File:TempacheShield-wideblank.png and Forum:Federal States/Freight Rail Network Proposal: Difference between pages

While our current procedures for organizing and planning freight railroads in the Federal States has been commonly accepted after we collectively voted on the structure several years ago, the freight network -- especially in regards to organized companies -- remains disjointed, and the "sponsor" structure of tasking particular mappers to try to organize national railroad lines and companies has been particularly challenging given varying levels of activity and regular turnover of stateowners. Additionally, as the project has matured, we are no longer in a "start-up" phase and have a stronger baseline to work from in regards to the overall geography of the nation. As such, I'm proposing that we officially codify the largest current railroads and, with a few logical planned expansions, create up to ten "canon" major railroads.

Structure

Most recent railroad company regions, last updated in December 2021.

According to the official list of railroads, we currently have seven railroads of Class B (serving two or more regions) or higher, briefly summarized as follows:

• Compass and Western (C&W), organized by Zytik. Currently mapped from Warwick with various main lines heading west and northwest to the Alormen River.
• Cordilleras Southern Railroad (CS), organized by Glauber and Geoc3ladus, connecting Riopoderos and Clamash to the Asperic Ocean at Wahanta.
• GESF, a legacy railroad that predated the old rail structure and has various locations throughout the nation but largely concentrated in the Southeast.
• Great Western & Asperic (GW&A), organized by Brunanter, which connects much of the northwestern FSA.
• Lakes, Mennowa, and Northern (LM&N), organized by Alessa, which has many routes connecting the Heartland zone, the West Lakes, and up into Alormen.
• Minnonigan Central Railroad (MCRR), organized by myself and a few mappers who unfortunately have left the project, with a main line connecting Lake City with Andreapolis and Port Massehanee.
• Sauganash and Northern Railroad (S&N), another railroad I organized that connects Lake City with the Asperic Ocean at Wahanta.

I'm proposing that all seven of these railroads be "promoted" to a major status, along with three new companies that can be organized in the future to provided more connections to less-developed parts of the FSA (namely the Central, Massodeyas, Mid-Ardentic, and Northeastern regions). To keep things balanced, each company would still have some geographic restrictions as to where it can operate, with almost all states having access to two or more companies for their state. Instead of putting the onus on a mapper who would try to organize the entire company themselves, we would all agree to use this framework and these constraints in terms of what company operates where, and then from there each stateowner would be able to plan the routings and network within their own state as they so choose with coordination and cooperation of their neighbors, similar to how motorways get mapped. Note that this system would not preclude creating other regional companies that are currently considered Class C or D railroads; stateowners would still be free to create and manage those as they like.

As a reminder for mappers who are not familiar with American railroading: companies historically have been in strict competition with each other at a corridor level (so there may be several companies on several different alignments between two cities), but overall still work cooperatively to interchange freight between companies to provide service throughout the nation.

Geography

Draft map. Darker colors are currently mapped; lighter colors are planned or potential. Note that individual corridors are only loosely represented; precise alignments will differ. Other more minor spur routes will undoubtedly be added as well; this map is not intended to be comprehensive.

The following table details at a high level where each railroad would operate, including main line(s) and the number of overall regions served. To ensure competition, I assigned each railroad up to four "points": one point is assigned if the company serves all or a substantial portion of a region; a half-point if the company is restricted to a certain part of a region (no more than half of the region), and zero points if the company only briefly passes through a region (about 200 miles or less). As a reminder, this is just a draft, and can be modified.

Discussion

Interested in everyone's thoughts. --TheMayor (talk) 23:16, 29 June 2023 (UTC)