Suggestion: "Upgradable" station

[knuckles88]

I know that a truly upgradable station (i.e., with an “upgrade to…” button) would be very difficult to implement, but I have suggestion for an interim hack: a station which takes up the same amount of space as a 5-track, 360 m station, but displays the model of a smaller station (with track extensions at the two ends if the smaller station isn’t as long).

The way that I think this could be used is:

1. Build your first station as an “upgradable” 1-track, 120 m station. This includes 360 m of track – i.e., 120 m of platform with 120 m of un-modifiable straight track on either end
2. Because the reserved track section is actually 360 m long, all connecting track gets placed further away (i.e. it’s not possible to place a switch/signal directly at the end of the platform), but this leaves enough space to seamlessly connect everything when it’s time to upgrade
3. Because enough space is reserved for a full-sized station, the city may develop an “empty spot” beside your station (in the reserved, but empty-looking, land which your station technically occupies). This is good news, however, because it prevents you from having to spend millions demolishing buildings later if you expand station
4. At some point in the future, you demolish the existing station and replace it with an intermediate 2-platform, 240 m, “expandable” station. Its model takes up more space than the original station did, but the footprint that the game reserves is still 5 tracks by 360 m. As far as I know, demolishing the station (and resetting your passenger count to zero) is unavoidable, but perhaps with developer support it could be done more seamlessly.
5. Eventually you upgrade to the full 5-platform, 360 m station, and the size of the reserved footprint and the displayed model finally agree

I think it would be good to still keep the original small stations (you wouldn’t want to have to clear out an enormous amount of land just to place a small station which you never intended to upgrade) so ideally I would make the “expandable” station available in addition to the original stations.

I haven’t modded this game myself, so I don’t know how easy/hard it would be… but I think that this would make the transition from early- to mid- and late-game a lot more pleasant.

[Norfolk_Chris]

This sounds like a good idea!  +1

[Woedl]

It could be a nice starting point, but I’ve another idea about how station upgrades can be done. It is more complex, but gives also more design freedom of your stations and has more possibilities for later features.

It could start with any size of station.

1. Add more tracks by dragging a new track besides the existing track/platform of the station. With a menu like the bridges you can then choose between a track with a platform or only a track. This gives also the possibility to build in passing lanes into the stations.
2. To elongate the platforms it will work the same as adding a track to the station, but here it’s done by elongate the existing track(s). This gives also the possibility to have the station building out of the center.

I guess that point 1 shouldn’t be that much of a problem to implement and is also the most important one. Point 2 however has some practical design issues like:

• How to deal with different lengths of different platforms on the same station?
• How to deal with different curved tracks? (When curved platforms are possible at all.)

These issues are of course also opportunities for new features later on.

A thing on the wish list is the possibility to add a station entrance on also the other side of the station.

[Neldot]

These solutions could work as interim, but imho the best solution would be to add platforms directly placeable on the tracks, like in CIM 2, instead of having to build the station before placing tracks.

In this way, the player could build a station at any angle, add more platforms that would automatic join the already placed ones, and set for the platforms the desired lenght.

This system would be much more feasible and with increased realism.

[Mattimo]

Not all stations are straight either some of them do have a curve.

[simonmd]

Why can’t we jst have platforms that snap to the tracks liek they do in Cities in Motion? I’ve lost count of how many times i’ve had to spend millions buldozing buildings and roads because the new station doesn’t fit in the same space the old one was!

[Author]

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