Will Simutrans simulate IRL networks

[One_Eyed_Engineer]

I had the idea for my sophomore Honors project this year to completely rework the Boston public transit network in order to make it more successful. My main questions that I need answered before I go ahead and use this software for this project are:

Can I start a file with an already existing transit network? my idea is to start with Boston modeled as it is currently, then improve from there.

Does Simutrans work with subway heavy networks? I saw some people saying that underground systems weren't modelled very well and I want to make sure Simutrans fits my needs.

Is there a full sandbox mode? I want to simulate a project where a lot of funding has been given.

How detailed is it? I would be ok with somewhat mid detail but if this is Flyout style detail that would be great

Thank you!

[prissi]

Somebody made a simulation of all England trains, so it is possible in principle. However, for a network simulation, I think other network software will be superiour. At its core, simutrans is a game and does a lot of abstractions from reality, like faster time flow and shorter distances. It is possible to tweak it but for instance, the passenger generation is not tied to the time of the day and many more restrictions.

[One_Eyed_Engineer]

Somebody made a simulation of all England trains, so it is possible in principle. However, for a network simulation, I think other network software will be superiour. At its core, simutrans is a game and does a lot of abstractions from reality, like faster time flow and shorter distances. It is possible to tweak it but for instance, the passenger generation is not tied to the time of the day and many more restrictions.

What other software would work better?

[prissi]

Simutrans is not geared towards building schedules. Experimental/Extended can work with schedules but you would still have to bother with signalling, track layout etc. So it would boil down to what aspect you focus on.

You could build something like Boston and surrounding towns and run trains and see the revenue. Then you could add variants with crossconnections and look at travel times or revenue. (Which is connected in Extended.) Still, working this out numerically in Excel is probably faster and more accurate, using the existing number of trips and potential destinations if such data are available.

There are other transport simulators which have commuters with daily changing habits, or schedule only simulators where you could try to work out denser schedules with running fewer trains. But in the end, games are not a good simulation of reality as they are based on simple models and aim to keep the player busily enterained without too much micromanagement or chores of real life.

Having said that: I am pretty sure that the real train operators use schedule simulator but have to cope with their added constraits like a finite number of drivers because noone wants to work 2 h a day during morning and evening peak times. Also train stock is limited and cannot (in the case of Boston) exchanged between lines freely.

If you just want to showcase something, and no scientific accuracy is needed, Simutrans Extended may be suitable to get you somewhat close. (You would have to do with British stock and lots of British signalling though.)

[TurfIt]

What other software would work better?

I'd take a look at JB BAHN. I've not tried it in a long long time, but vaguely remember it's good for modelling a full timetabled system.

[Matthew]

I had the idea for my sophomore Honors project this year to completely rework the Boston public transit network in order to make it more successful. My main questions that I need answered before I go ahead and use this software for this project are:

Can I start a file with an already existing transit network? my idea is to start with Boston modeled as it is currently, then improve from there.

Does Simutrans work with subway heavy networks? I saw some people saying that underground systems weren't modelled very well and I want to make sure Simutrans fits my needs.

Is there a full sandbox mode? I want to simulate a project where a lot of funding has been given.

How detailed is it? I would be ok with somewhat mid detail but if this is Flyout style detail that would be great

Thank you!

If you are thinking about this project, you should definitely begin by exploring Carl's Great Britain map, which aims to recreate the Great Britain rail timetable from about 2013 (he has a specific date in mind, but I forget when it was).

This post contains a link to the savegame and also a complete installation of Simutrans Experimental, which is now known as Simutrans Extended. If you're not familiar with it, Extended is major alternate version of Simutrans, with increased complexity and realism. You should install this in a separate directory from the Standard version of Simutrans. Simutrans can either save settings on a per-system or per-user basis; if you choose per-user then Standard and Extended will both be using the Simutrans directory in your Documents (Windows) or Home (Linux) directory, so you might want to back that up first. This project was mainly done in Extended because Standard didn't have any scheduling at that time.

The others may well be right that Simutrans isn't suitable for your purpose, but seeing Carl's modelling might give you some inspiration nonetheless. And for an academic project, explaining why you didn't use a particular methodology might also be an interesting contribution to human knowledge.