[Simplest] player transporting system in vanilla?

[LazyLoneLion]

What is the simplest player transporting system across the factory?

A factory could be quite big, and a car is often not useful enough.

I'm trying to plan some railway transporting system to have an ability to ride from one end of the factory to another. With several intermediate stops.

Let's say there is long bus and a factory along it. There are several train stops, for example: Smeltery, Moll, Science, Modules, Refinery. And railways between them, of course. I'd like to have a train (locomotive) on every station waiting for the player. I enter into the nearest one, click the destination station, and my train goes there (and some/all other trains are going forward to take all the stations again). No ramming into buildings, trees, poles or tubes, very fast transportation.

But I can't really plan how to set up the logic. Trains are supposed to wait for a passenger, so they should be somehow stopped on the station, but it should be possible to drive through to the destination any moment -- there should be no red signal on the path, the station shouldn't be disabled, etc.

Did someone solve this task already? Or should I just build the rails and stations, and keep a loco in my pockets? (not very comfortable)

[eradicator]

Not done this myself but how about this:
Every passenger Station has 2 stops. At every station you place one train. All trains have a shedule like this:
[Station 1][Inactivity 5s]
[Station 2][Inactivity 5s]
[Station 3][Inactivity 5s]
[Station 4][Inactivity 5s]
...
Except every train has a differnt condition for his home station:
[Station 5][Cictcuit condition < 0] (any impossible condition).

That way you can hop into a train at any station, select your target, and after you get off the train it automatically returns to it's home station. No circuits required.

(Personally i just got annoyed of having to sit in a train for a minute until i get anywhere, so i modded in waypoints diablo style :P)

[urza99814]

Can't share a blueprint right now but I recently built a tram system that should do what you want.

So here's what i did -- two headed train in automatic mode with one station in the schedule (I called it PT for Personal Transit). Next you build each tram stop just large enough for the train, with a stop named PT on each side so the train can enter from either side (all stops have the same name so you can keep expanding without altering the train schedule) Next you decide on a label for each station (I just used the A-Z circuit signals). Build some gates and a constant combinator at each station. The gates opening will trigger the train to come, and the constant combinator is used to select a destination (using those A-Z labels)

The logic is then set up as: if the gate is open (ie, you're at the station) then that station gets enabled. If the train is in auto mode, it'll come to any station you are near. Next you need to wire all the stations together to build the call system. When the gate is open, any signal from the constant combinator goes out on the wire. The remote station with the same name detects that signal and locks it in an S-R latch to keep the remote station enabled. When you get in the train, the gates close making the local station disable so the train starts moving to the selected remote station, and when the train arrives you use that signal to reset the latch, disabling the station again.

[eradicator]

@urza99814:
Waiting for trains at the station? That's a bit too much realism for me :P

[LazyLoneLion]

Not done this myself but how about this:

Nice. Thank you.

[SpeedDaemon]

Can't help but think you're over-thinking this a bit... My factories tend to end up as sprawling, rail-connected monstrosities, so walking is right out (and I'd get run over by all the trains constantly).

Here's what I do:
Make yourself a passenger train - just two engines back-to-back.

Stick little terminus stations in wherever you want your passenger stops, and name them whatever makes sense. The train schedule should just be all of the pax stops in alphabetical order, with the depart conditions set to "Item Count" with no condition set (meaning it will wait forever).

If the train isn't at your desired stop, use the train interface to call it there (a little planning ahead means you rarely have to wait). Then just get in, select your destination, and hit Go. You'll quickly get so lazy that you never walk anywhere, so the train will almost always be at the nearest stop, anyway.