speed limit curious

[mkid6985 0]

In a youtube video that I recently saw, it described the speed limits on each type of road we used in our network from street to highways. the speed limits ended with the suffix kph, and I jus wanted to know, was kph supposed to be mph, cuz I calculated how fast kph was on each road type and realistically, the speed limits were no where near what they really are on each road type if they were indeed kph speed limits.

[Duke87 1,070]

Can you provide a link to this video?

[Vahr 341]

The thing is with SC4 is that it even though we can logically deduce that speeds are defined as KPH, they really aren't; they're generic units.

In Simulator Z, the speeds are as follows:

Road: 50 (Same as ave in order for proper NWM functionality)

EHWY: 110 (Highway Network)

Street: 30

Ave: 50 (Same as road in order for proper NWM functionality)

OneWay: 75

RHW: 110 (Highway Network)

GHWY: 110 (Highway Network)

The NAM Unified Simulator (Based on Z I think) has similar values, but balanced the same way as above. In the game the speed doesn't matter too much as compared to how the speeds relate to each other.

If we were to suppose that these speeds are in KPH (which they really aren't) we come up with the following (speeds rounded to the nearest 5):

Road and Ave: 30 MPH

Street: 20 MPH

OneWay: 45 MPH

E&GHighway, RHW: 70 MPH

So either way they do fit pretty realistically in (+/- 5 MPH in pretty much all of them)

[mkid6985 0]

oh ok cool...thanks for clearin that up

[z1 566]

Originally posted by: Blue Lightning

The thing is with SC4 is that it even though we can logically deduce that speeds are defined as KPH, they really aren't; they're generic units.quote>

Once you know that tiles are exactly 16m on each side, it can be shown (and has been, in multiple places), both by calculation and by experiment, that the speeds are in kph.  They aren't generic units.

The NAM Unified Simulator (Based on Z I think)...quote>

The base versions of the NAM Unified Traffic Simulator are identical to Simulator Z v2.2, which was released on the forums, but not with the NAM.

In the game the speed doesn't matter too much as compared to how the speeds relate to each other.quote>

Actually, this isn't true; the absolute value of the speeds matters a fair amount, as they have to relate properly to certain other constants in the game.  This is a big reason the "5x speed" and "10x speed" traffic simulators were removed from the NAM a couple of years ago.

If we were to suppose that these speeds are in KPH (which they really aren't) we come up with the following (speeds rounded to the nearest 5):

Road and Ave: 30 MPH

Street: 20 MPH

OneWay: 45 MPH

E&GHighway, RHW: 70 MPH

So either way they do fit pretty realistically in (+/- 5 MPH in pretty much all of them).quote>

In the final release of Simulator Z, which became the NAM Unified Traffic Simulator, all highway speeds were raised from 110 kph to 150 kph to generate more realistic highway usage.  At first glance, this seems to throw the highway speeds out of sync with the other speeds.  Actually, it does just the opposite.  Although the highway speeds are now higher than RL, the other speeds were all along as well.  The reason for this is that even though the other speeds seem to match real-world speed limits, people don't actually travel that fast through cities due to stoplights, stop signs, bus stops, etc.  For example, in a city where the speed limit on roads is 30 mph, you're generally lucky to average 20 mph.  Taking this into account, the new highway speeds fit in properly, since highways are the one network in which there are no stops in RL.  (Congestion is factored in by the traffic simulator, at least to a large extent.)  But you can't just reduce all the traffic simulator speeds by a third to get actual travel speeds; although the individual speeds would be more realistic, the traffic simulation would be worse, for reasons that we cannot correct.

[Vahr 341]

Ah, thanks for the clarification Steve. Looks like I need to go over the stuff again, its been a while.

And of course I'm all for more highway traffic

[Cyrilix 0]

Blue Lightning, where do you get the Simulator Z speeds from? Also, would you mind giving us the rail speeds as well? (GLR, HSR, regular rail, subway)? Thanks.

[z1 566]

You can get them from the Simulator Z exemplar. The rail speeds are as follows:

Subway, el rail, GLR, and freight train: 105 kph

Passenger rail: 140 kph

Monorail, HSR, & BTM: 225 kph

[Cyrilix 0]

Valuable information. Thanks, z1.