Rail passengers stations as subway stop ?

[tariely 4,496]

I did some relots of existing passenger railway stations on which there were a subway and/or bus station. Mine are not functional, though. I am not sure for the bus, but I know (by checking for instance Bripizza 15m multipurpose station in the Reader), that you can place a tile of subway in the lot, thus enabling it as a subway stop once the tile is connected to a subway line.

How do I do that ? Or is it only doable by the NAM team ? (surely not, as @mattb325 has brilliantly proven...)

[matias93 7,535]

I know for sure it's possible, and right now I'm lotting a station myself, so this comment is more of an excuse to recieve a notification when somebody knowlegdeable answers...

[rsc204 21,808]

Adding the subway connector to a station does not actually enable subway functionality. In fact, it is perfectly possible for this to work without the connector, any tile of the lot connected to a correctly modded station will work for subway transit.

The short answer to this is you need the correct Transit Switches in place. They must exist to allow sims to use the station, switching between any valid modes of transit. So for a basic Rail station to work, you must have these basic switches:

• All Directions / Outside to Inside / Ped -> Rai
  Sims walk to station from any side/edge, enter the lot, then transfer to Rail.
• All Directions / Inside to Outside / Rail -> Ped
  Sims get off trains, exit the lot on any side/edge, then walk out of the station.

Such settings allow for sims to walk to and from the station and switch to/from the rail network, but not much else. It quickly gets much more complex and the more travel types you wish to use, the more switches will need including. As such I'll expand upon this further below.

The other part of making a station work involves setting the Transit Switch Entry Cost (TSEC) and Transit Switch Capacity values. A complete run down of that is provided in this guide:

The TSEC is very important to ensure efficient usage of the station. The simplest solution is to use one of these values:

• Where Monorail/HSR is used -    .0043
• Where Rail is used                    -    .0069
• Where El-Rail/GLR is used      -    .0083

In short, look for which of the networks your lot should support that is highest in that list, then use that value.

It's also recommended to ensure you have a sufficiently high capacity to prevent issues, see the link for calculating that.

Adding Bus, Subway and/or other transport types will make the number and complexity of switches needed vastly higher. To really explain everything in depth would take an exorbitant amount of time. But here is a simplified break down of available switches and usage scenarios:

Through Connections:

• West,East or North,South Only:
  For example, looking at the sample station from Matais' post above, such switches would be North,South. But if the transit runs from left to right, it would be West,East.
  • Rail - Rail
  • El Train - El Train
  • Monorail - Monorail
  • Freight Train - Freight Train
• All Directions:
  • Pedestrians - Pedestrians
  • Subway - Subway

Note: All switches here need both Out to In and In to Out versions for the same transit types.

Transit Switching (i.e. converting from one network to another):

• All Directions:
  • El Train - Ped
  • Subway - Ped
  • Rail - Ped
  • Bus - Ped
  • Car - Ped*

Note that these switches are based on Out to In,  the reverse is used for In to Out, i.e. El-Train to Ped becomes Ped to El-Train.

• Outside to Inside ONLY:
  • Freight Truck to Freight Train
  • Car to Ped

These are special cases, since Rail to Truck freight makes no sense in SC4.

* - Similarly, whilst Ped to Car is a valid switch, you may prefer not to use it. Because that will allows sims to switch from other transport types at a station and get into a car to continue their journey. However there are scenarios where that may actually be useful.

To summarise, the through connections allow Rail Networks, Pedestrians and/or Freight Trains to travel through the lot, without switching. I.e. allowing sims to travel through the lot without switching transport networks.

Whilst the transit switching converts all traffic types (Outside) to Pedestrian traffic (Inside). Once inside the lot, all traffic is Pedestrian (Inside), but there should be switches allowing Ped traffic to leave the lot via all traffic types (Outside). I hope that makes some sense. But in essence this ensures all potential traffic conversions work correctly.

[tariely 4,496]

Thank you VERY much, Robin. Something new to learn how to do in SC4 !