Any thoughts on a quick way to develop a schedule. I have a few books but I have not read them in a while and I would like to develop something, even temporary , for this weekend. I was thinking of simply running all extras but wheres the challenge there. I have a three track staging yard so I could hide some trains but I still need to have some kind of schedule. Should I start off with the yard working early to make up a train or two then the road crews can get started? Should I have trains ready for the road crews in the yard from the get go or just have them pull them from staging themselves? I like the idea of having the Yard Master and his assistant to deal with staging and surrounding industries. I may end up with two or even three road crews. I don’t have a long mainline but there is one town with three sidings to work.
I was also thinking of running half a day. This way I could have one passenger train in one dirrection but never gets turned.( no reversing on my layout). I could also run open load cars but only in one dirrection.
I know, I am asking for the easy way out. I do intend and have progressed on a chart for timetables and speed tabs to determine meets. I just have a few people who are interested in checking out my layout and talking about building thier own.
Anybody in my area interested we will be runnig trains and BS’ing on Saturday 9/8 around 6. PM me if you like.
For starting out, I think a sequence timetable works very well. This discussion from my web site shows one way to do it. http://www.modelrail.us/id39.html
The sequence timetable is just a way to list the order in which trains will run and the events that trigger each job to start. You can see the simple example in the link above … starting simply and adding complexity over time is the key.
I would definitely recommend having one or more trains ready-to-go at the start of the session so everyone doesn’t wait around for the yard crew to build the first train out. Real railroading is a round-the-clock business, so there’s no reason for our sessions to begin from scratch. These pre-made trains can be in staging or somewhere out on the layout, as if you’d taken a snapshot of a railroad day in progress.
Here’s a few thoughts. I developed a schedule years ago for a club I was in. Do you have MS Excel?
Make a list of the stations along the route and passing sidings.
Determine what type of trains will have priorty over other trains. For example, eastbound (EB) has priorty over westbound (WB) and passenger trains have priority over freight trains regardless of direction. Thru freights have priority over locals etc.
Time a train going from the beginning to the end. Real time is OK, fast tme is better. Determine the time it takes run from station to station or passing sidings.
Make a list of the trains you want to run during the session. EB pass, WB thru freight, local turn etc. Write each down on an index card.
But the index cards in order that you want to run trains.
Pick a start time say 8:00 am
Create a spreadsheet that lists the time the train leaves its origination point and when it passes each timed location. Assume that all trains will run at the same speed.
Just like a real timetable, make EB read down and WB read up.
The time is important even though you won’t be running based on time.- Now use Excel to create a chart. Look for where trains’ line cross each other. Do they cross at a passing siding? If not adjust the trains’ times based on priority so that they meet at a passing siding. Start at the earliest time continue doing this until all trains are adjusted.
Use this to make up index cards telling the engineer what train they are running from where to where and what trains they are to meet along the way. For example, WB freight leaves Station AB, continues W to CD siding to meet EB pass. train. Then continue WB to ST and terminate at XYZ.
This gives some order to the session. Progress sequentially through the index cards until you’re done with the cards or the session. It pre
I would start with a graphic plan, a schedule. Write the station and the times. Then start with passenger trains (if you run them), next hot freights and at last locals.
This schedule was made with CorelDraw. You can omit trains and run them as Extras.
Starting point was the prototype’s published timetable. I renamed stations to protect the guilty, but retained the prototype’s arrival and departure times.
Then I developed a daiya, a Japanese graphic timetable tool that looks a lot like wedudler’s diagram, based on the timetable. Since the prototype was accessible, I also noted when freights passed through/stopped at my key stations (and found that a lot of them ran on the times of weekend and holiday passenger schedules.)
Other things got added later, but that was the foundation on which everything else rests.
I understand that certain prototype railroads run every train as an extra, even though some of them run on fixed schedules.
As for which train is superior to which other train, Peter Josserand’s Rights of Trains covers that in exhaustive detail from a TTTO/early CTC standpoint. The book is almost half a century old (since most recent revision) but the principles remain the same.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - using the prototype’s timetable)
Folks have posted thoughts on more advanced schedule creation. Since the original poster seems to be a novice to operations and the layout has never been operated before, I’ll reiterate my earlier suggestions.
Start very simply. A sequence timetable is fine – essentially just a list of events. After you have some experience from operating in this fashion (which is fun in itself, by the way), you’ll have gained the knowledge about your interests and the idiosyncracies of your layout that will make the time investment in these more advanced approaches worthwhile.
Nothing wrong with fancier presentation and more sophisticated scheduling approaches, but I think the most important thing is to start simply and gain the knowledge from operating early and often first.
Wunderbar Wolfgang. That’s exactly what I meant. This can still be an event driven schedule and not based on time. It just let’s you know where meets are supposed to take place and allows you fill out the index cards with the proper info. The operators don’t need to see the chart.
Notice on the chart, if this is a single track line, that any time 2 trains meet, one of the must be stationary as evidenced by the vertical line being crossed by an angled line.
Cool, Cool. Thanks guys for the suggestions. I was looking for something I could make up quickly so for now Byrons suggestion fits my timetable the best. I have begun to make up a chart with train speeds and meets but I just don’t have time. Visitors arrive sat at 6. I will eventually develop a thorough, sequential schedule so I can operate myself or just one other person.
In the past I have operated with a fast clock and found it enjoyable as there were some interesting solutions people were attempting to pull off. We would simply stop the clock laugh a little and get back to it when caught up. We always used the clock as a guide not an unstopable thorn in our sides.
If all goes well I will post some results. If they don’t I will post anyhow.
