Suggestion: Customs houses as Rail Construction Offices

[Nationality]

If new railways are put into a region, is it more common that these rails are built starting from offices in the middle of the region... or from the border which has rail access already?

Doesn't it make sense to be able to construct railways from customs offices? The only place in your republic that has easy access to trains is the one place you can't build from. It might be at a premium, because you're building out using foreign workers and foreign materials, but it does make sense, at least. The Siberian railroad didn't originate in the middle of Siberia, after all.

So please, let us rent rail construction vehicles from customs offices and let us build directly from the border... at great expense, if need be.

Rail construction remains the only reason I leave realistic mode off. It can't be this painfully slow to build railways in real life - I want to play 100% realistic, but rail construction is just far too fiddly and requires intense micromanagement, unless you don't mind construction vehicles slamming into each other at high speed.

A general boost in rail construction speed would also be quite welcome... maybe construction speed can be a new difficulty option?

Thank you comrades. Soviet Republic planners of the world unite, we have nothing to lose but our trains!

[Sirius Czech]

Interesting idea, though I personally have no problem with RCO speeds now. It is more depending on resources available (and people) then in ability to build fast. In realistic mode I play usually first 10-15 years completely without trains without greater issues and hits for export and such. And when I can afford it, I already place an RCO on city border, plan rails to customs, city station and some branches and just truck in two MUV/AGMU units that wander freely and build the network long before I need any trains :D

Their slower speed is, in fact, an advantage as they do not consume that much of a steel and other resources (which changes rapidly with EDK300 on stock).

It is a question of a timing.

But having the ability of "foreign railroad workers" is a really nice one

[esbenmf]

Just build a RCO close to the border and staff it with foreign workers.

[Nationality]

Originally posted by esbenmf:

Just build a RCO close to the border and staff it with foreign workers.

Comrade, I have done that before, and it works out very badly. I actually wrote a post about it on this discussion board.
RCOs only work with consistent labor supply. The vehicle leaving the station is only triggered with workers, but by the time the vehicle goes to the work site, those workers are ending their shift quite often, which means a lot of wasted labor. The vehicle ends up coming back without doing any work.
It is a nightmare. If workers only started their shift when construction began, your method would work, but it begins with arrival to the RCO.
I have not done enough research on how rail construction works in real life, but I can't imagine it works like this. Why not keep the construction vehicle at the site, and have a small vehicle shuffle materials and workers between it and the supply dump? This makes a lot more sense to me.

[Nationality]

Originally posted by jan.mitiska:

Interesting idea, though I personally have no problem with RCO speeds now. It is more depending on resources available (and people) then in ability to build fast. In realistic mode I play usually first 10-15 years completely without trains without greater issues and hits for export and such. And when I can afford it, I already place an RCO on city border, plan rails to customs, city station and some branches and just truck in two MUV/AGMU units that wander freely and build the network long before I need any trains :D

Their slower speed is, in fact, an advantage as they do not consume that much of a steel and other resources (which changes rapidly with EDK300 on stock).

It is a question of a timing.

But having the ability of "foreign railroad workers" is a really nice one

I'll admit I'm too impatient for trains for this, I like them a lot. I've never been able to play in a republic with a truly fully developed rail network, but I'd like to. It just feels impossible with the way RCOs are managed now.

[Silent_Shadow]

It's fine. In fact I'd say its good for balance, as trains already are the dominate transportation method on land.

If you really want to build faster, then build more RCO along the routes you want and use more disassembled track builders. You can also use ships to import large track builders to the center of the map or to just far from soviet customs houses.

[Sirius Czech]

I never knew you can import trains with ships, but tbh I never used ships in this game before :D

The point about trains is that their infrastructure is expensive (rails = steel), but even a single train can make fckton of money really fast if it is long enough. And not only with bauxite, aluminum, fuel or steel, but even a decent train full of coal can earn 100k RUB per trip and getting it full is not that hard as well. So once you have them, your money problems are gone (or should be!).

Build taking time is part of those costs. On the other hand - I have planned a huge city, steel industry, cement plant for exports AND prefabs etc and, tbh, rails came that 3km distance from my first city much faster then my people are able to settle, so... :D

[Silent_Shadow]

Originally posted by jan.mitiska:

I never knew you can import trains with ships, but tbh I never used ships in this game before :D

All you need is a small cargo harbor attached to a large space for vehicles/containers. You will still need a disassembled track builder to connect the RCO to the large space for vehicles though.