OpenGeofiction
Cross-posted from my “Bliki.”
This morning, as I was working on my transit system RUTA-VC, adding stations to the many lines I’ve projected, I realized that I had crossed a milestone of sorts: RUTA-VC now has more than 1000 rail stations, including Subway, Elevated, Commuter Rail and Trams.
This seems like too many. But I’m not sure. The source-model for RUTA-VC is probably Seoul, since I know it best, with aspects of Mexico City and Chicago thrown in. Seoul is a city much larger than my current concept of VC, but it has an integrated subway/commuter rail network including about 600 stations. Many of the stations I’ve been building lately are tram stations, which Seoul doesn’t have. I like trams and wanted VC to have all the trams that a large world city would have if it had never undergone the “busification” that happened in so many cities in the 1940s-1960s. Cities like Los Angeles, Tokyo and even Mexico City once had vast tram networks. So I think adding all those tram stations creates a seemingly unrealistic number of “rail” stations, but they’re just tram platforms, every 500m or so. If I subtract the tram-only stations, I get 681 rail stations for the whole RUTA-VC network. And… currently projected routes are not finished at all. So… Still probably too many rail stations. The Ardisphere is obviously a rail-mad country.
Or… maybe VC is bigger than I thought? Here is wikipedia, on rail transit in Tokyo: “Public transport within Greater Tokyo is dominated by the world’s most extensive urban rail network (as of May 2014, the article Tokyo rail list lists 158 lines, 48 operators, 4,714.5 km of operational track and 2,210 stations…” At my current rate of rail-network building, VC is destined to reach those figures.
So, is VC Tokyo? Metro Tokyo has 30,000,000. Metro VC is supposed to be 13,000,000. A Tokyo-sized VC seems improbable… Not impossible, but improbable. I have no idea what I want to do about this. It’s a kind of “deep scaling problem” that comes from a lack of planning. I don’t want to go around deleting all the work I’ve done on such an extensive rail network. But I don’t want VC to seem unrealistically rail-mad, either.
Discussion
Comment from histor on 26 February 2015 at 09:35
What a town needs, it is needed. I do not have counted the stations of the Latina metro-network with the 15 lines and the commuter-stations too - but if there live enought people and a metro, tram or railway is necessary, the the town will build the line (if there is enought of money).
So I think, a metro (or tram) is not to draw for herself. But if your town has the structure of Tokio or Seoul, this lot of stations are logical.
Comment from Sarepava on 27 February 2015 at 23:59
Not unrealistic for a large capital city. London has 200 or so mainline stations only within the boundaries of Greater London (not even including the Overground, Underground, Tramlink and DLR) - if you include the rest of these commuter lines out to Windsor/Reading, Kent, Surrey and Essex it would total about 1000 stations. Paris has 246 RER and 381 Transillion stations, Buenos Aires 267 and Chicago 239.
Comment from Luciano on 28 February 2015 at 04:55
Thank you for your comments. Histor is right - if there is need, just build it. But in a lot of places I have been building the rail first - not because I believe that “came first” but because it’s how I decide how I want communities to be laid out or how I imagine the overall growth pattern.
I still think it’s a bit unrealistic, but I’ve decided to just be OK with it. I will assume that Ardisphere has always focused on “rail-driven” development, hence the rail “precedes” the growth. Seoul does a bit of this, with its Sindosi etc,, and I’m sure Tokyo is similar. I may revise VC’s population upward, however. Currently VC has much lower density than Asian Cities - it’s modeled to match Latin American Cities. I may increase density.
Comment from histor on 28 February 2015 at 08:59
O.k. - we draw fictional maps. But if you draw (as I the last days) first a town with middle importance (800 000 inhabitants like Givullion / Latina) and try then, to set in the necessary net of tram-lines, then you have the same problems as in reality and must make a lot of changing in the town, that your tramlines can roll.
So it is the question - first the landscape, houses and rivers and then the rails = more realistic or first motorways and rails and then the rest = more easy.
Comment from Luciano on 28 February 2015 at 09:24
@Histor. Yes, we always must balance “realism” with what we are able to do. I think for Ardisphere I am focusing on “end result” and not following a realistic development path. For Mahhal, I am doing opposite, trying to build everything “in order.” The result is that Mahhal is very very slow. Heh. But both are interesting challenges. For Villa, I just have to adjust the population to fit my preconceived rail system, I guess.