Hi, this is the first idea I want to propose and discuss: In real life, many times a piece of track is built aside the road with the bus stop (like in the picture) so the bus won't be in the way of other vehicles while stopped. Maybe Simutrans could have that kind of bus stop available: it would be very helpful with traffic and much more realistic than building full pieces of dead end or parallel roads just to build a bus stop that won't disturb traffic, especially when you want to program the bus to wait a certain level of load to go on. I look at the Parking Lot feature and I think, if in a square there's room for the road plus the parking lane then there's room for a bus stop in wich the bus come aside the flowing lane to make its stop. That's how it works in real life.
The tile system in Simutrans doesn't allow this. To change this would require a huge change in the way Simutrans works, one which would have other benefits also, but would take a lot of work.
I think the biggest problem might be whether there is room for four vehicles abreast, plus graphics for the halt itself, on a single tile. If there isn't, and one must take all major pak sets into consideration, it will look ugly without a massive change that will likely never happen. If four vehicles do fit, making vehicles pull over to the right (assuming drive on right here) to stop at a halt shouldn't be any more difficult than overtaking. But it takes someone with the time and motivation to do it. Since there isn't much traffic in Simutrans beyond your own buses, most vehicles passing a halt will likely stop there (at least in my games), making such a feature less pressing. For big bus terminals, using loading bays (or bus bays if the pak set provides it) are an not unrealistic alternative.
If the way is free, such a bus will be overtaken. Obviously not before crossings etc. though.
For me that partially solves the problem, but I've never seen that happen though. I'll do some tests to check it is really working in my simulator. Unfortunatelly I'm traveling now so I'll have to wait until next month. By the way, only one square from the crossing ahead is enough for the overtaking to take place?
I believe you need two. Haven't checked the code, so I'm just guessing from what I think I once saw.
I ran a quick test, and two road tiles between bus stop and intersection will allow a vehicle to overtake a vehicle waiting at the bus stop, but just one won't.
Huh. This changes some building strategies for me... Two tiles, eh? I need to play Pak Britain with its expanded city sizes. :D
Quote from: Ters on May 16, 2015, 07:09:50 AM
I ran a quick test, and two road tiles between bus stop and intersection will allow a vehicle to overtake a vehicle waiting at the bus stop, but just one won't.
I wasn't even aware of that feature, but on testing (nightly rr7542) one tile between intersection and bus stop was enough...
Quote from: DirrrtyDirk on May 17, 2015, 09:12:14 AM
I wasn't even aware of that feature, but on testing (nightly rr7542) one tile between intersection and bus stop was enough...
Top speed of overtaking vehicles and/or road speed limit is possibly a factor.