Why such high bridges...

[Karoti]

please give us a realistic bridge height...

http://www.hondawanderer.com/350253_Honeybourne_2018.htm

[killakanz]

European railways often require much higher height clearance than Britain's railways. We don't do double-deckers here because of our low bridges and tunnels...

[Didz]

It is possible to adjust the height of bridges by a combination of minimising their length and pressing the N key to lower their height. Its fiddly but it does make them look more normal.
https://youtu.be/7bN0fUAGiwg
Another even more fiddly approach is to use roads or track parrallel to the location to be bridged and raise the ground first using the M key before deleting the road or track you used to create the embankments. Its then usually possible to just run a road between the two embankments to create an instant bridge at a more realistic height.

[chrisasnyder]

Here's a couple examples from my current game, I wasn't trying to make these any particular height, just making a practical looking bridge. I know the fly junction mod makes it much easier to build crossings with tighter clearences, so you can give that a try. The construction tools will allow you to create some very nice looking environments.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1314404505

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1314404261

[Karoti]

Thanks for your replies. #Didz That's prettry much how I do it, but I switch on the terrain tool which shows you the ground height at cursor, takes the guess work out of it. I have found that you have to raise each side a minimum of 11 points above the road/track you are crossing before a bridge will form. As I said, that's way too high.

[JK]

I've been considering doing more UK bridges in the style of the first picture. So will bear that in mind if I do them, it might be possible have the meshes appear lower than the game thinks they are.

[Robbedem]

I agree that bridges need to be too high.
One of the reasons is that the catenary needs to be fully under the bridge (which in reality doesn't happen, because they will just attach the high voltage wire to the bridge so they don't need a suspension cable)

It's even worse for bridges over roads, because the trees need full clearance, while in reality you just wouldn't have trees under the bridge and 6m or something would be enough for all road traffic.

[Didz]

I accept that because of the GFX issues with catenaries the bridges need to be higher than in real life, but to be honest that isn't the real issue that makes them look oddly deformed.

The critical issue is that when dragging out a bridge the AI tries to create a smooth arc across the width of the gap, and this causes the centre of the bridge to be even higher than would be necessary just to clear the electric cables, (and it even happens on road bridges which don;t need to allow for them).

This is why carefully reducing the length of a bridge span reduces the height of the bridge, and why preconstructing the embankments on either side of the bridge stops it doing its arcing behaviour. (as demonstrated by Chrisasnyder above)

If bridges simply rose to the required height and then remained level for the rest of their length they would not look so odd, but then they probably wouldn't look so graceful either.

[Super Fegelein]

It would also be pretty cool if Bridges were built differently depending on the type of Road you were using.

Country Roads should require more gradual slopes, while City roads can get away with much more rigid changes in elevation.

[JK]

It is possible to have level bridges, more like in the first picture, it just takes a bit of work and doing it in stages.

I did this one by building the ramp embankment to about the right height (with the manual arrow buttons). Then did a very short bit transistioning to level. Then the main section (still at complete horizontal). Then the ramp and embankment on the far side.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1315366454

Unfortunately it's still quite high for the train.

There is one pillar (not shown in the screen shot) and I could add more manually as they're included in this mod: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1177726084

[chrisasnyder]

The auto bridge building is ment to be quick and solve the crossing problem and I think it's fine the way it is. For those who care about how it looks, the construction tools do allow you to build pretty much whatever you want.

This mod will allow you to create the lowest bridge of 8.7 m,

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1114711628

[Karoti]

#chrisasnyder Unfortunately, the Flying Junction mod crashes my game.

[chrisasnyder]

Are you using any street/road mods? I've found many of those cause problems with other mods.

[Karoti]

I'm not, but thanks for checking.

[62bMoose]

You can make a low bridge by digging a 'well' in the bridge approach, which fools the AI into thinking it is bridging a much deeper space:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1316821336
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1316821977
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1316822662

[fatfluffycat]

If you build the bridge first you can then lay roads or track under it with much lower clearance I found out. You can also try the post above mine.