FLexible UnderPasses (FLUPs)

[z]

Shortly after NAM May 2010 debuted, I posted here about whether GLR stations could be plopped along Underground Tram tracks to effectively create functional subway stations.  Still wanna know about that.  And if the answer's yes, where can I find a GLR station without tracks through it so I can download n plop em?

The answer is "yes," but I haven't seen any such stations.  Some will be coming out in RTMT v3.70 (the next release), but that won't be ready for a while.

In fact, now that I think about it, there's no reason why existing RTMT stations with subway access can't easily be retrofitted to handle tram FLUPS as well.  Hmm...

[jpj_starfleet]

Any word on FLUP's development for the NWM pieces?

[Kitsune]

Is there a piece to go under the road and tram combo?

[Kitsune]

And another question... has there been any thought on a neighbour connection piece? This could allow us to finally make neighbour connections without needing land...

[Rady]

There are FLUPs-under-RHW pieces for just about all of the ground networks included in RHW Version 4.0, actually.  They're at the end of the Road/RHW Puzzle Pieces TAB Loop.

-Alex

Sorry to bother you with that topic again, but what exactly do you mean with the "Road/RHW Puzzle Pieces TAB Loop" ... ? I searched centuries for that FLUP puzzle pieces since the RHW 4.0 but haven' t found them so far ...

[z]

They're a little hard to find - there are just so many puzzle pieces these days.  They're near the very end of the Road menu, in an entry labeled "Road/RHW Overpass and Interface Puzzle Pieces".  If you click on that, then doing a Shift-Tab will rotate you backwards through the tab ring starting at the end, and you'll find the FLUPS pieces quite quickly - they're the second and third ones from the end.

[z]

While developing RTMT support for FLUPS, the RTMT Team came across the following rather interesting situation:



Here you can see pedestrians walking down the road, then descending the stairs in the RTMT station and boarding buses that run in the FLUPS tunnel, as well as pedestrians traveling in the opposite direction.

But you can also see cars traveling down the surface road, then driving down the stairs onto the FLUPS road.

This is not good. 

The reason I mention this here is that this does not occur merely in the new RTMT stations we are developing; this picture was taken with the current RTMT stations.  But it is not limited to them, either; it occurs with all of Cogeo's stations, and with DarkMatter's before him.  It also occurs with the SFBT road top stations, with deadwoods' stations, and with the various other road top stations created by various other people.  In fact, it is not possible to fix this in RTMT, nor, I believe, in FLUPS.

Why?  What determines what goes in and out of RTMT-type lots are transit switches.  Unfortunately, transit switches are two dimensional.  This means that if you put an RTMT station next to an overpass or an underpass, to the RTMT station it appears that it's sitting next to an intersection.  Therefore, any traffic that is permitted to leave the RTMT station can find itself on the overpass or underpass, and vice versa.

You can see a similar effect even with the Maxis stations.  If you put a Maxis bus stop where one side is facing a ground-level road and the other side is facing an elevated highway, buses on the elevated highway will use the ground-level bus station.

So with the situation with FLUPS, what is the solution?  If you use a FLUPS road underpass near an RTMT station, be sure that there is at least one road square between the RTMT station and the underpass.

FLUPS tram underpasses don't have this problem, unless they are passing underneath a road or avenue with a tram line going down the middle.  In this case, the same problem applies, regardless of whether or not there is an RTMT stop for the tram.  However, this can be turned into a feature, at least for tram-in-avenue.  If the RTMT tram-in-avenue station has subway stairs, then the stairs effectively go to the FLUPS tram line as well as the subway, and you get an underground tram stop at your RTMT station.

[Mike1814]

I wonder are there any parallel pieces just cuz I thought it would be neat to build a double decker road if that's not too possible already.

[jdenm8]

There aren't due to SC4 having no height perception meaning traffic will flit between the upper and lower roads at random.
The game will not see it as "One above ground road and one two-lane tunnel" but as "One four-lane Road".

[jp]

i just found out that the maxis el rail to subway transition works with FLUPs!

[j-dub]

Congratulations! I'm glad the game is smart enough to continue the Tram line through, looking at how the query arrow goes down, this must mean that the height of the subway and FLUPs is the same?

[Chrisim]

The FLUPs are designed to work this way. The light rail follows the paths of the transition lot into the subsurface. Traffic is not converted to subway, but simply continues as light rail below the surface along the FLUPs pieces. The height (or depth) is defined by the SC4Path files. The height of FLUPs-SC4Paths is designed to be compatible with this and other transition lots.

The decision which depth to use for FLUPs was one of the first and most important and took quite some time of testing during the FLUPs design phase. -10 m is deep enough for automata to visually disappear below the surface, and shallow enough for these transition lots to work. Most transition lot paths go to about -6 m height, and the game accepts height jumps up to 4 m. The only (known to me) transition lot that was incompatible with FLUPs is the original NOB Sunken GLR at -5 m, so I had to apply a trick during remodding to get them to work, too. However, the remodded NOB Sunken GLR lots are apparently still unpublished.

Subway path height does not matter here, because traffic is not converted to subway in this case. Anyway, if you look at subway path heights, you'll see that they are at 0. So obviously the game treats subways differently from surface networks.

[OwlGreene]

I'm very intrigued by what I'm seeing in that last picture.  I have two very important questions: 1) Does it work for UDI, and 2) Exactly what FLUP pieces are being plopped?  Someone who knows, PLEASE share the knowledge!

[dragonshardz]

It does work for UDI. The pieces being plopped are just basic FLUPs, nothing special.

[Rady]

Sorry, obviously I'm to stupid tfind out by myself, but:

Where do I find those FLUPS pieces that go under the RHW??? I searched the whole menu up and down several times, but they still manage to hide from me ... 

[Blue Lightning]

Road x RHW button

[zakuten]

Sorry to be dense, but does the new FLUPs have a passing-under-GHSR tile yet? I still use that mod, and I'd love to see a piece for it. I think when I asked way back it was said to be being modded, but I've not seen anything of it yet...

[Gringamuyloca]

just skimmed through all 18 pages...didn't see any mention of Single Track Rail over road

Did I miss something?... maybe it is 'in the works'?... or maybe it is something I could learn to 'make'? ( would be nice to add something if it's within my computer skills... which I admit are limited... but willing to learn.)

Thanks for adding so much to the game!

[Chrisim]

Sorry to be dense, but does the new FLUPs have a passing-under-GHSR tile yet? I still use that mod, and I'd love to see a piece for it. I think when I asked way back it was said to be being modded, but I've not seen anything of it yet...

I guess you installed a recent NAM (v29, or the version from May 2010)? Have a look in your HSR rotation ring ...

just skimmed through all 18 pages...didn't see any mention of Single Track Rail over road ...

You did not miss anything. Such pieces are only created if somebody asks, and you are the first to ask. I am wondering whether STR-FLUPs make sense. STR is used in rural or industrial areas, and in both cases it is unusual to build underpasses (in real life). Do we really need road underpassing single rail tracks?

[Gringamuyloca]

Do we really need road underpassing single rail tracks?

Need.. no 
...would like.. yes