Hi to all,

Just to confirm that I have started this week working on a template package for Paul Charland's Dominion Atlantic Railway route following his invitation to have a template made for the route. We have worked out the last details to have it ready for a template and it's a go now. Paul has cooperated very well and thank him for his assistance with this great route.

Benny (bennycdn) has volunteered to test the package once done. If some of you are willing to test it too, let me know.

Since I'm at work right now, I will post later for some additional details about the route and template.

Hi to all,

I have finished (about 95%) all the templates All that is left is adding one AI traffic train for each template. The traffic will be one RDC train on the opposite direction to the player train.I hope to have this done this week-end. Paul had just provided some info about the schedule of the passenger trains. Thanks Paul!

Each of the seven templates represents one of seven (7) trains which operated in the seventies, including wayfreight, Yards and Gypsum trains.

Since it is a dark territory, I will provide time of arrival at meeting points to allow the player train to decide where to take the siding. This traffic pattern map has been done with the Ozark Northern, the A&O and the Blackfoot 2 routes templates.

I hope to send to Benny soon the whole package for testing.

The downloads used for the templates are the same as the one required to run the activities provided with the route. No other downloads are required.

In the meantime, I am including some shots of the route during activities provided with the route to give an idea of what it looks like.


















Will update later

Hi to all,

Testing is continuing and Benny is assisting with the reports. I had earlier a traffic issue with timing and had resolved the issue by shortening the paths to exclude the part between Windsor and Windsor Jct. Anyway, no meet were expected in that section of the route. The AI traffic consists of two RDC runs which timing is authentic and was provided by Paul.

As it was done with earlier route templates with dark territory, I have set a traffic pattern to allow the user to decide where to meet.

Since all templates tried to reflect as possible true operations along the DAR, departure times are different throughout the day. That means not all trains are expected to mee the RDC during the activity.

The next screenshots include the traffic pattern map and some shots of SLG-Generated activities.

















Will update later

Additional images of other activities generated with AG

The First two is from the Train 24 Template, starting at Kentville, the second setting out its load at Windsor.

The other two is from the M22 & M21 template working its load at Falmouth. The M22 train is from Truro ( the template actually starts east of Brooklyn) . It goes as far as Falmouth and returns as train M21 back to Truro. On this one the user must set his activity to end reaching 20mph and completing his act.









The route and stock will take some good resources from your computer. It is unfortunate that I have only a dual-core. For those with more powreful machines, you will enjoy using the package. A great route and stock ( mostly done by Paul as well) to enjoy.

Continuing testing and Benny continues to send his reports. He has given some recommendations to improve the Gypsum template to have it more realistic. Changes have been done and now the Player train is composed of three SW1200's rather than two to handle up to 20+ loaded Gypsum cars.

An issue caused AG to generate in most cases insufficient cars to make it more realistic with the 20-23 cars the Gypsum train. I have been able to increase the number of cars for each siding, based on the 14 meter Gypsum car.

Also a feature I have only done once with the Green River template has been applied with the Gypsum template. I have added three loose consists in areas not used with the Gypsum template. The first of ten (10) empty Gypsum cars has been added west of the Empty Gypsum siding in Hantsport. This will allow the player to add with the designated work load from AG, if insufficient, additional cars from the loose consist to make the load more realistic. The player will be able to bring the combined set to destination, as long as the designated cars AG has set get into the limit of the siding.

The same principle has been done at the Miller Creek mine (6 cars at the MC loader siding) and at Wentworth mines (WW5 with a ten (10) car loose consist) for the return trip to Hantsport.

A SLG-generated act had been successfull in bringing a combined load of loose consist and AG- designated cars to its destination. Will wait for Benny to confirm the result.

Shots of the Gypsum template



















Will continue updating

Paul wrote me this morning to give precisions for the Gypsum train. Changes were made to eliminate the CN Gypsum cars, and have a two back to back sw1200's instead of three.

Here is the successfull result of a SLG-generated act with both runs having a mix of SLG designated and loose consist cars, all Canadian Pacific Gypsum cars.

Thanks Paul for the additional info, much appreciated.

Hello everyone,

Benny gave me the green light to release the final template package. I have sent tonight the ready package to Steve for uploading.

Here is the image to be seen in the templates page:



Sincere thanks to Benny with the testing and also to Paul Charland for his expertise on the trains operating along the route in the 70's which helped a lot to give this package a more realistic profile on the DAR.

Will confirm once uploaded

The template package is now in the templates page ready for download.

Thanks again Steve and happy trainsimming to all!

Now on with the Buffalo route template...