outside, but our passengers are nice and toasty inside with Hot Drinks and fine food.

We pull thru the yards with smoking hot passenger cars, referring to how the brakes work on these particular Coaches.

Ah our favorite hotel with late folks having a smoke on the Balcony as we pass on thru. Too bad it's so late, or we would stop a second and pickup some good Submarine Sandwiches from the Butcher Shop, will our hot chocolate and Scones will have to get us thru for now....There fresh baked so it'll work out for us.

Signals our clear at this hour.....Thank you dispatchers for stacking our signals in favor of this direction.

Look at the heat coming off these cars from some hot brakes........That's OK, they'll cool off, we had quite a few curves and grade changes. Good to know our brakes can keep up, I can assure you, these cars are very heavy, well built Steel construction, and they'll last a lifetime if we keep the Maintenance up.

Coming thru the Bridge over some very icy cold water..Don't go out swimming here, with less than a full wet suit, Better yet, wait till Summer and water will be great.

Wave hello to the night owls....Having a great night with Drinks and Friends.......

Little peek inside one of the Cars, yes there old, but in pristine condition.........

Lush green grass here for now, until the Ice sets in.

We have lots of Farm Silos here, gives us good Grain Trains, for now the Growing season is over, and farmers will start planting new crops next year........

Headed out to the Badlands now, dark windy, and watch out for the wild animals, if they get hungry enough, well you know what can happen, your dinner......So better to be on the train where it warm, safe, and some steel between you and critters......Werewolf's anyone......LOL

That'll do for tonight, have a great weekend all..........
 
Timber Ridge Notes / Marias Pass Consists Pics

Good Sunday all,

Been busy on Timber Ridge Line, and I found out something that was staring right in front of me?

I knew I had Dual Gauge Track, what I thought it was, is Narrow Gauges combined, but what I found out, it was Standard Gauge and one of the NG tracks......So now it appears I have Standard, and two Narrow Gauge Track sizes for a total of 3 different Gauges running together and independently, which changes a few things for me. As you can see I still have much to learn about Narrow Gauge Style tracks in Trainz.

What brought this surprise to light?

I came across a Passenger Station where the Dual Gauge kind of looked connected to the Passenger Station Tracks but I found it had Standard Gauge Stub. and unless you use the Narrow Gauges or Standard Gauges by themselves. The Station cannot handle the Dual Gauge.

So You lose the Narrow Gauge Track and that Train cannot enter the Station on either side. Who knew, I didn't so what I'll probably the do, is use separate Gauges to go thru one side of the two side Track. Giving me 1 Standard Gauge and one Narrow, probably 36" Track.

Once I figure it out, I'll show the pictures........Only problem is, there is a bunch of interchange and Yard Tracks all around different Gauges in some spots.......Track Puzzles.
==============================================================================
Below is more info for the D&RGW:

The Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad, often shortened to Rio Grande, D&RG or D&RGW, formerly the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad, was an American Class I railroad company. The railroad started as a 3 ft narrow-gauge line running south from Denver, Colorado in 1870.

https://www.google.com/search?sourc....0.94.94.1......0....1j2..gws-wiz.wv63EFXPOEg

Locale La Plata County, Colorado
San Juan County, Colorado
Dates of operation 1881–present
Track gauge 3 ft (914 mm)
Length 45 miles
Headquarters Durango, Colorado
Website www.durangotrain.com

The Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad (D&SNG) is a 3 ft (914 mm) narrow-gauge heritage railroad that operates 45.2 miles (72.7 km) of track between Durango and Silverton, in the U.S. state of Colorado. The railway is a federally designated National Historic Landmark and is also designated by the American Society of Civil Engineers as a Historic Civil Engineering Landmark.

The route was originally opened in 1882 by the Denver & Rio Grande Railway (D&RG) to transport silver and gold ore mined from the San Juan Mountains. The line was an extension of the D&RG 3 ft (914 mm) narrow-gauge line from Antonito, Colorado, to Durango. The last train to operate into Durango from the east was on December 6, 1968. The states of New Mexico and Colorado purchased 64 miles between Antonito and Chama, New Mexico, in 1970 and operates today as the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad. Trackage between Chama and Durango was removed by 1971.

The line from Durango to Silverton has run continuously since 1881, although it is now a tourist and heritage line hauling passengers, and is one of the few places in the U.S. which has seen continuous use of steam locomotives. In March 1981, the Denver & Rio Grande Western sold the line and the D&SNG was formed.[3]

Some rolling stock dates back to the 1880s. Trains operate from Durango to the Cascade Wye in the winter months and Durango–Silverton during the summer months. Durango depot was built in January 1882 and has been preserved in original form.[3].........
============================================================================

Now lets flip over to Marias Pass: As of late I not doing anything on this Route other than running Test Trains for Grade % compliance, Proper Signal Aspect and coverage Etc, and checking on Track arrangement in the new Quarry section I enlarged. That area has Coal, Sand & Gravel, Several ancillary support operations and Businesses. With this type setup, we are generating lots of Loads for Bulk material and other corresponding construction needs.

Running a heavy load of Logs into our new Facility and Mill. I changed the loading a track for more length to handle a 25-30 consist........

This Wye needed a little longer curve in it, I like the way it handles now.........And this Route goes into a Branch line of several miles, into a Portal at the end. For now, if I recall correctly, the Portal is set for Consume all Trains.

Our Log Train coming across the Valley from 15 miles away on the East side.

Using SW1000 Switchers, geared low, and works perfect for these heavy log loads........

Passing thru local downtown area.......

Well looky here, a bonafide Air Stream Trailer sitting here....Wonder who it belongs to? I'm very happy with how the buildings are laid out here. And these Crossings work perfectly.

Good ole SP1500, heavy duty Switcher.........And they can haul a lot of cars too........Sorry that they look so Clean.......But for me, after seeing so many filthy looking SP livery growing up in So California, this is refreshing for now.......And I due have some really heavily weathered U-30 and some others in my assets.

Stopping on Red here, we have Passenger ahead coming this way, but will divert to another Branch and then will get our clearance. Weather is good today, but wait 5 mins and it change.

That'll do for now, thanks for coming by folks.....And have a Blessed Sunday,, as we pray for those Forest Fire Victims who lost Family and Homes during the horrific Fires this last Month.....
 
Good evening all,

Been busy running around like most of your probably the day before a major holiday, getting all those last minute things you think you'll need and hope you don't forget yea haw....

So more about the Timer Ridge Line:

Boy have I been learning some good lessons with Man6 Dual Gauge, etc, it is whole lot different in the way you make Stub and spur Tracks depending on what Gauge your going into or connecting up with, and it does like some have said, very difficult to get the connections lined up, till one gets the hang of it......

But it is one cool Track to work with.

I have also been busy changing Curves, Elevation, and reducing some Trackage in major Yards where my weak Graphics card has issues with Rendering of several Tracks 10-15 or more in straight view.

Re aligning some of the houses too for some improved curves coming into and out sharp corner....

And belief it or not, I haven't even got to the Snow Part of this Route.....

So tonight. I'll show you a few spots I'm heavily working on for various reasons.

Alright so here is the very beginning of the route straight out of Portal......I added a Tile, because I prefer my Portal not hanging out the edge of the Route into dead space.

I use the open space here to lay out Assets for Viewing purpose, kind of like a Scratch pad of sorts, and to test Color Texture Designs too.......

One of the things I need to due is thin out the Trees about 50%, hopefully Bulk Replace will handle that for me. It helps me with better Frame performance etc.

Here is the overhead, on the right where you see the blank Gray Tile is the beginning of 30" and 36" parallel mainlines.

Red circle is the area where I am reducing Tracks and doing re alignments etc.

Bottom lower left is the Snow part of the route, it shows in a light gray.......Open Range with Desert Scrub plants our tan Tiles. Forest is the dark Green areas of the Route on the Center to extreme Right Etc.

OK, So in this Civic Center here, straight across from us was an Locomotive and Care Shop, I felt with nice out door restaurant on the right.

So I moved the yard and car house from here, and pushed it over a Block to the left of here which was wide open next to our main lines.......I think the diners wont be bothered with some occasional Freight switching on Single Track here, versus a 5 track setup running thru here before........

Some noise is OK, but lots of noise when your dinning out doors, no,, not conducive to the Food patrons here.

Over here I use a mass of Rulers here to line up the main and Yard lines, in unison, and delete a Yard line here and there, it was just too crowded for the area and my tastes. We have plenty of room in other parts of the layout to put up more Staging and Sorting Tracks.

Got rid of the Fog here for a while we work......Now if you look at the trees, and they are huge Groups, just too thick here for me.........So will go thru and thin it out..

Red Circle here is where the old Car house was,,,,,,,Lavender is where I moved it too........

Yellow is where the Gauges Split with 36" straight ahead, the 30" goes off to the right into a new leg of tiles......Perfect bifurcation for duel Gauge Action........And boy do we have it on this route and Standard Gauge to boot, who could want more........This Great for Narrow Gauge lovers........

Also in the picture you can see how I'm using the Rulers to get those Tracks straight with parallel ones, and the Curves friendly for the Crews.......


Oh and while I thing about out, I even found a small mining area with 18" mining Narrow Gauge Tracks, so this Route has

One Standard Gauge

And 3 different Narrow Gauges on it, and you know if I can, I will expand that mining area with 18" Gauge too.......

Now in several places in the Route, where Rail comes into Street Running, they used narrow strips of Wood Crossing Boards, and I am changing those out to simpler less Graphic intensity Crossing Boards, as this setup with kill my Video Card in some areas........

Great selection of Buildings here too.........

Here is a overhead view of the Yard I just showed you previously,,,,It has a lot of action here.....Very well laid out......I deleted one mainline yard track, and one sorting yard to give me some more room in this Puzzle Track.......

Black Circle here is another spot to change out the Crossing Boards for better Poly control.

These 2 tracks handle Goods and several other items 24 hours a day, there is lots of Shunting to be done here.....Great Access, we generally do late nights and early morning Shunt here so Traffic won't be to impaired.

There wasn't this many buildings when these tracks where put in. But you know how growth comes in over the years, kind of creeps up on you.

However the Town knows all to well which side their financial bread and Butter is one......The Railroad generates a lot of Jobs here to keep this City Thriving........

Wishing everyone one of you a wonderful holiday with family and friends. Looks like we have one of those CUT OFF LOW Storms coming in late tonight and part of tomorrow.....Will see how much Mud and flooding we get out this one in the Fire Burn areas of California......It's a huge mess, and they are still looking for about 700 missing people too.......

Peace and Blessing to you and your families......
 
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Hello Blue,

great work and a lot of details on this route ...

Keep on friend !!!

Marc

:cool: Thank you sir for the kind works, I hope that what I show and discuss here will help others in their quest of changing things up an curing those weird issues that confront all of us from time to time.....

:wave: Have a great day Marc!
 
Flaam Upper Level in the Alps

Wow, did Thanksgiving go away fast, and its off to the Xmas Holiday Shopping Races. I hope all of you enjoyed some quality time with your families and prayed for the Fire Victims that maybe could not yesterday. Last night I came home late after having a wonderful dinner.

Opened my Trainz, worked on it for 45 mins, and almost did a face plant on keyboard. It was 11oo PM and there was not a minute more of Track adjusting to be done else, I break the Screen. And that was the end of the night......

Today,,take Mr's Blue out for a bit of Xmas Shopping and it was a very good day for me too.

Now I take a little time and show my good friends some more Pictures of Flaam Route in progress.

Now this area, is not seen much by you, it is the final height area where I needed to bring in Mining, Heavy Industrial Manufacturing and Oil extraction etc, coupled with some Ethanol Plants too. I plan on adding some small Manufacturing areas, and other items? TBD........Will take it as it goes.......

Alright with that in mind, this Ethanol production below. IT comes from Dave Snow and some other Authors. There will be lots of Tanker Trains coming here from the Ports below......

Natural Gas Plant and Valving for pressure to push this much needed Gas to other areas of the Alps.......Lots of needed for the heating of City, Hotels and Residences, you name it.....I kind of Cobbled this together..........There is probably more items I find over time.......I also need to add a Proprane Plant up here in the heights too, there is plenty of Room here to do it...

Also need to add lots of Trees too. so this area is naked at the best, but I want to get my Buildings and Tracks in first then Trees and Shrubbery........

Larger picture of the area, the valley floor here was originally Grey Granite and Rocky, to drab for my tastes, so I change the floor to Green and Dry grass areas........I think this is Propane plant here, and some light Oils with Natural Gas........

Coal Power Plants next in line.

Ethanol entrance for Rake Tank Cars.......

Nice Signals here, doing exactly what I need, proper Aspect, because when this area is completely built, there is going to be lots, and lots of Chemical Trains, including Passenger Freight service too, our workers don't drive to the plants,, they come in by Train......Vehicles are shipped in by Rail and kept up her, the Roads coming up here are too icy and dangerous, with or with Storms that get blown in.....Trust me, we are up to 10,000 feet or more up here.........And you don't play with mother nature if you know whats good for you.......

Signal Aspect is Clear with restriction to not go over recommend Track Speed.

Looking at that Map below is the Lakes below in mid level area........In the bottom half is upper level, and where I am adding lots of heavy industrial sites......

Next level down is Oil Refinery, Brakeman are helping move switches for the Tank Trains coming in for a fill up.......

New Ethanol Plant is in Startup Phase as the first rake of Cars is brought in for fill up..........And once this plant is 100% functional, it will be outputting 100,000 Gallons of fresh Ethanol for the markets........

Over to the right is natural Gas processing plant......I have some Tracks in, but this plant will need to some more, once I figure what else needs to come into the picture.......I need to find out exactly what else is messing here for operational needs........Semi Tankers and some other ancillary items for sure are needed.

That'll due for today........I'm busy working on Straightening Tracks and moving Buildings around, fixing Curves, Bridges, and whole lot more with the Timber Ridge Route line, am I complaining here, oh heck no, LOL/..........


I am having a ball, playing with what if scenarios in reference to the same.

For instance, in the first town, with heavy Rail yard facilities and Duel Gauge operation, there are close to 15 Tracks in part of the area, and they get Stub out or leave by single main line for each Gauge, so what if, I could dual mainline them and reduce the Bottle necking. Now it will be possible for 2 trains to come into the main yards independent of occupying one another'S main line.....

Of course, and this is for now, those 2 tracks due have to come into one main line, but that is a mile away from the Yard entry. Should work real nice......

And that is the fun of it all, when comes to playing with another persons route........Or not changing it at all........It all works out.

Have a good Friday..........
 
Helping a neighbor Day and life on Maria's Pass Route

Good Evening all,

I have to say, after you get past Halloween and then Thanksgiving, it just gets busier with Xmas on the Horizon, and today it was no exception!!!!

It turned out to be a Help Thy Neighbor, trying to cut down a Tree with a new Chainsaw, no experience and using the wrong size and type of Ladder to use on one Huge Fruitless Mulberry of 50 yrs old.

Potentially a very bad recipe of huge proportions up too and including fatal injuries from the felling of limbs 500-1000 Lbs.

So seeing how I had noticed the neighbor attempting to cut this monster tree down, I did the neighborly thing and politely intervened with help, and all was well, since I have been in the Tree Trimming and/or removal business for a very long time .........
th
It was a good day, as any of you know, backyard projects can end in a number of ways..I was determined to make sure my Neighbor wouldn't get injured or worse.

Now to our main topic Trainz:

I read one of the Threads discussing the King Mountain and Western Pacific Route merge.

So I downloaded the Merged Route and it is really nice merge. And I proceeded to download the separated Routes that were merged. And made a merge using 4 blank Tiles between the merge points, I want to try and do it a little differently to see how it works out.....So for now that'll stay in my bucket list to come back later on when I finish , as I real busy reworking the NG D&RGW Route, AKA Timber Ridge Line.........Which is coming along real well......

The latest thing I found, is the Snowy Section has really steep Grades up to 6% in several places, so I have a plan in place for that. I keep it secret for now, and let you all in on it later once I've tried the first of 2 potential options on solving the Grade issue......

Over to Marias Pass, we are using Dragons Pass Power to bring in the heavy load. As we ease into the Lumber Yard lead.........Dispatcher is holding a Freight ahead so we can cross over to the proper leads.

Over at the other Lumber Yard, we have lots of Shunting going on......In this yard, I did lots of re arranging and adding additional Tracks and Switches to handle the Volume of Finished lumber.
Lu
Using Triple Signal Interlock-er 08 here for proper movement.

Everything is moving smooth as we take our loads out to Mill for finishing.

I'm in Wire Mode here to clean out additional excess Water not needed for the small pond area. Point here is, when your not in Wire Mode and the Texture and elevation will hide the excess water from view, so I try to clean it up for resource issues not needed.

Signal Aspect is perfect here, as the switches are aligned ahead by dispatcher.

Engines running light for a bit, as we wait for Lumber Hostlers to move the loads onto the Cars, we leave and head out for some Fuel and Lunch break, come back in a few hours to pick up the loads for delivery. Unless of course Dispatch sends us out to a different job and a patch crew Extra Board comes in to finish this Job up.......You never know how your day will end. All in a days work.

Well looky here, I Short line LAJ power coming to work some of the jobs, Acronym stands for Los Angeles Junction Railroad.......Tehy work a lot of industrial Leads in LA County area of California.

Oh here we are as we finish coming into the Finishing Mills......Got power pushing in from the back so as not to break a knuckle of this very heavy train of Logs. 15 Mph is our max on this Branch we don't need a derail disaster.......Safety first, all else follows along........

This is where we come from out of 3 Logging Camps, and there is lots of Lumber to process, good money for the RR.......Looks like the weather might be changing here too.....

I bid you all a good night, and great week ahead..........
 
Kings Western Pacific Routes and Timber Ridge Etc

Good Day all,

Weather has been great, and I hear we get some Rain tomorrow night, I right in the middle of putting up Xmas Lts outside, looks like today and tomorrow morning have to count.........But being a 7 year protracted Drought, you learn to take the Rain when you can get it......And we and Texas really need some from what I read and hear.

So on to Trainz Biz,

Been playing with one below, and when I downloaded the TANE version, all the Tracks are missing, and when I download separate Routes, they have their Tracks, Crazy. But I understand Stouhtm has uploaded a revised version with no errors to fix the other one.........

Kings and Western Pacific RR Merge

I merge the 2 routes a little different than his Route, so decided to run some Freight and see how things roll here.....So far so good.

And it is a beautiful Route, with lots to see and do between the merges.........UP Power with Police Caboose.....Cool huh.....

A rake of Empties heads out over the Valley Green side here and on to the next Rail yard........Traffic is light in this area, because MOW is making new Mainline Connections to the other Roads Rails.......Elevation, Grading and Texture will be needed as I added about 4 tiles double rowed to fix the elevation difference.......No big deal and I have less mountain moving etc to do........I'm learning more and better ways to do things.....LOL

Ok we are in the yard, signals and switches are good here. Will drop off the cars and add some more inbound ones to transfer out to other locations........Very nicely done with the Trees, This is what I like for Density......so cool...........

Looking from the front, love the sky scenery on this too.......We coming in off mainline at 20 MPH slowing down to 10MPH.....Don't want to derail these empty flatcars......

And we are set and Staged for decouple......Dispatcher is making new orders for another arriving consist to take out. I forgot to say I am running the Cyclops Loco here....Runs great and is pretty strong too.

Cab view as we get ready pending new load pickup orders......Since I am new to the Route, I have my milepost guide here, as I have no idea where all these tracks go......LOL

OK this is what my merge looks like here..........In the middle of the picture is where the Routes Dark green and yellowish green come together....I did a whole lot of Texture and hill pasting here after watching Youtube Video by NV3 Staff on how to copy and past bulk areas of interest, it really helped me, since I didn't understand all of the buttons that well......I need to experiment more to get it clear in my mind how do different Copy and Paste functions with tool.......

Timber Ridge Pics:Here is an abandoned line here, but you know who is going into the mining business here, and will add on some more tiles and mountainous area for maybe an Open Pit mining operation.......later of course, I want to get the Snow area % issue straightened out first. and reduced from 6.5% lower maybe down to 3 or 3.5% for our trains, else I have to run lots of locos and much smaller freights up there, which doesn't make sense when in the top they have a huge freight yard installed..........

OK here I have divvy up the main yard from throating into a single main to 3 legs into 2 leg main line,,,,,,takes out lots of the bottle neck, and I may extend the main line much further around the mountain for less clutter of trains in the yard approach area.

Ok got to run now, before the Rain gets here........Thanks for coming by,,,,,,,,,,
 
Good Day all,

It's Raining Cats and Dogs here and I am a happy Camper.....

So you know, I say from time to time, I see different Trains on the Road, and most of the time, I can't safely stop and take a picture, well yesterday, I saw some Local UP Gensets working local Freight Shunting back to the City of Industry. Nice clear day for some shots here.

It appears they are returning back to the main Yard and awaiting clearance into the yard by dispatcher......

I guess this Single Lumber load from nearby is headed out some where else......

Empty Lumber Spine Cars in the Mix.........

These Switchers are graffiti ed to the max with Paint.

And look at that, they even have a SP Caboose in the Consist, I am happy camper.......Yahooo

Mainline here heads to City of Industry Intermodal Yard..........

https://www.up.com/customers/premium/intmap/losangeles/index.htm

https://www.google.com/maps/uv?hl=e...hUKEwjbjaT47freAhXlqVQKHSz8CTsQoiowCnoECAUQBg


I edited this from the consist pic, so you could see the Graffiti better here........

Over to D&RGW I am moving up the Mountains here, doing that Gradient % redo thing, and finally I got it figured out how to set perfect % Grade going up or going down, whatever you want. It all has to do, where your place your pointer on the section of track your trying to change the Grade on. What is difficult is when you have small sections Splines to click the change properly, and what I do find, is it works best in Wire mode, so you can clearly see how your change works, versus looking thru Texture, which inevitably can cuase an error.

I started out at the bottom of the Route at the end point of large City area, and started the Grade change from 0% on the desert floor, and increase it to 3.5% over the next several Miles.

Also what I needed to do is cut that whole leg of the Mountain and Snow section of the Route into 4 Sections to decide where to begin, and where to end, and also where a critical area, that I would actually have to add Tiles to the edges to make it work.........So far, 4-6 Tiles have or will be added, depending on exactly where I need to maker those Mainline changes smooth out, in lower section, I had a meeting change of only 12 Feet, but at 3.6%, I didn't want to increase my incline further, so I had to adjust the Radius of the lower Grade Mainline to stretch enough to compensate for the change and keep it in tolerance, it took a little tinkering and adding some more track, but I got it......Now the I need to run a train too actually see if all the Curves and upward incline works..........Will See?

Last large city here, look over to the Right, you'll mainline headed up to the mountains, and I intend to make this double main line, why, well , to my amazement, there are several good size yards up in the mountains North of here........I think you can see, why I didn't want to change the elevation here with all these buildings and lots of Trackage, Roads etc. Just wouldn't be worth the Time and effort, when I can change on Desert Floor on Right.

Now looking North here , you can see way in the Horizon some very tall mountains, and the elevation, goes from 0 to 875 Feet, in trainz with only about 20 tiles or so, that is a heck of a lot of change, but we will prevail..........

Lots of Trestles all over the place........

Here is the Track with new alignment in the hanging in the air, as we make the changes, I have since raised the Desert Floor up the level of the new Grade.

Another view of the tracks as they start grind upward into the high mountains ahead....

That'll do for today..............Lots more to come.......Have a great day........
 
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We have a Switchback in the Route?

Good Day all,

Looks like the Rain has moved on now, and we got looks like about 3-4 inches worth and "This last rainfall season (2017-2018) was the driest for Los Angeles since 2006-2007 and the third driest since rainfall records began being kept in 1877"

https://imgur.com/gallery/MbijzqP

Alright so will here is the latest on Grade % changes in Snow Country.

I had 3 yards up in the top, so without changing them to much, I adjusted grades from 4%-10% yes, one of them was 10%, cough.......down to 3.5% and average was 2.75%-3.00% overall.....however when I got into some of the lower sections of the Route, I had to bust out the walls sideways, adding 1-2 Tiles outward, because there was 40-120 feet drop to the next area and I just couldn't swing the downgrade in such a small one tile width area.......And it was to be expected...

Found out that just before the Mountain grade finishes and heads straight to first desert City, there was a switch back on the mainline, I couldn't at first figure it out, how you drive straight thru to the upper Snow Covered Mountains......

Now Railroads in some areas of the country do use a switch back on very heavy Grades.......I use one on my Mining operation in Maria's Pass, and it works great, but mind you, the mainlines in Maria's Pass go from Point "A 'to Point "B" going pass the switchback, not thru it as in Timber Ridge Line does.

So this meant, I needed to figure how to make this a thru line and incorporate it into the Switchback but allow a Straight shot uphill to Snow Country area.

so what I did, is take the end of the Switchback and add a Tunnel to it, and then 3 tiles for a long mainline extension to pick up 45 feet of height, in a somewhat figure 8 crossover......

Cut off the old Bridge extension to the Switch back......

Now what happens, you come into the switch back yard from the desert side below, drive thru it, into the Tunnel make several loops, end up coming across and on top the Switchback yard below, and then parallel leading back to several more loops gaining more altitude and re connection to main line up in the top of the mountain grade......The pictures will make more sense of this when you see them.......All Grades in this area are 1.5% to 3.5% max........No more Switch Back, you keep your momentum going up the hill to the other 3 Yards, one of them being a major logging operation which is going to increase now that we have dis-parted from the Switch Back operation midway up the Mountain Grades........

So the Ques becomes, are we there yet, well not quite yet......More to do, but once I get the Track grades I want, the rest falls into shape......

Here in this picture is the end of the Switch back operation, but now instead of the 2 Tracks stubbing out, they come together into a switch then enter the Mountain......thru Tunnel.

The building there on the main is a Silver Mine, and we are going to move that to the back Track of and out of the Mainline here.

Over here, this bridge use to go straight across the tracks at 90 degrees off set and connect to the Gravel path on the mountain to our left........That will be removed completely and replanted with Trees etc......The Bridge set at a 45 Degree angle now heads out across the mountain green space and will go into a figure 8 of sorts, and then comes back below from the new tunnel I installed. I didn't like the tight curve going across the switchback anyway, now we have a gentle curve leading into the Bridge.........

At the bottom of the picture is on lower Tracks, is where they head downhill to the desert Cities and Communities Etc..........

The Red line was the old connection to upper end of the Switchback operation...........Now you can see how the Bridge was moved........It took a Country minute to move it too, as you have to carefully get those Bridge Trusses to align else you have a derailment at the Spline Joints in Rail connections.......There are 2 types of bridges connecting here.......And they are quite finicky about how they mate up.........

Here is new Tile with Rails coming out of switch back and re connection to upper Snow Country Main lines.........its about 50-55 foot increase in elevation.........

Over to the Right is where we are working, all the Gray areas are Snow Country.....And you can see I added the tiles for decompressing the extra heavy downgrade %.......Believe it or not, I really didn't want to add the Tiles, but I couldn't find a better way to eat up the severe elevation changes, so I went with it this way.......

Red Stripe was fixing the Grades from last huge Desert City, this was my start point......Yellow was coming from tip of upper part of Route down, and re grading the mainlines to 3.5% or less in trackage......Orange was the 3rd part of Elevation Smoothing operation.....Then between Orange and Red in the Green area was when I got in trouble with too much elevation changes, that constituted using some Tiles off the edges to make up for sudden descent in parts of the Green area......

Black Circle where I just busted out the walls, to get 3.5% or less wherever possible......Only so much room to work in.......

Now in here, you can see the return descent Loops I put in to make this whole mainline work..........Another reason, is I want to pull lots of passenger Trains up into the Snow areas, for Snow Bird folks, and I want it to be relatively fast getting up the mountains............Easier on the Equipment, and safer for the Crews to operated in, Also it really Snows heavy up there too.....All things to consider when you look at the larger picture......

Black Circle is the logging area, which is going thru a major Build out up there.

Yellow Circle is old Switch back operation,,,and the pink was amount of area you had for a passenger or Freight Length to make your switch back restriction work........The other Red and VBlack on the right side are Rail Yards and Passenger Stations up the mountain......

Just another larger view showing the new Tracks I put in on the additional Tiles Added......The Pink Circle is the figure 8 or however I make that return loop to high Trestle Bridge where one end of it will connect for the final connection.........

Once I get all my final Grade adjustments in, and check them one more time, then I'll run some trains from Desert up and Snow Country end back down, to see how we have done.....You'll see more pics then to get a better view of how this is going to work out........

That'll do for today I think.........Thanks for driving by here as you take your Screenshot tours.........
 
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Good Monday morning all,

Work on Elevation corrections is coming along nicely now, I think I can see some light, I had to add more Tiles on both left and right sides of the single Tile parts of the mid mountain access Routes, the distance was a difference of approx 55 Feet in elevation drop, so I wouldn't have been able to make it.....I also figured the area of Switchback Tracks, was in a Canyon so unless I made a very long tunnel, not conducive with Steam or Oil burning Locomotives.......And/or the passengers with open air Coaches........So this was the best way to handle it......

I did need to realign the Yard tracks over closer to the Northern part of the Route and I moved the Silver mine over to the last Spur track, so the mainlines will not be fowled with loading of Mine Cars out of the Silver Loads..........

Fluidity and minimal bottlenecks is important when you talk to the Crews, once they have momentum coming up the mountain, they hate to lose it, because, as is all to well known, sometimes it is very hard to get that consist moving up a mountain grade.......That in and of itself was another reason to cut my Grades from as high as 10% to 3.5% or lower wherever possible......

You can push the higher Grades with good Train and Horsepower to Axle Count, but you also set for derailments and extra wear and tear on all the equipment.......I like to have some leverage in this area, if I have an area that we just have to have some harder grades, then so be it, but If I can smooth out the Grades overall, it makes for better working conditions. As is said, pick your poison and see how hard it can be. I'll avoid it at all costs......

So shortly, will start running some freight up the track, I still need to change, add, move some signals and maybe some curves........Lets see how comes out on our first runs up the new mainline alignment........

MOW of way, has been working 7 days a week, 12 hour shifts with Bulldozers, dynamite and lots of hard manpower, back breaking work to whip this into shape, now will see if we truly do get some fruits of success out of one very expensive project......And if it works as I theorize it should, we might see an Open Pit Mining operation, more Logging, maybe some gold operations in them there hills? I await the future here........

Over to Maria's Pass, we have been running heavy Logging Trains and regular Freights, along with Commuter Passenger Express, so far so good..........Got lots of Tree planting to do too......And I see that we need some more Power Plants in specific areas of the Route, along with a Water Treatment Plant for our growing Cities along the Route.

We have some Dragons Pass Leased Engines working our Logging Train today, and they have lots of Horsepower, doing great with our 35 Car load of Forestry Products.......

If I recall correctly the go into Kauspell City.......

First picture below is Timber Ridge, high mountain area, heavy Grades, the Red is what the Route Line looked like, the blue is the revamped curves........

Here is a view looking out over one of the high ridge lines headed up......

We draw out to the side and you can see the much lower part of the line. 3.5% is where we are holding the line.....

Over at Marias we have some Dragon's Pass Lease Power pulling our logs thru the city.....

One thing I would like to do, is lighten the Color a bit if I can.....

This what happens when your inside a building looking out, now I know how they save on Poly Count, got to get rid of it somewhere.

Heavy Timber loads lumbers thru the City pulling about 35MPH.

As we come thru one of the Yards here, we encounter great looking passenger passing thru here........

Looks like I forgot to move the Trailers back into the lot, I think I was realigning the Buildings and changing some elevation here.

Passing thru some heavy industrial areas here.........

Haven't work on Marias in the last month or so, but will return to finish some more changes in Texture and farming areas, as well, I need to replant all the Conifers in the high mountain passes etc.......

That'll due for today........Xmas is approaching and there is a lot to accomplish.....

I bid a good week to all.....Enjoy
 
Timber Ridge Construction continues on.

Good Wednesday all,

Looks like we are in luck here, more needed Rain is coming down thru few days and will take it......

Over at Timber Ridge, hard at work getting the Rails aligned and I found my Colors for environment were off. Could figure out why the Snow and other effects were strange....Duh! Guess whatever I had been doing in the building phase got into between Color Time points and i was in one of strange configurations where my Snow was yellowish Green and who knows what else Colors, and then there is that pesky Fog creeping in.......All good now, I just needed to pay attention to small details......

One of the things I had thought about in some of new areas in upper Snow areas, was, where does all the Snow Melt end up, and one of the thoughts came to mind, there are no small Lakes or Streams up here, and there should be.....So when in Doubt of what to do in a large area, throw in some Ocean, Lake, Stream etc....And that is what I did, I can always remove or Change the water and add other things, AKA, Necessity is the MOTHER OF INVENTION...........

I also created a Water Fall of Sorts from high above the small Lake I made, and its connection from a small Icy River above..........I think it will look and work ok.........

This is a new Tile added for the Track Elevation Changes and it will have a small Lake added among other items

River high up in the mountains here and you can see the new Lake over the waterfall in the top middle of the picture.

This is the waterfall of sorts, here, trying to find the right color texture was, well, it took me a while, mix and match....I wanted a greenish icy glow to it.......

And since we have Icy Wet Waterfall that can really have huge amounts of water during Storms, well, we need a Trestle or similiar bridge here so the Tracks don't get washed out either.....

The Lake was easy to make, it just takes time to make the texture edges here, and still need to add some river Rocks trees and Reeds, Flowers.......I'll do it later on.

This is the Logging area, it looks strange right now since I had to raise the track some 50 feet here when I evened out the Elevation Smoothing phase. So the Floor on either side of the Track will get raised too, and it will look more normal in later photos.

Here I am starting to raise the Floor elevation you saw in the previous picture after making sure I got the Track Curves and elevation the way I wanted them......Think of it as a Foundation to a Building in retrospect, that Foundation has to be the way you envision it, if it is off in anyway, it throws all your other measurements out the window, and you'll drive yourself crazy trying to adjust other things and then coming back to due the Tracks....That is one of the reasons I do my Elevation and Track mainly first to get the scene and the reasoning of what I am trying too accomplish into sync, once that is in, it seems to me, that the rest falls into place much easier.....I also use the Ruler a lot, in tandem with the Grid Lines to get Tracks lined up squarely where they need to be, but remember when you go into curves, the Grid lines are not parallel, and that is when the Ruler really comes in handy to set your Angles elevation, whatever into to play.....At least it does for me, everyone has there own way of doing things.....

Top View of the area I am working on, roughed out, before the Lake is put in.....

Just another view of area as I am throwing down Texture colors here to see how they work.......And I found I had to adjust the depth and width several times to get the jagged look and feel of what I wanted to see in this deep mountain canyon area......

Over view of how the Tracks will cover and where the Water will meet and cross the mainline area, the lake will fit right inside of the curve here........Now take a look in lower middle section of the picture here, you'll see the old lines of where the tracks came down at 6-10% grade and that's why I had to add these tiles in here........
 
Good Evening all, we got some good amounts of Rain the last two days, and I am grateful for it.

So on Timber Ridge Line, we take a little trip on the extreme North End of the Route, high, very high in the Cold Icy, Snowy Mountains. I hope you like the pictures, I had a chance to work on more of the Texture and Mountain Scape up there.

So far so good, it was one of those days, I found just the Right Color Texture and overlap of blending Snow Scenes that it looked good to me. On the downside, I found some Grades out of whack, so will need to readjust the grade a bit in some spots. Speed limits where increased in some spots to due to better Curves on the overall route.

This is the very end of the North Track here, it terminates into a Portal about 150 feet to the right side of this curve.

We have a Snow Flurry starting, and were told a Cold Nor'easter is headed our way, no big deal, this business as usual up her.........We have Snow Plows and Blowers down in the Valley if we need them.......For now, we have a full load of Passengers waiting patiently to see the pristine Scenery up here.......

These tracks have all been aligned here, setting at between 1.5% and 3.5% max where the incline heads down fairly hard........

Dispatch has cleared us to head down the mountain..........We have some Boxcars to drop off in town.......

Good Head of Steam as the Snow Flurries continue, it's so peaceful up here..........The smell of Pine and Spruce......And Xmas is counting down.....What more could ask.......

All bridges have been checked for Safety, and Abutments installed to keep the joints in toe.........Looking out ahead, th Clouds are starting to thicken.

Rails are clear, but after the Storm finishes will need to inspect the Rails for Thaw and Freeze spots etc.......

Coming round the bend into Town.

This is one interesting Tender here, where the brakeman or Fireman sits to watch the Coal delivery?

Stop here to set the Switch and now we headed to the Passenger Station around the corner.

Alright, looks like we are getting in just in time,, weather is reported as degrading, white outs everywhere, so will tie up just down a bit till the Weather improves......We have some hotels if needed by our passengers, we don't have any sleeper cars on this run.....

Tollume Pass Station is where will tie up tonight till we get clearance to continue our trip.

I need to add lots of Buildings and other items up here.

That's it for now, tomorrow has our Sunshine returning.........

Night all........
 
Good Day all,

Another week has finished and Xmas is not too far out now.......Time flies when your busy working, getting things ready for the best holidays of the year.....And some good family and friends time.

Timber Ridge Line is coming along nicely,

Been adjusting and smoothing lots of Hilltops and Mountain Ranges, along with trying to get some colors to match OK in the Texture side of things. Grades are looking well now after some adjustments here and there.

Below are trip continues down the mountain, Snow Storm has abated for now, and there's lots of fresh Powder with Ice here and there.

As you can see, I need to add some buildings around here.....

On the other side we see our first mixed Freight coming down the new tracks. I see one thing I need to fix here. Shouldn't see a track coming out of the back of the Engine House, have to go back and get fixed up.....

Were stopping here to take on some more water before we continue our Trek down into the valley.

I think we stopped the engine in the wrong spot here, just gave the brakeman a cold shower......I think we are in bit of trouble, the cap further back is where I think the water goes on this Steam Tender. OH well, practice makes perfect.....

We got our poor brakeman some clean dry clothes and got the water drained out.

Now that is done, we on our way........Mighty cold up here now after the Snow........What a view......

This is one of the areas where I had to stretch out the line to compensate for heavy drop in elevation.....I made a mountain here and allowed us to bend the Track in good curve to take up the slack in the down grade.....

Taking the curve now, passengers are enjoying some hot chocolate or fresh Coffee with some pastries from the local township......

Lower down the mountain, we pass by this Snow Shed, it protects our tracks from a known slide condition when we get heavy snows.

Other side of the curve here, it's a gentle curve at 3.5% downgrade and our brakes are doing well.

I really like these old switches, I think they have character........We check all the lines with local Rail Workers to make sure there is no frozen switches on the Route, if there is, then we have hand free them with couple of Workers......With the Freight and Passenger movements up here, we need to keep our lines clear and free of delays as much as possible......Folks enjoy the Rail , and it makes travel easier for them.

That's about it for now........

Enjoy your week ahead and thanks for coming by........
 
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Good Tuesday all,

Getting ready to go shopping for some Gifts for family and friends, so I thought I'd jump in and drop a few pics in for your viewing pleasure.

Been re texturing and smoothing out the old Line area, that was cut for the new grade down into the Desert, moved a lot of valleys and Mountains around, had to add some more tiles for areas that looked to chopped up,,when your coming up the grade. I will also be adding some Background panels too. I made it all the way to the Desert Cities, but more needs to be done on hiding the ends of the Tiles where it drops off.....

And one Texture for Desert area, I am not sure I like that well in the transition area between Desert and Green Forestry area, so will see.....

Elevation changes are looking good, I lengthened out crossover switches in some spots.

And I took some portable buildings that were setting off on top of Stub branch track in Tollume and put them to the side of the track. I guess the reason they where there, was an Engine was used to pull them off a Flat car or something, I'm not sure, but they kind of looked like a narrow engine house with track going thru them. So I moved them off the way. And they look better now, I will show them in another round of pictures.

Now look at these pics of our Consist make it's way down the mountain from upper Tollume area.

She be coming round the mountain! And here she is with a full head of Steam, beautiful cold, crisp winter day........Tracks are in good shape and all is well so far......

One thing I was thinking about, most of these trees are the same grouping in here, I need to add some more variety, here and there, just sprinkle them in.......

A view from the cab here, our engineer has it under experienced and steady hand........Like how this recreated, looks really nice......

Crossing one of the ice roads here, and that is something I need to fix, since I changed lots of the elevation here, this road is all choppy and block y now, so I'll need to add some Splines and smooth it out...........Need to find some Horses and Snow Sleighs too.......I think I have some in inventory........I need to add some of Cuks people too.

Coming into town, and doing some shunting........Got a few Snow Flurries.......Nothing like fresh dusting of Snow.......I
got the edges fairly well built up here so you don't see a drop off into nowhere, but further down, I have a few problem areas from my meddling with elevation changes and adding some new Tiles.....So that is a work in progress for now......

We have left the town with more Passengers in tow now........... You can see I need to get some more Trees planted here and other areas like it.......Of which there is plenty to fill in.....

Here is a broader view of the area I'm talking about, and I need to add some different Snow and some Rock Textures like German Snow stuff.

Coming across a large Valley area here, doing I think about 35 Mph, still adjusting some of my speed zones for the new track alignment.

And a view out the right side of the Cab, like the color of Green that was used here.........

Coming thru some small Township here and will drop off some Boxcars, I think I mentioned, but at all end points on this Route there are Portals, and I want to make them so I can jump to the other Portals as connection points, I had it on my other routes and it is a nice feature to use as a return point, depending in what your trying to accomplish, for now, my trains disappear, eaten up by the Portal, and that's OK for now, while I'm in construction.......

Nice sorting and storage yard for Cars and Passenger Consists........Have some engine houses too...

That'll do for today.......Thanks for dropping in Folks, see you in a few days......

Off the Stores with Mr's Blue.............
 
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Prayers for jordon412, Trainz Member/ Marias Pass

Good Morning all,

The week has gone by quickly, doing some Charity work, shopping for those special gifts, and putting up the final Xmas Decorations.

And here we are to Thursday........

While I'm thinking about it, please keep one of our fellow Trainz Members in your thoughts and prayers, he has serious situation and is recovering from his recent injuries associated with his latest epileptic Seizure.........Here is the link.......When you read about this, think about what if this was you and how you would handle this serious situation in life........

https://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?150034-Reality-Check-at-the-Doctor-s-Office-Yesterday

Now on Trainz, Work continues on Timber Ridge Line, I redid Logging area located up high in Snow Country, after doing some Shunting with the Log Cars, I decided I needed some more Team Cars, and probably a Small Turntable for the Engines with a Engine house, as well, I did add a "Y" too, so will see where it all ends up.

Worked on the invisible Speed Limits, adding Speed to some, reducing limits on tighter Curves in other spots of Snow Country.....Once we ran the Trains, it made things more apparent where adjustments needed to be changed.

Today's pictures are from Marias Pass which sits idle for a while longer as I work on Timber project......

Below we are Shunting the back alley tracks to Processing Plant where I added this service to a new customer........Tracks were never here and the Customer needed porch front service....This will work great for the RR as we have a small yard just on the other side to hold Boxcar Shipments etc to his Factory.......

Dragons Pass Power is bringing in heavy loads of Logging to the Pulp and Lumber Mill ops here......

A heavy duty tractor lifts the Logs off the cars as we slowly pull forward.

Over head view of the operation here.......I added tracks for more capacity, since we come a long ways to bring in the logs from local forest areas.......

Finished Stacks of Logs pealed and ready to go out to other Furniture Etc Factories in the North.......We have 30 cars or so in this load today.......Will drop off the Logs and head back to get more today, we usually get 2 trips a day per Crew.......

Remember the first picture today, this is nearby yard here and those tracks connect into the bottom of the yard. As you can see, we have lots action here as Passenger and Freight intertwine their movements.

We have just the right number of tracks to handle traffic and a very good signaling system to boot, we are fluid and flexible, and that means a lot to the customers we serve daily......

We use 3 headed Signals, wherever and whenever possible to give us added flexibility of movement in complicated Track puzzles while maintaining safety distance and control of Train movements. The bonus is I get interesting aspects including Lunar lights.......

Lots of Boxcars used in this area with all the factories we have to service......Empty Log Spline Cars headed to Wood lot facility around the corner..

BNSF local came in with a junk consist, and now the sorting and Shunting begins.........Lots to do and our crews are happy to have the hours of work.........

I'm trying to remember what I did here, I think I was putting in secondary Mainline line into this spot for a runaround for a nearby set of Rail Yards........Seems to me I used a Tunnel to go thru some nearby Mountains, this saved a lot of connecting Switch Puzzles where the Crews coming and going off to Branch Line destinations could bypass the local yards.

This gives us the benefit of faster Transports to the Northern part of the Routes where we are typically headed.

That'll do for today, I have quite a "Honey Do" list to get completed.......Never a dull moment this time of year.

Wish you all great day, and Drive with Car out there.......We want to come home safely during this holiday period......
 
Passenger pkup and some Snow Storm

Good evening Folks,

Busy weekend coming up for me, so I am dropping in for min and get those new Pics posted for your viewing pleasure.

Were coming into Town, to drop off some cars, pick up some more Passengers, seen here, waiting patiently for a nice Train ride into a much warmer area.

Coming into another yard to pick up some more cars, and will layover here till the Storm passes thru the mountain.

These cars are going to shunted into the yard, it snowing pretty right now......I like the Buzzard Paint Logo here......

Passengers are disembarking the Coach and new ones are coming onboard as we get our new Train orders from local dispatcher......

Storm has cleared, and we head down thru the mountain passes with reduced speed limits in this area, since the Tracks have more curves in them here.

Beautiful crisp day as we head on to the next town........

Pulling in here, will do some switching and shunting of Boxcars and Passenger Coaches too..

These cars got some maintenance down in town, now they are pressed back into to service as we have plenty of passengers to pick up, the local holidays are over, and they are ready to head back down to the flat lands after getting some local Skiing practice.......And believe me, there is plenty of Snow up here.

Pushing the Boxcars off to the spur here.........We have another small loco that will come out and spot them where they need to go, we have Passengers waiting, so there is not much time left to get things done and get our consists put back together.

Got the last 2 cars pulled out the Consists and dropped here, now we grab our new coaches and get the move on, Passengers have places to go, people to meet and all the other things you do as travel........

Been busy with the Logging area up the line, adding more Team Tracks, a WYE, Engine houses to store our Locomotives when they stay over.

Added some houses and other ancillary items for the logging area.

While I was doing that, I figured out, I need Telephone Poles, Semaphore Signals for the whole Route. All in good time.......I still need to learn now to drive on dual Gauge Track and get a working idea of where the cutoff points are for changing Track Gauges. This Route will be a great Primer for me, in the fact I learn about the different Gauges Work and how they work together in Dual Gauge setup. I downloaded some Wikipedia stuff on how the Gauges where used in this fashion.

That's it for now.........Enjoy the weekend folks and thanks for dropping by......
 
A good Monday Morning all,

Been fooling around with these variations of the Niddertalbahn German Routes, by various Authors, it is fantastic Route to play with, and I would encourage those who are new to Trainz, if you don't have it, get a version, there are different Sizes to play, one size may not fit all, depending on your Graphics Card, mine included, it is weak intregrated setup, I do get some Frame Stutter on this Route.......There are lots of Splines in this Route......But beyond that, it great looking, lots of things to do, and a perfect size Route I thing for most all computers out there?

Terrain, Track Puzzles are well laid out, and fascinating to me.......It's is a keeper, if you have disk space concerns, then do a CM search on the Route Name, and look at the physical size of this Route, about 7 to 23 Megabytes in size do to the Versioning and Author who made or changed the route etc.

I had no problems installing it to my computer, I think one asset was Faulty for a Switcher and I just deleted it, bec mesh issues etc, which is above my Pay grade......I had plenty of other UK assets that'll work fine with this Route........

<kuid:881982:100009> Niddertalbahn mit Erweiterung LeSchizooo 2
<kuid2:661281:200001:3> Niddertalbahn
<kuid:414456:100075> Niddertalbahn mit Erweiterung V4
<kuid:238039:100096> Niddertalbahn-and_cameras-simpleTreesv1

Over to Timber Ridge Route, I am now working on the cut off sections in the route (end of Tile Structure, right or left, on single Tile bands) when I take a picture such as the left side of this pic, I need to add a Tile and smooth the mountain down into the new Tile and it will look much better..........Now this is not an end all be all thing, some folks don't care if this looks this way, or if you have single setup or Strips of Single tiles

With that in mind, You might want to decide where the Tracks are going to lay in reference to the open edges, will there be Trees, or Background Panels added so you don't see drop off edges on your Route, various ways to make it look better........These are just suggestions to think about.

Pretty much all the Elevation changes are complete now........So I am working on the cosmetic side of it.......

Coming across the great Divide here, a magnificent Trestle Bridge, and there are more of these on this Route. I believe this is the late great Ben Dorsey's creation, and he made ton's of Assets for fellow Trainzer.......A gentle giant of a man for sure.....RIP.......

Overhead view of the Logging and Switching Yards here. Logging area is real basic here and quite unfinished, so I will find out what I need to add to this scene.......Besides lots of Piles of Tree Logs and some loading equipment.

Tail end of the Train, and there's a nice Caboose attached, which makes me a happy Camper here......

A closer view of the Log Jig here, it is amazing when you think of the ingenuity these Settlers had in such a Rugged Climate, They brought there few Tools, made the houses locally with Wood from the Forests, and they did lots of work by hand, Life was rugged, hard, and they didn't live as long as we do today, the Cold part of the year would bring Flu, Colds and lots of other things like pneumonia from which a fair number would succumb and pass on......We are so lucky today, with our medicines and other technology to help us in a time of Crisis.....

I've been working on the Mountains alot, to get them to look more natural where I can, and add some end Tiles when the overlap cuts off to abruptly, when that happens, I add the Tile, then run the back side or shoulder side of the mountain continued down in elevation, so when a picture is taken of the trainz running etc, you don't see that chopped off look...Elevation has a lot to do, I learning that more and more, as I take photos.....

This is a perfect example of what I am talking about here, when I say a Chopped Off look......

These are the new coaches from Service Shops that are being pressed into service as our ridership grows up here....
Another view of one of many large Valleys here, I will probably develop it more over time with some homes and industry, and more different types of Trees used sparingly here and there.

A long view of one of yards and the large Alp like mountain is one of them, I tried to fill it out to make a look more appealing, I had a front drop at the top of it, that just didn't look to good from this side when taking this particular angle shot.


Looks like it's bedtime and time to go to Bed before the Sun comes up.
 
Good Weds to all, just think another week, and Xmas will have arrived, sneaking up fast on us for sure, hope you all are doing well. Over here, we are do some last repairs on the house..Painting and Plumbing stuff, got to run lickety split to get it all finished in time, and as I get older, I do get Slower.....LOL, At least I can still go the repairs, but the old body has more aches and pains it seems like......

Alright, so let's see what we have here?

Did you know about the special Xmas Lights on Pere-Marqette consists, well here is the link and how to activate the special Lights.....Who knew, I didn't, but now I want to check it out?

https://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?150097-How-To-Activate-The-%B4s-Sectret-Chrismas

This is the smaller of the Niddertalbahn Route

With the following Notes from Author:The 30km track from Bad Vilbel to Stockheim was originally built by Pängel_Anton and was upgraded to current standards in track design. This beautiful German route has a gorgeous landscape that you are sure to enjoy. Finally a new german community was created for Trainz-Multiplayer where you get all news and information. Make sure to visit us www.trainz-multiplayer.de

And this the larger size here with the following info:This is a version of Niddertalbahn with cameras placed along the route, and simpler cardboard cutout type trees, replacing the awful frames destroying speed trees. This route actually exists in the real world, but without the many industry's that appear alongside the tracks that appear in this fictionalized version.
There are DB consists throughout the route.

This one of large switching areas on the Route, and there are some very interesting Track Switch Puzzles where tracks from several directions, merge, crossover each other. Very well engineered Route.

This is called a Cut Class P-1 Electric Locomotive from Pweiser and it is so Cool, I had to adjust the pantographs higher so I can run it on my Milwaukee Route......No biggy, this is one swell Locomotive.
https://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?150078-CUT-Class-P-1-Electric-Locomotive

Mid way down the Mountain, towards the Desert is one Large Logging Branch Spur here, there is lots of Room for more development once I figure what should go in here. I'll need to check a few of my other Routes that have Logging facilities similar to this, too see how they did.......

Two Shays are hard at it getting the empty Skeleton Cars loaded up with heavy logs for Saw Mills in the southern part of the layout.

Long view of the logging loader operation. You can see all the mountain peaks from here, and I think I have them about the way they should look for Single Tile in this part of the Route. I probably have to add a Tile on the left side for the Mountain way in the back, it needs to extend out gracefully lower to match in with the other peaks. However when in on the Track elevation, it might be Ok, need to run so more trains and peak from different angles to see if I can detect any cutoff views from the left angle going up the mountain, I think going downward it's not seen.

Now here in the Right side shot, I raised some of the peaks up here and there so you can see the drop-off on the right side of this Tile, so it looks mostly like we driving thru a deep Canyon or Valley area and that works well for me.

Coming round the mountain, headed South to the Desert Run area......

Here I was able to manipulate the edges of the Tile downwards, I hadn't done this before, but it works pretty good for getting this Mountain side to blend in with the other peaks when you look from a distance.

That's about it for today, see you all soon with some more Picks from?
 
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