Name of route: Donner.zipVersion and Release Date: Version 0.1 8 Dec 2004Description: Route between Roseville, California and Sparks, Nevada through the Sierra Nevada mountains. This route crosses over the famed Donner Pass summit and along Donner Lake. This route also passes through Auburn, Colfax and Truckee, California, and Reno, Nevada. Installation Method: One 105 MB Zip file extracted into the ..\Routes\ directory. Run the install batch file to copy default routes objects prior to running the route.Size of Download: 104 MBytesSize of installed Route: 520 MBytesProtypicalFreight and Passenger service. The Amtrak California Zephyr passes through this route each day in both directions. Numerous Freight including Autorack and intermodal unit trains as well as generic freight of both the Union Pacific Railroad and BNSF railroad (via trackage rights) routinely cross this route.Length of Mainline: Approximately 250 MilesLength of Branches: There are two branchlines. North of Roseville for approximately 5 miles and north of Reno towards Reno Junction for approximately 10 miles. These branches would eventually connect with the WP route across the Sierra Nevada mountains.Number of Sidings: Approximately mainline 8 sidings. The Sparks NV area has numerous sidings serving it's businesses. There are a couple of other industrial sidings to the north and west of Reno NV.Number of yards: 4. The Roseville yard is one of the largest on the UP system being over 5 miles long and consisting of a hump yard, classification, receiving and departing yards both westbound and eastbound and a small city yard. The Sparks yard is medium sized, mostly serving the business interests of Sparks NV as well as division point between the Roseville sub and the Salt Lake Sub. Finally, there is a small yard at Truckee, CA mostly to support winter snow removal equipment. Likewise, there is a small yard in Colfax, CA.Mixture of dual and single track. All but 7 miles of the main line, between Emmigrant Pass and Cisco, is either dual track or single track single direction. Note, between Sparks, NV and Truckee, CA the route is left hand running ABS signalled.Level of trackside detail: Includes all signaling, either CTC or ABS as per the prototype. Few other trackside details at this time.Amount of scenery completed: Less than 10% Mostly untextured buildings in Reno and Sparks NV and the outlying areas. I haven't figured out texturing yet.FPS. The usual. Highly sceniced areas and/or numerous highly detailed rolling stock will bring it to less than 2 FPS. 1000+ pieces of rolling stock in the Roseville yard is about the most I have been able to install and have an activity start at all. Activities provided: NoneAdd-in Track sets required: Xtracks less than 6-months old. Newroads also less than six months old. I've kept updating them so I don't know which versions are required but I have made no modifications to the route since August 2004.Tsection.dat used. Same as for Xtracks and newroads.FreewareKnown problems: Track database is not rebuildable. Track bumpy in some locations due to geometry of multitrack curved sections and gradients. There still seems to be some uncoupling problems when running more than 40-50 miles although junction nodes have been place at least every 7 miles. Mexican standoffs are easily created in activites for no reasoning I can ascertain. Particularly, for the single track section portion between Emmigrant Pass and Cisco (movements are held at both ends of double track forever). Where it can be downloaded: Train-sim.com
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