As I'm quite new to the game, I could make mistakes, but seems like I've created quite a simple principle for newbies to work with crossings or side-lanes. And that principle works with single-track railways and double-track (or even more complex ones).
So, will it (mostly?) work or will it not, if:
1) we don't place any signals inside the crossing at all. So the whole crossing is one rail-block.
2) we place signals before and after the crossing so that there can fit a whole train that we use. In fact, we just need signals before and after the crossing.
Like on this abstract picture:
- signals on railway crossing
- RailSigs.gif (7.33 KiB) Viewed 1594 times
* red dots -- where we DO NOT place any signals. No signals inside the crossing at all.
* green dots -- regular signals
* blue dots -- chain signals on the incoming side (train does not enter the crossing if it is not possible to run through)
* grey dots -- regular signals on the outgoing side
blue and grey signals might be both removed.
Seems like it works fine in any difficult crossing. There are few quite simple prerequisites:
1) there are not too many trains in the system. So that:
2) ...there is no blocking outside of this crossing.
This way there will be no train staying on the crossing "block", and so no blocking of the crossing, be it any high complexity at all. Any train will cross the free crossing and will wait behind it (in the case there is a need for some waiting).
Almost any crossing is much shorter than tracks between stations, so we don't need any trains stopping ON THE crossing. We can afford to make it a small "non-stop zone". I really don't understand why some people put lot of signals there and brake a crossing into dozens of blocks.
This principle looks like simple enough for any newbie. Isn't it?
