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Linear route - passengers going the "long way round"

Started by AP, February 28, 2012, 10:36:28 PM

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AP

Hi everyone

Just noticed odd behaviour in-game, using the latest Simutrans Experimental and pak.britain-ex.

I have a linear route A-B-C-D-E (actually about 20 stops in total). It was set up without using the "mirror schedule" function, ie ABCDEDCB every stop except A and E was listed twice. I noticed that, at the termini, vehicles were arriving full of passengers, most of whom were not for the terminus, but rather were going in the other direction, and who logically ought to have not boarded until the vehicle went past their origin station in the other direction. As thought it were a circular route.

So I tried re-making the line with the mirror-schedule function this time, thinking that must be the problem. So now the route reads ABCDE only, no repeated stops. But it makes no difference.

I can't help but thinking it's distorting the economy of my game, since the passengers are occupying a seat for significantly longer than necessary (it's a long route!) and stopping other passengers from boarding.

Is this known/intended behaviour?



jamespetts

I have not definitively tested for this issue, but I wonder whether it might be connected to these issues for which Carl has released an as yet unapplied fix.
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Carl

The only time I've seen this phenomenon is when I was accidentally running trains which were too long for the platforms at certain stations. If that's the case, passengers in the last carriage(s) won't be able to alight at those stations and will stay on the convoy indefinitely. Could that explain the problem?

There is a bug relating to this sort of thing which been meaning to track down -- but I've never before seen it on a perfectly linear route (it usually arises on "loop lines" in the style of Merseyrail in  Liverpool.)

AP

The route in question is riverine, with ships, so am pretty sure it's a not platform length issue. I know the loop-line bug, it's been around a while I think, whereas for me also this is the first time I've seen it on a linear route.

I think I have a savegame which should show the behaviour, if that's of use (can upload it if someone will suggest where best?).

I don't know if the phenomenon mentioned here is related (maybe not).
QuoteAt some point I even saw passengers from B to A making the trip to C, and remaining in the train for the return journey



omikron

That may be fixed with Carl Baker's new routing patch. When the waiting times at B for A are getting too long, then it might be faster to travel via C, even if this means remaining in the train at the endstop. I would retry the savegame in question with this patch included.

I have not noticed anything strange anymore since I applied it.

omikron

Carl

I think the error being reported here is more serious than that. The code is supposed to stop passengers from stop C to stop E from boarding a convoy which will return to stop C again before it reaches stop E -- and waiting times should play no part in this. If the above is right then this bit of code isn't working properly in some cases. We know that it works in most cases (otherwise we'd see this bug reported all the time), so maybe this is a ship-related error?

omikron

I think it is working properly: The waiting time from B to A is getting so long, that the waiting time from B to C + travel time B to C + waiting time C to A + travel time C to A is faster than the direct way. The passengers board at B in order to go to C, their via-destination, where they leave and rebord immediately for A.

This is especially pertinent on long routes where most passengers will want to go to the terminus in order to change convoy - the stop next to the terminus quickly gets overcrowded because most convoys arriving are already full.

omikron

AP

Quote from: omikron on February 29, 2012, 08:34:15 PMThis is especially pertinent on long routes where most passengers will want to go to the terminus in order to change convoy - the stop next to the terminus quickly gets overcrowded because most convoys arriving are already full.
Exactly the phenomenon which brought the issue to my attention. The last 2-3 stops, actually, because of the length of the route.

Carl

Quote from: omikron on February 29, 2012, 08:34:15 PM
I think it is working properly: The waiting time from B to A is getting so long, that the waiting time from B to C + travel time B to C + waiting time C to A + travel time C to A is faster than the direct way. The passengers board at B in order to go to C, their via-destination, where they leave and rebord immediately for A.

This is especially pertinent on long routes where most passengers will want to go to the terminus in order to change convoy - the stop next to the terminus quickly gets overcrowded because most convoys arriving are already full.

omikron

Aha! Now I understand. I had previously thought that passengers were staying on board at C rather than alighting and then reboarding. Thanks for clarifying.

In that case, one of the goals of the waiting times patch that people have been referring to is to reduce such anomalies. At the moment, this anomaly will perpetuate itself because lots of zero waiting times will be registered at C. My patch stops these artificially low waiting times from being registered, and so hopefully the anomaly will iron itself out over time.

Of course, where there is overcrowding, unavoidable anomalies will often arise.

omikron

@Carl
Until you explained your patch, saying that the passengers left in order to immediately bord again instead of just staying on the train, this clarified it for me. I had always thought of the pax simply staying on the train/boat. Now I undertsand their behaviour.

omikron

AP

In fairness, it is perfectly normal human behaviour. I used to do it with a bus route I had to ride at rush hour. If I went the wrong way at the start, I got a seat from the terminus. On an outgoing bus I'd always have to stand.