Developing Express & Overtaking Trains

[Guy the Wise]

Hi; it's been a while.
I'm currently playing through a new game to get some rust off my fingers. However, I'm running into an age-old problem: train overtaking.
I usually stick onto Standard; the Extended features are very nice, but I prefer going more old-school. That, and I'm unsure if I can use all the addons I've collected correctly in Extended; I've got quite a lot.
My normal run consists of setting up passenger and freight as soon as possible in the steam era. Being a more frugal person, especially in the beginning, I mix both onto the same line. Freight is slower, hitting speeds of 45kph. Passenger services can hit 75. This I can easily deal with - build a passing loop and route the freight to go "into the hole" (take the loop). The loop is set up so that slower trains in the loop get easily overtaken by the passenger services.
However, later on when my empire is much bigger, I keep running into this problem: armies building up at certain locations, wanting to go to other certain locations. I've got a good amount of dough in the back, but since I want to build stuff as if I were in charge of an actual railroad, I build passing loops around stations and set up an express train. I want to try to load the express train up first with those passengers and leave the remnants to the local services; I want to save the local services for local stops instead of taking on passengers that could be better serviced with the express train. However, even the express services can only go 75kph due to locomotive top speed. Due to this, it keeps lagging behind the same local service, getting stopped every time the local stops. This also allows the locals to take on passengers it really shouldn't have business with, therefore making me lose tons of cash on the express. I could build longer loops, but I find that wasteful. Is there a way to ensure the express service can weave through the locals and freight without essentially dedicating a separate track just for itself?

[Sirius]

The most reliable way is to build a pasing loops at local stops and put the platforms on the sidings, so the express train doesnt have to slow down.
Placing signals before such stations quite densely will also assist.
Oh, another nice tool is schedules.

[prissi]

There are also the recent addition of priority signals, which helps too with passing of trains on side tracks. Those reserve two blocks so there is a higher chance than a local train on a station needs to wait for the express, especially of the first signal after the station is not too close.

[Guy the Wise]

The most reliable way is to build a pasing loops at local stops and put the platforms on the sidings, so the express train doesnt have to slow down.
Placing signals before such stations quite densely will also assist.
Oh, another nice tool is schedules.

This seems to work pretty good, but I've noticed the commuters sometimes still pull ahead of the expresses. I know about the schedule tool, but I'm only seeing minimum load & wait time. Would I need to construct dummy stations or something?

There are also the recent addition of priority signals, which helps too with passing of trains on side tracks.

Priority signals? I haven't seen those, but I have seen that "GreedyBlockSignals" is a newer feature. Would you be referencing that?

[Sirius]

I know about the schedule tool, but I'm only seeing minimum load & wait time.

I am not quite sure about this. Possibly schedules are not yet included in the latest standard build. So either use a nightly or wait a new release.

[prissi]

The greedy block signal is the priority signals, i.e. try to reserve the next next signal if possible or else just resrve the next and only stop the train of the next is not free either.

[Guy the Wise]

My apologies for not responding sooner; got busy with other things.

Possibly schedules are not yet included in the latest standard build.

I've got the latest stable I believe (122 r9274). Not there; just minimum load & wait time. I could cheese it with an invisible car that carries a cargo not found in the game ("1 nothing"), but it'd probably be a bit hard to find one; I'm not experienced in developing addons in the slightest. Either that, or maybe a dummy station with no capacity.

The greedy block signal is the priority signals, ....

I've tried it out in different situations and I can say that this works great for me. Thank you for the information; I'll be sure to use them a lot in the future.

[EmelyLu]

My apologies for not responding sooner; got busy with other things.I've got the latest stable I believe (122 r9274). Not there; just minimum load & wait time. I could cheese it with an invisible car that carries a cargo not found in the game ("1 nothing"), but it'd probably be a bit hard to find one; I'm not experienced in developing addons in the slightest. Either that, or maybe a dummy station with no capacity.I've tried it out in different situations and I can say that this works great for me. Thank you for the information; I'll be sure to use them a lot in the future.

This game isn't openttd. It's more like it's long lost relation. So no grfs...

[prissi]

Simutrans addone are easier to make than grf, luckily. Back to topic, the schedule feature is a feature of the nightly. The next release may be soon however.

[Sirius]

I guess it's rather about the ingame addon/new grf manager vs simutrans addon folder, so many people don't even know that simutrans supports addons nor are there many addons available out there.