Topic: How do you name your routes?

[accord2]

I'd like to know how you name your routes?
I use this system:
First I write the transport type: B (bus) S (ship) R (regional train) U (urban train) IR (train between regions) HS (high speed train) LR (light rail) T (tram) A (plane) M (goods train/bus)
Then I write the first and last station name, or instead a route name (e.g.: R San Luca or R Town1 - Town2)

[Ters]

For intercity passenger routes, I use the name of the two cities at either end, joined by a hyphen. On very rare occasions, it serves three cities, in which case the name is three names joined by hyphens.
For intracity passenger train lines, I use the name of the city plus "Local". If there are more, which is rare, I would add a running number. Intracity bus and tram lines have the name of the city plus a number. Intracity mail lines are made up of city name, "Mail" and a running number. Passenger and mail lines serving factories and attractions outside the city proper have the name of the factory or attraction rather than a number. If the line manages to serve more than one, I will use some descriptive word like "Hills" or "Industries". If necessary, I will add a running number as well.

Goods lines will be named for the destination city, the type of goods and, if necessary, a running number. Sometimes, multiple lines are needed to get the goods all the way. Usually because I use trucks for the final leg inside the city, but it can also be because I use ships to cross some water. In that case, the lines will have "A", "B", etc. right after the number. Some boxed goods lines may operate more like passenger lines, with goods of different type to and from multiple places on the same train, in which case I use a similar naming to passenger lines, but with "Goods" after the city names. If mail has been split from passengers late in the game, mail lines are the same, just with "Mail".

In addition, my trains are named after the lines they serve, postfixed by a running number. Ships have proper names. Other vehicles just use the default name.

[el_slapper]

I keep the initial number, that I find very practical, and add details, like "(1) Coal Zeebrugge Auckland", or "(497) Air Vladivostok Brasilia". enough, and practical.

[yswang]

I do similarly as you.

I write transportation system first,
for example:
AIR for plane,
AIR HELICOPTER for helicopter,
BUS for intracity bus, intracity trolleybus or intracity bi-articulated bus,
BUS AREA for bus, trolleybus or bi-articulated bus of region, intercity,
BUS BRT for bus rapid transit,
BUS CABLE for aerial lift,
BUS HIGHWAY for highway bus ,
BUS MRT for rubber-tyred mass rapid transit,
CARGO for any freight by truck, train,ship or plane,
FERRY for ocean shipping or canal,
MLM for maglev,MLM from http://simutrans.fr/doku.php?id=en:mlm_dev,
MONO for monorail,
TRAIN for conventional rail,
TRAIN COMMUTER for regional commuter train,
TRAIN HSR for high speed train,
TRAIN MRT for railroad mass rapid transit,
TRAIN SHINKANSEN for shinkansen(新幹線, new trunk line, from Japanese) train,
TRAIN SUBWAY for underground train,
TRAM for streetcar or light rail.

then the second,
city code of the first station is put,
I numbered every city a code so that the route is sorted by city code.

At late,
the purpose of the route and the city name which the first and last station is at,
It may be "city A to city H regional bus line", "city A - city D - city H express train line" or "city A to city H coal truck line".
But I use another number code for intracity route.
So it may be "city A canal line 02" or "city B intracity bus line 63B".

[ROCAMBOLER529]

oh well nothing difficult

cityname-cityname, for air, routes, rail, ships, monorails, maglevs & street cars between cities of passengers.
cityname for buses, street cars, monorails & maglevs for local lines of passengers.
cityname-cityname M for air, busus, railways, ships, monorails, maglevs & street cars between cities of mails.
cityname M for street cars, buses, monorails & maglevs for local lines of mails.
cityname-stop/tourist attraction/industrie, for buses street cars, monorails, maglevs between a city & a stop combination, tourist attraction or an industrie for passengers
cityname-stop/tourist attraction/industrie M, for buses, street cars, monorails, maglevs between a city & a stop combination, tourist attraction or an industrie for mails

Goodname (number) for railways, trucks & ships of goods example; paper (01); paper (02); wood (01)...
CARGO (number) for air that it contains goods example; Cargo (01); Cargo (02); Cargo (03)...

and thats all

[NNW]

Cityname-Number for Innercity Routes
Cityname-Cityname for Route between Cities
Start point-Ending point-Good name for Cargo routes

[PitecoSheldon]

Hello everybody,

It's my first message here in the forum 

Me, I name very aleatory my routes, but that follows a little bit the Parisian lines:

For trains, I use the "RER" names, like RER A and after I write the names of the initial and end cities of the line. I use trains only for long distances, so it's not two or more train stations in a same city.

For metros, i list all the line with numbers and each station receive a noun of a personality (like Albert Einstein). For each line I write so a number and the initial and terminus station.

For buses, I have listed each city with a number. Normally, I use bus lines only in a city, they don't connect two cities (it has some exceptions). So I list the bus lines with the number of the cities service and two others numbers. In big cities, I try (i repeat, I TRY) to list with zones to in the third number. So I have XXYZ, XX or XXX (I have 150 cities, something like that) for the city number, Y listed if I have zones and Z for the number of the line.

For airplanes, I just write the name of the cities connected by the airline, normally only two.

That's all for me. Sorry about my english!

[chung390]

Pak128.jp player here.
I use a random city's name for the line. I mention every line that the train passes through.
Then I separate the fast and slow trains (sometimes I add names for the express trains)
After that I add the terminals if it only serves for a part of the line.

For trucks I currently use 'A-B Delivery Truck'

[accord2]

Hello everybody,

It's my first message here in the forum 

Be welcome!

[accord2]

I keep the initial number, that I find very practical, and add details, like "(1) Coal Zeebrugge Auckland", or "(497) Air Vladivostok Brasilia". enough, and practical.

That sounds a great way to name routes! Why do you find the initial number practical?

[el_slapper]

That sounds a great way to name routes! Why do you find the initial number practical?

3 main reasons. First of all, a mere number is a rather useful mnemotechnic tool. So I can remember the (53) is the Air link between the two parts of the maps, for example. It also sorts the lines according to their creation date, which helps finding them, as I remember more or less when I opened what. Finally, it warrants a unicity of the name - (3) Tram Saint Denis and (99) Tram Saint Denis are two different tram lines that stay within the boundaries of the city.

Said otherwise, I'm playing with the limits and the potentialities of the human brain. Lacking creativity for a different name for each tram(or Trolleybus) line within the town is not a problem. And it also holds an history of when I created things.

[MobileRod]

Considering I usually play only passenger service, I name each line after its origin and destination. I tend to change stop names, so I can remember them better. Most lines are served with buses, and when they reach a large number I give them line codes, which will be grouped by town attended and service (within a certain town; between different towns; between some hub town and a neighborhood in another town etc), so that I can locate them easily in the list.

Some examples:
"Library" (in this case I only attend one town with more than one line)
"Renden - Library" (the same line, given Renden the name of the town; in this case I attend some towns with more than one line each)
"Renden x Renbury" (line between different towns)
"Renden x Renbury (Floresta)" (in this case, Renden would be a "hub", and this line links it to a point in Renbury, not downtown, which I randomly renamed)
"Renden x Appington (via Renbury)" (this line links two different towns, but has a stop in (an)other important town(s) in the middle)
"110 Renden x Appington (via Renbury)" (same line above, but in this case I have too many lines so I need to organize them)
"Train Renden x Appington" (a train instead of a bus - I usually run train services only when busses need but can't support more traffic)

[accord2]

"Renden x Appington (via Renbury)" (this line links two different towns, but has a stop in (an)other important town(s) in the middle)

I liked that idea of via X. I'm going to use it too 

[KJ]

I developed a name scheme after playing on a map big enough to get a few routes mixed up. What I came up with kept the names as short as possible while still giving a full description:

tBRU1-ANT4bul

This means truck from Brussels station 1 to Antwerp station 4 carrying bulk items.

The first character being vehicle type helps me quickly see if I have multiple modes of transport. T for truck because they are most common. tn for train, b for bus, sh for ship, fer for ferry etc.
Second and third parts obviously are the location name followed by unique identifier for each station. For bus only stops I use b1, b2, etc so that keeps from usually hitting double digit numbers in one city.
The last part is the first 3 letters of the item, oil, crates, livestock, or just a simple p for passenger. I generally just use oil for anything that is fluid like that so it stays simple. I don't bother with p on buses or ferries because that's a given but on trains it is very easy to spot my passenger trains mixed in with goods. For ships I just use sh and the locations, shMIA1-NYC1, since you can use the same route for ships carrying different goods. You could use sh for ferry lines but I found it worth keeping them separate.
When I concentrate goods into single purpose docks/stations I will name it something like South Bulk Depot and use SBD for the location. Seeing BD in a name really stands out.

Playing with 26 cities is often big enough to be challenging so if I play on a map with 26 or less cities then I will take some time to rename all the cities A -Z. Saves all the typing by making each location be a single capital letter and is easier to sort through. Also it gives me a chance to shorten all those crazy long names like Benton on Thames that can clutter up the map.

[1993matias]

You all overcomplicate stuff, I think. I tend to keep it simple, see:
R = train service (Regional) for most stopping and semi-stopping services.
IC = train intercity services with few stops, also fast trains
U = Subway/underground/U-bahn
S = Suburban rail
NG = Narrow gauge

CB = Intra-city bus service
RB = inter-city bus service
CT = intra-city tram
CE = intra-city trolleybus (=electric)
CM/RM = intra-/inter-city mail truck

All these get the relevant city or city pairs as a suffix. Bus services in the city are sequentially numbered (e.g. CB London 1, CB London 2, CB London 3 ... )

X, Y, or Z = cargo to put them at the bottom of the list

Much easier to work with than those complicated systems haha

[Freahk]

R - regional services
Medium diatance, speed 120-160
Stops everywhere when it's the only service on that route, skips the least important stations when those are served by suburb services.

IC - intercity services
Long distance, speed 200-225
Usually one stop per town, but might skip or bypass some towns.

ICx or ES - high speed services
Long distance - speed <= 250
Usually one stop per metropolitan area.

IR - regional services expanding across regions
Long distance, speed 160-200
Basically the same stop pattern as R services on a longer route

S - suburb services
Short distance, speed 100-145
Stops everywhere, connecting the biggest cities to nearby suburbs

RT or also S - tram-trains
Short stop distance, speed 80-100
Stops everywhere. Linking nearby city centers directly.

Intra city:
U - rapid transit lines
T - city trams
C - citybus
CE - express citybus

M - any mail services

Intra city services are named
Type town number

Intercity services are named
Type number origin destination "via" list - of - important - intermediate - stops

That's my naming scheme after 1900

[KneeOn]

InterAir - Town-Town for air
SeaRider - Town-Town for passenger ferries
SeaHail - Town(factory)-Town(factory) for boat freight
(Town) Buses (route number)  - local bus network
National Link (route number) - Town-Town for national buses


I mostly play rail and use
SubUrb - Town-Town for local passenger services
Intercity - Town-Town for intercity lines
(Town) AirLink - airport services
CountyRail - Town-Town for non-urban, regional rails




For subway lines, it will be (town) metro/underground/subway/transport and then a line number, lette or I'll give it a name like "Serpentine" or some other generic name.