Station/dock combinations that can be two units high

[MProoveIt]

What I would like to be able to do is create iron ore/taconite pellet docks for railcars/ships such as exist on the Great Lakes in North America.

The most popular type, the stub-ended docks such as currently exist at:
Duluth, Minnesota,
Two Harbors, Minnesota
Marquette, Michigan

Similar docks existed at many other locations on the Great Lakes but are no longer in use.

Docks at these locations had 2 or more tracks on top over pockets (hopper bins) that fed chutes that directed material directly into vessel holds.

But also, it would be nice to create the type of continuous dumping dock as exists at Taconite Harbor, Minnesota, which was used by Erie Mining Co. (see https://th.bing.com/th/id/R.601e5ae704c ... ImgRaw&r=0)

This dock allowed for dumping ore cars on the move into storage bins, then conveyors would be extended over the hatches on the arriving vessels.

Would these dock types even be possible in OpenTTD? Is it even feasible to create this functionality in OpenTTD (or something similar, like SimuTrans)?

If these are feasible with the current code, I'm interested in learning what I need to know to create these in a NewGRF.

[kamnet]

Won't be able to do anything exactly like that, it's just not something that the game could currently handle. Currently the game has no way to implement elevated rails and stations that raise up over the land.

What a person MIGHT be able to do is create an object that looks like the hopper bins that could overlap a land tile next to it, and then put a station on top of that piece of land, and then connect a bridge to it. It would kinda/sorta simulate it. You'd still need a regular dock tile for the ship to pull up to, though. The sprites would have to be drawn pretty elaborately in order to pull off the realistic effect.

This is a very rough and badly drawn example, but you kinda get what I mean.

[MProoveIt]

Thanks for taking the time to mock this up and explain it. I've played the game off and on since TTD came out originally (and original Railroad Tycoon before that) and I really appreciate the OpenTTD community.

It's good to know how the game's limitations make this essentially impractical.

I wonder if there are any similar games are not limited in these ways such that these dock types would be practical, as I'd like to one day digitally model some of these operations. I have done some actual railroad modeling, but the scale of some things I'd like to model are just too large for anything but digital.

[Not In Service]

A bit of a late reply but was browsing the forums and figured this may be helpful and lead to some design ideas possibly: Sometimes you can multi-tier stations if the corner tiles align as per this example (foundations touching a station's corner count to join it as part of the station and function as one larger facility which works and this is a vanilla OpenTTD thing)

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/ ... 3393630600

so it might be possible to combine that possibility with the earlier suggestion from kamnet where there's a station tile or tiles that would work for this with a clever bit of terrain setup and station tiles placements, all you need is to have that diagonal tile link upwards so you could probably get something close as it might be possible to use one of these tiles to then extend rail (or other as required) station tiles outwards from above behind and in parallel line with the dock.

Something close may even be possible with the current station tiles in new grf sets or if not it would maybe be possible to design the right tiles to build such a facility with.

Might depend on the terraforming vs building options though as the example above isn't exactly this so it's only a maybe I've not tested in-game, where it could come unstuck as an idea is for example in that design you'd maybe need to be able to build on and out from the tile where the red station label (Kemin Test Docks) is which might be scuppered by how foundation 'fillers' work (the striped brown bits that build on slopes) but if this is a problem maybe such a tile could go higher if that's doable code wise- some do like the bridges and shoe house- or maybe there's a way of allowing station tiles built level with a higher reference point station tile, so in that image level with the higher of the three bus stations, imagine that being extended out to where the dock is but at the same height as the highest station.

Another option thinking of your Taconite Harbor, Minnesota idea is if you can't put the station above due to (I think) still not being able to build elevated stations on raised bridge-like structures there may be a way to mimic this with a station where you can put one where you can and some bridge track where you can't (you'd just need to fix the land to join a bridge on), may even be possible if you can get the station after the bridged bit train entry wise to use an overlong train so it is partly above the dock when stationed and unloading/loading but again not sure if could do that for sure as it needs some clever fudging of how things place and align and how trains function so it depends if there's a way to get everything creating the right visual illusion of the harbor workings and design.

But it's an idea also useful for some creative thinking as there may be some interesting station/ multi-transport hub possibilities in this with the right station tile additions and maybe adapting how the foundations work if needs be.

[odisseus]

It is already possible to construct something similar with ISR Stations and ISR/DWE Objects.

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