About Railroad Ops

Welcome to Railroad Ops. This website allows players to manage and operate their own railway companies, handling everything from train schedules to complex cargo logistics. Experience the thrill of railroad management and the challenge of keeping your operations efficient and profitable.

From laying track, to connecting industries, to managing a railcar fleet, and dispatching trains, this global multiplayer rail network will deliver.

We are currently in pre-Alpha. Email railfeedback@roadwolf.ca to request info or an Alpha access account.

Interested players are encouraged to Register and fill out the account request form. Worst that can happen is I approve your account, and you spend hours on this website.

Industries:

Industries are defined by Admins and content volunteers. They are often based on real world industries. For the sake of simplicity all product is converted into Liters and assigned a Kg./L weight value. Packages are defined which can contain a set volume of product. And product which is shipped in a packaged form, like pallets, or stacks of lumber will ship in those set volumes. Bulk product will ship based on the capacity of the railcar.

Each industry has at least one process, which will process input materials (unless it produces a raw material) and produce so much of an output material (unless it is a consumer only location).

Industries will have the option of shipping by truck if rail's service isn't sufficient. Currently the trucking price is $3 per mile. Rail's goal is to beat that price.

Much of this mechanism is already functional in the program.

Tracklaying:

There will be a few tools to create different types of tracks for your railroad. First, your first 'Subdivision' has to be defined. Then you can begin to plot out the course for your subdivision's mainline. The selection of 1 track to 4 tracks is possible, but each track has its associated material and construction cost.

Once saved and finalized, an Admin acting as the Surface Transportation Board, can make final adjustments to the plan and approve or deny it before the subdivision is allowed to go live. But it also needs to be constructed.

Materials will have to be purchased and transported to the site to build the line. So materials actually have to be produced for lines to be constructed. If the subdivision connects to other rail lines, the materials can be delivered by train, otherwise the trucking cost is added on.

Incentives and discounts will be awarded to companies who create tracks in remote areas. But in congested areas, where railways cross each other, construction and operations can become more expensive.

Branch Lines, Industrial Lines, and Yards will also be able to be constructed after the mainline is finalized.

Operations:

Each subdivision will have a dispatcher on staff 24/7 and a MOW and Signal crew, superintendent, safety officer, inspector, as well as a trainmaster. So each subdivision has its associated running cost. Branches usually do not have dedicated support crew and utilize the nearest subdivision's workforce.

The player is responsible for setting up schedules or some sort of routine for running trains. They can choose to only run a train between A and B if there are enough cars waiting. Or run the train on a set schedule.

Dispatching will likely be allowed, where the player can manually route trains along the subdivision. Manually operating individual trains will likely not be a feature.

Switching cars in yards will be a feature. Whether it is clicking and dragging cars from track to track to make up new trains, and then have the program simulate the switching operation, is likely how things will go.

Auto switching can happen, but likely will take longer.

Managing waybills and providing cars to industries will also be a feature. Especially if your company owns cars which industries can use to transport their goods.

Railops Roadmap:

Subdivisions, lines, path finding, waybills, and railcars are all set up. We are now accepting pre-alpha testers. Train Assembly: - Allow railcars to be connected and disconnected. - Create basic locomotives, and railcars available on the used market - and create a used marketplace. --- Open Alpha Testing --- Subdivision Expansion: - Double track, subdivision construction - needing materials delivered. - Premium content - Signals. - Control System upgrades - Bridge (water crossing) detection, road crossing detection (crossing gates). Future: - Separate dispatch screen for each yard and subdivision which are dynamically generated from polyline and database data. - Automation script for real time train routing. - Regional Incentives - Passenger Services - Local and Continental - Custom topo map tileset void of local roads, and railway lines, except for rail lines generated in game. - Grade traversal impacts, and sharp turn traversal effects.

— Roadwolf