News Regarding the CSX Tampa Terminal Route

The route I usually like to do in the winter-spring seasons is the CSX Tampa Terminal area from Tampa-Lakeland-Auburndale-Vitis and etc, pretty much CSX operations in the western half of Florida. Since we're getting back to that time of the year I've started to concentrate on it.

One of my conflicting issues with the route, however, is the ever-changing trackwork. Already areas that were modeled between 2011-2012 have changed drastically. Originally, I was going to ignore the changes, but due to the fact that the changes reflect more trains, and it will improve operational realism to do so, I am adding the new changes into the new year.

Key changes include:

• Siding between Lakeland Junction and 10th Street near Kathleen
• Siding in Knights
• Super Siding between Lumberton (1 mile south of Vitis Junction) and Ellerslie (ex. Distant to Dade City)
• Big improvements to Winter Haven including the new intermodal ramp set to open next year

Expect screens to show up over the Holiday break.

More Key Lime Pie, Please? KWE Progress!

I felt a bit motivated to pick up on the FEC Key West Extension project. Lots of the work I managed to do was to clean up some messy roadways, like the South Miami area. US-1 and Sunset is kind of sort of up to date with freshly programmed signals and a new station.

Also, what I'd call part 2 of the Dadeland area, part 1 completed last year, is almost done. This involves a fully functional crossing-intersection at SW 71 AV and SW 84 ST. Put a railroad in the picture and the intersection, with the garage of a Tri-Rail and Metrorail station behind, can be extremely busy. The traffic light design at 71st and 84th proper is partly inspired by International Drive and Conventon Way in Orlando, FL due to its feel and function.
Also, to answer the absence of a rail platform on the Belt line side, as I plan to operate a Tri-Rail line on this line, I'll be adding a station to the south (right) of 84th Street.

Also, I'll add that a more up to date road system will be developed over the coming months, as well as the possibilities of getting the crossings fitted with Ryan's new system. Traffic lights will also be done with hopefully LED coronas.

While the first two pics brought out the roadgeek in me, I saw fit to balance it with a pure railroad scene. I did a rough job of the Homestead Intermodal and Automotive Ramp in the throat between US-1 and Card Sound Road. The original working was skew to both, but I chose to have it parallel Card Sound more instead in a redo that was done the other day. Your pure Florida railroad scene of a FEC loco switching the ramp will be coming to a computer screen near you!

It is also from here where the Turkey Point Coal Trains will have a place to go. An equally level extension to the game map was made two miles east of here, allowing for a loop reasonably close to the actual power plant. That loop is connected to the looping IM yard lead via a spur and turnout by the interchange between US-1 and Card Sound. (This fourth image predates the third image)

More to come, including an ops session with JR's new FEC engines!

Tampa Terminal Back in Business after SP1 Snafu

I am glad to say for the most part all the missing dependencies in the CSX Tampa Terminal route (aka "CSX Tampa-Winston-BV") have been since resolved. Since I moved to a pooched TS12 SP1 installation, I lost some files when trying to back up my content, and when I reinstalled the game to the correctly installed SP1 they showed up missing. A couple of obsolete signals of mine and dispensable assets from others show faulty but I think with those being removed or replaced, (and with a new signal system slowly in the works from yours truly), the route is back on track to be released in the future.

The missing dependencies were mainly textures that aid strongly in speeding up the routebuilding. The color textures form an atlas roadmap of the area which allows roads and infrastructure to be pinpointed easily.

Plant City

Back after a little break in Trainz. Plant City is now continuing to grow in Trainz, with me building outwards of the diamond. Much of this has been inspired by my recent trip to Plant City a couple of weeks ago.

84 Lumber is shaping up at Park and US 92. This is a steady customer along the A-Line. You can even see the beam cars from the intersection.

At best it could be said that I improvised this high school. The property was recently detailed last week.

The NW corner of the "Improvement League" per Google Earth has also been textured.

Areas like Oaklawn (above) and Calhoun (below) are also beginning to shape up. I caught a few trains at Calhoun St in particular so I was quite motivated to detail the crossing.

There remains a whole lot of work to do. Much of the balance of it is to get Plant City to Auburndale completely finished. Also, before I graduate I hope to have quite a bit of S-line trackage towards Zephyrhills textured.

Operating more than two trains in Trainz...

Lots of routes generally have this figured out through AI, but I am still at the caveman stage of doing it myself. I ran an op session yesterday in the eastern section of the route with three trains in conflict of each other.

The story went that Q452 was going closer to being on the law, and E109 empty coal was in the way. E109 tucked into Winter Haven Siding to let Q452 pass so that it would hit Lakeland first.

A SB on the A-line, an R741 in game but in the place of Q187, was fast approaching once this train went past Auburndale. So I slid it into Carters... a perfect but close fit. The 4,800 foot siding can barely hold it.

Eventually the all business R741 overtook 452 on its run to Tampa.

After that, the two Miami trains went on happy and jolly.

This was a generally successful operation. One easy part was no one was in opposite directions to the train but overall it was a priority fight. I could just slam the drive button on all three but didn't choose to do so since the route was incomplete and signal information could be off.

Running three or more trains manually is pretty easy but you need to know all the lengths, locations, distances, and what siding can take them. Automatically it's all boring as you don't have control of the throttle and boy do I like to man it. One challenge is you may lose coordination so your train may end up doing a 60 in a 30.

This multiple train run is the baby step to future operations sessions. Lots of trains meet in the Tampa area, mainly around Tampa proper and along the S-line. When I went to CFL three trains met around Winston within 30 minutes and another was just east of the wye. Tucking trains in, dispatching them to pass each other, and other grueling tasks makes this fun. Expect more in the future.

Auburndale 2.0 (WIP)

This was one of the original areas from the route I did in 2010 that was abandoned in favor of this project. While much of the buildings were reused I managed to make some changes compared to that render, those being the track/the scenery around it and the texturing. That's why I did it from scratch, to texture and apply my new routebuilding standards by hand.