Rail improvements for ATS

[flight50]

@Felk Oh okay. Gotcha. Nice model by the way. I always wanted a setup like that when I was a kid. Obviously, I had no money as a kid to do such. I once bought a N scale set as an adult but I don't have the space currently to really dive into such a project. I wanted to use a standard sheet of plywood to do some landscaping like you did. I see the one lone piggy though, lol. I like to see variety with the intermodal trailers and the piggyback trailers on trains when I see them. Obviously the ATS trains are much shorter than real life but hey, that's why this thread exist.

[wato]

FWI even in Germany and in the whole europe intermodal trains only move the trailer and then the truck pickup and deliver trailers at the terminal.
It would be a waste of money to move a truck on a train.

Look at the pic:
https://www.freightwaves.com/news/why-i ... -transport

Not correct. Both models exist.

Loading the whole truck onto the train is particularly used through Switzerland and Austria for crossing the alps. This reduces traffic volumes on the roads and curbs local emissions in the sensitive mountain environment. (There may also be other places that use the same model).

That's down to Europeans not looking at everything from an economic perspective only, but also considering sustainability and quality of life, e.g.
The incentive for trucking companies to use the train is two-fold. For one there is a quite heavy road toll on trucks (at least in Switzerland), and second, truckers can avoid thorough inspections of their vehicles by not having to go through the checkpoints along the motorways.

[plykkegaard]

Closing time through Switzerland is very strict, even in Germany you don't have truck traffic in the weekends, one of many reasons for this setup

[Felk]

@flight50 Thanks man! This layout is from the model railroad club that I'm a member in my parents home city. There are a lot of more videos of my trains running on my PC and phone to upload to YT.

In N scale with very limited space you can build very nice and detailed layouts, using a plywood table or a room corner. HO is more difficult, but I've seen nice switching layouts in constrained spaces.

For more variety regarding trailers in piggyback cars on ATS, I think we need an ingame company like UPS or Fedex with express type of freight to haul. With this, there is more sense in usage of double-trailers and could also be spilled to trains with adding the 28' pup, alongside 53' ones, to trailer cars and more companies skins.

[Vabis22]

I support rola system in game if it possible

[FrancescoMasci]

@wato they are probably a minority thoug. When I visited europe two years ago I had a look at the trains (I'm kinda an enthusiast) and almost every intermodal was composed only by trailers.
I've been in Germany, Austria and Italy, not Switzerland anyway.

[plykkegaard]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_highway

Austria: From Bavaria via Tyrol to Italy or to Eastern Europe
Switzerland: Gotthard and Lötschberg - Simplon routes
Italy: The Ten-T Network
France: Autoroute Ferroviaire Alpine from teh Savoy region to Turin and Bettembourg, Luxembourg to Perpignan

[wato]

@wato they are probably a minority thoug. When I visited europe two years ago I had a look at the trains (I'm kinda an enthusiast) and almost every intermodal was composed only by trailers.
I've been in Germany, Austria and Italy, not Switzerland anyway.

As @plykkegaard wrote, they run on specific routes. It's a good reminder that there is always something we haven't come across or noticed, even if we have visited a place.

[FrancescoMasci]

Wow, thanks for the heads up guys!
I'll be sure to go get a good look at them when I'm in Europe again.

[flight50]

I think we need an ingame company like UPS or Fedex with express type of freight to haul. With this, there is more sense in usage of double-trailers and could also be spilled to trains with adding the 28' pup, alongside 53' ones, to trailer cars and more companies skins.

Well we have UDS and PostED. Annies PostEd is beautiful. I'd love to see a PostED as an option to haul. If we could get SCS to make those into functional depots, we good. There are tons of hubs around to deliver those to. Worst case, at least give us Amazon. Amazon has a ton of cargo to haul and packages that UDS and PostED would haul, can come via Amazon. Call it the Nile or Congo. I'd love to see SCS replace the 6x4/6x2 AI trucks with the new 4x2 that are coming for 1.40. Pups and triple for AI traffic hopefully gets switched over to 4x2.

Train wise, I really really hope we can get more vanilla skins from SCS. Whatever is on the road, we should be able to see on a train. Intermodal and standard trailers. I'd love to see SCS bump things up another notch for Intermodal. I think there is a great opportunity in ATS to really tune into intermodal. Majority of the US is landlocked. Unlike Europe, tons of intermodal containers have to get hauled to and from train depos to coastal ports. So increasing the number of skins for Intermodal contains would be quite realistic. It would be another step in the right direction for immersion. I stopped using the 3d Company logo mod and run with the SCS companies now. I am actually kinda glad too. SCS is coming up with some pretty decent company names and these fictional name are growing on me, lol. I just hope they continue to add lots more new companies. I think 1-2 new companies per dlc isn't too bad to ask for. Heck anything is better than zero new companies. With 39 more intercontinental states left, that is only 78 more companies and can be spread thru out the US very easily. As the map grows, SCS can always replace some prefabs in older states.