Atomic Systems

Indeed, there are too many scenarios these days written where you have to drive over the speed limit in order to arrive on time. One route I found this to be the case is the NEC, some of their scenarios I found I had to speed all the way in order to arrive on time at each stop, if I wanted to get the green ticks. I then ran same scenario and was well late at every stop, whilst keeping to the speed limits and driving in a 'safe manner'.

One of the best routes for timing is the E - G route, sometimes I find myself having to reduce speed in order to arrive on time or to avoid long waiting times at stations.

Does make you wonder how much these were tested and the driving style of those doing the testing.

Burst Pipes isn't actually too hard to complete. Nail the braking points in notch 2, and drive up to 0.5 over the limit. Approach the signals at East Croydon aggressively, but at a speed where you'll still be able to stop in time for the red (realism purposes). Go through the red at 15mph (don't know real procedure here, I only know that's the speed limit in London Underground right after a SPAD). I stopped the train 1 metre short, blew the depot whistle then coupled at 1mph.

Precise braking saves an unbelievable amount of time.

Inthernet wrote:Go through the red at 15mph (don't know real procedure here, I only know that's the speed limit in London Underground right after a SPAD).

Correct procedure would be to stop, telephone/radio authority would be obtained to proceed at a speed at which you can stop short of any obstruction.

Incidentally, the term "SPAD" is grossly misused in Train Simulator. SPADs are erroneous passing of signals at danger, whether driver's error or caused by a signal fault. If a driver is authorised to pass a signal from the signal box, it is not a SPAD.

John

yerkes wrote:Does make you wonder how much these were tested and the driving style of those doing the testing.

Just a general comment. When you create scenarios you find yourself going over the tasks repeatedly during editing and testing. You eventually complete many tasks much quicker than anyone that downloads and runs your scenarios and timings which you find quite achievable may become more challenging to others..

Seasons Bleatings,
Kernow2

You guys have brought up something that i have been having issues with too, that being related to arriving on time at stations that are particualry close together.

I will have to go back a bit to read your posts but I am finding it increasingly harder to get to stations on time. Now i find it kinda hard to explain but in real life does a train on the busy L to B route arrive bang on time to the minute every day of the week? If in TS your arrival time is set at 11:03am and the next station is close by and arrival time is lets say 11:07. If the loading time takes say 45 seconds for the train to get loaded and then its going to be hard to get to the next station on time.

So how does it work on a real railway?

It maybe that no one has written any documention for TS on arriving on time or arriving late. But sometimes I feel that I am having to Bugatti Veyron style to get to a station on time. Sorry if my description is a bit naff but I cannont get quite what i mean out of my head and into text... i think i am trying to explain my frustation at seeing to many X's next to my arrival time

TheTazman wrote:So how does it work on a real railway?

Looking at the Working TimeTable for London Victoria to East Croydon (which has just gone out of currency as of 8th Dec and is available on the net if you look hard enough), I can see this paragraph:

A fixed percentage of time is allowed in all schedules for contingencies. Allowances over and above this are shown:-
[2] - Indicates the number of minutes allowed for temporary speed restrictions and other engineering work
(2) - Extra time for pathing requirements
<2> - Performance allowance

In a nutshell, the working timetable (which does not contain the same timings as the public see in their timetable) has an amount of slack built in, for the most part, and has extra elements here and there at known 'hotspots' where time might be often, but irregularly, lost.

In TS2013, I think the nearest we can get to recreating the first of those parts - the inbuilt slack - is through the Performance setting, when making the timetabled stops. The game's default is 75%, but I've never actually worked out how many minutes - end-to-end over the L2B route - that would give you 'in hand'.

There is also that other well-known wrinkle in the real world - whereby a train's punctuality is only measured at the final stop. This is what catches out all those people submitting complaints and demanding refunds. The train can be late all the way from Paddington to Plymouth - but if it arrives at Plymouth within 20 minutes of its allotted time, everyone can go whistle for refunds, because it was 'on-time'. I've probably got the exact specifics wrong or out of date, but it boiled down to something akin to that - the timetables always had enough 'looseness' in them that meant that 95% (or more) of trains get there 'on time' - even if they don't!

Hi

I think we're starting to head towards differences between the passenger timetable & the working timetable.

Take a look at some of the timings on the advanced view on http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk and you'll find in some cases (Heart of Wales springs to mind nearing Llanelli) that the ptt is a few minutes earlier than the wtt with no chance of the train ever hitting the ptt time! Then at a later point; the waiting time at a station is such that the times come back in sync.

TheTazman wrote:....So how does it work on a real railway?....

The timetables are written to take account of the capability of the rolling stock, line speeds and station dwell times. Far too many timetables in RW scenarios aren't constructed that way. I compared the timetable for one default L-B scenario, I think the train started at South Croydon and ran to Clapham Jn, and over that short distance the time allowed in the game was about ten minutes less than the 'real' timetable allowed for a train making similar stops.

Andy L

Carinthia wrote:Correct procedure would be to stop, telephone/radio authority would be obtained to proceed at a speed at which you can stop short of any obstruction.

John

Thank you for that information. Performing a full stop just outside East Croydon would make the timetable incredibly tight and unreasonable. Might still be doable but it really needs another minute.

gswindale wrote:Hi

I think we're starting to head towards differences between the passenger timetable & the working timetable.

Take a look at some of the timings on the advanced view on http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk and you'll find in some cases (Heart of Wales springs to mind nearing Llanelli) that the ptt is a few minutes earlier than the wtt with no chance of the train ever hitting the ptt time! Then at a later point; the waiting time at a station is such that the times come back in sync.

That's intriguing.

When I worked in Train Planning ("timetabling" to you and I) for BR, it would always be the other way round - public arrival times would be after the scheduled time.

Another factor in timetabling not mentioned here is that (of course) it doesn't take round minutes to get from station to station. Hence a train may be scheduled to a half minute in the working timetable but it won't even adhere to that exactly and may legitimately leave at forty seconds past the minute, for example. TS2013 doesn't really have leeway for this. Station dwell times are from 30 seconds upwards (this used to be adequate for all suburban trains but was not enough in the peak hours when sliding-door stock came along), but again not adhered to exactly.

I'm rambling here and could say a lot more but really all I am saying is that there are a lot of factors that a computer simulator would need to take into account to be perfect. It took many years to get the computer-based timetabling package we were given to do as good a job as we did with pencil and paper.

John

Interesting stuff, John. Times have obviously changed since BR days - presumably because corporate protection is more important now than passenger service.

I found a peculiarly 'give-away' paragraph in the header-document for the London Victoria to East Croydon WTT which has just gone out of circulation as of 8th Dec 2012. It says:

iii. Trains must leave at the advertised time whenever practicable. Where the advertised departure times of passenger trains
are slightly earlier than those shown in the Working Timetable, the former must be used in quotations to the public.

...which implies that they are well aware that the PTT is often (and deliberately) shown with earlier times than the WTT. A curious situation at best!

On the subject of dwell times, it goes on to say:

iv. A half minute is allowed for station duties in the case of diesel-electric trains and 20 seconds in the case of electric trains
unless separate arrival and departure times are provided, or more time is specified by letter indication.

Going back to PTT to WTT differences, later in the same document, it has a key for all the codes used to show them, per service. There is quite a potential for variance, both earlier and later, as can be seen here:

p – Public time 1-1½ minutes earlier
q – Public time 2-2½ minutes earlier
r – Public time 3-3½ minutes earlier
♣ - Public time 4-4½ minutes earlier
£ or Θ – Public time 5-5½ minutes earlier
↕ – Public time 7-7½ minutes earlier
v – Public time 1 minutes later
w – Public time 1½ -2 minutes later
y – Public time 2½ -3 minutes later
z – Public time 3½ -4 minutes later
Ø - Public time 4½ - 5 minutes later
∞ - Public time 9½ - 10 minutes later
Ω - Public time 10½ - 11 minutes later
● - Public time 14½ - 15 minutes later
¥ - Public time -4 minutes earlier arrival AND departure

The interesting discovery we can make from that is that the largest difference by which the PTT is early, is 7½ minutes - but this is more than offset by the largest difference by which the PTT can be routinely later - which is 15 minutes! These 'late times' give potential for quite a bit of making up of (public) late-running without actually having to do anything out of the ordinary, other than stick to the WTT! But quite why an earlier publicised time should even be needed, I haven't yet worked out... but it's there, all the same. Maybe to muster all the passengers on the platform a little earlier than is actually necessary, if it's a slow-boarding or very busy station, maybe?

If you give a later public timetable arrival at the train's terminus, that allows for the train to be late throughout its journey - but it arrives on time for statistical purposes. How many train operating companies claim 95 per cent or better punctuality?? I also believe that an arrival within five (or is it ten?) minutes of the public time is considered as 'on time' anyway!
regards Ted.

Jacko wrote:I found a peculiarly 'give-away' paragraph in the header-document for the London Victoria to East Croydon WTT which has just gone out of circulation as of 8th Dec 2012. It says:

iii. Trains must leave at the advertised time whenever practicable. Where the advertised departure times of passenger trains
are slightly earlier than those shown in the Working Timetable, the former must be used in quotations to the public.

...which implies that they are well aware that the PTT is often (and deliberately) shown with earlier times than the WTT. A curious situation at best!

Yes, similar wording has existed in timetables for years. That's appropriate for departures but I was responding on arrivals!

The most common reason for difference in departure times is when a "clock-face" departure cannot be achieved on a specific journey. Another is to stop something looking like a connection when they don't want it to.

John