Railworks America

Hi there!

I thought I'd just like to introduce myself - My name is John McKenzie and I live in England. I've been a trainoholic for as long as I've been alive!

I blame my parents - two years before I was born they bought a house opposite a patch of land they assumed was spare. Wrong!! Baby John's bedroom window faced the railway and I can remember always watching the trains whenever I heard them coming.

I was always very keen on all things British and also have had a great fondness for German railways for the past 30 years too.

US railroads however never seemed to capture my attention. Sure, I had several books about them but they somehow never seemed quite real, if that makes sense - they were just so far removed from British railway practice. However, and it is a big however, I have Railworks to thank for my greater understanding of the beauty of US railroads and wanting to make up for years of neglecting your trains!

RW also gives you Americans the opportunity to appreciate the some of most beautiful, elegant trains which have operated on this side of the pond!

I hope I can draw on your expertise over there - and I'm more than happy to discuss UK railways with you too!

Kind regards
John

Welcome to the Forums.

You are not the only "foreigner" here. I'm from Germany and ther are a lot of other Germans on this Forum, too. We also have some Brits here.
Just take Dick Cowen from Britkits. He does great US steamers.

I hope you'll take to US railroading. When I was a child I was mostly interested in German trains (no wonder ), but the classic US Steamers (Wild West) and Diesels (F7) have always attracted me.
And with RW this interested became almost an addiction. Hehe. I even lost the interest in our German trains.

US railroading is just BIG, BIG, the Biggest. Dirty, unique engines, really long trains and loud sounds. The wide open range, the mountain routes.
Wonderful, I love it.

Thanks very much for your welcome!

micaelcorleone wrote:I even lost the interest in our German trains.

Surely not Baureihe E03?

micaelcorleone wrote:US railroading is just BIG, BIG, the Biggest. Dirty, unique engines, really long trains and loud sounds. The wide open range, the mountain routes.
Wonderful, I love it.

Yes, I can see the attraction!

johnmckenzie wrote:Surely not Baureihe E03?

Nice engine, but compared to US Diesels it's a toy train.

Welcome aboard. I'm just starting to get interested in the UK and German trains and routes. They sure are different from ours, but I love the scenery. The strangest thing about your trains is the horns, they sound pathetic, they just don't sound like you really mean "Get out of my way".

Yes, they're more a sort of polite "Excuse me"!

johnmckenzie wrote:Yes, they're more a sort of polite "Excuse me"!

I do love your Police sirens though.

Samwolf wrote: The strangest thing about your trains is the horns, they sound pathetic, they just don't sound like you really mean "Get out of my way".

Maybe here in the US, we have more dummies that like to stop on tracks at crossings, and we need that "YOU BETTER GET THE FRAK OUT OF MY WAY!" sound than they do across "The Pond"

Welcome aboard John . I myself are in the same boat as you, being from "the other side of the pond" . Who came up with that one?? what side of the pond is the right one?

Unfortunately , my love for the US railways is not up there at the minute, too long and drab for my liking, I prefer the passenger side of things with Rail sims and unfortunately the Us routes I have seen don't offer much in the way for passenger scenarios ( unless its a special built route but they mainly use steam engines , major fail with me there )

I have been dabbling a lot with scenarios for other routes and have 2 loaded on another site but right now I am trying to figure out the route building part and get my own route on the go . Stumbling block for me though, but I am sure I will get there eventually.

The only US route I ever enjoyed playing was unfortunately not a Railworks route but an MSTS route, although I am pretty sure I read that someone was building it and planning on a release ( NorthEast Corridor ) . Hopefully that can be reproduced to Railworks Standards and if it does the scenario creations for that route could be endless as you can split freight and passenger services right down the middle in one scenario ( not sure how frequent or if it even happens on that route as I have no knowledge except from the MSTS version )

When I finally figure out where I am going wrong with the route buildign and beat the problems I will be uploading it here hopefully ( if Hawk doesn't reject it that is )
Unfortunately it won't be an American Route as I said before I am from your side of the pond lol.


Just on a side note, I didn't notice how long you have been using Railworks. I was wondering if you have dabbled in the scenario creation side of things yourself. Without the community the game wouldn't grow to half the size it has and to those who have spent countless hours days and even months at building I salute you ( creating scenarios I found how frustrating it can be if something goes pear shaped somewhere )


All the best

Mark

Mark wrote:I will be uploading it here hopefully ( if Hawk doesn't reject it that is )

All the best

Mark

I don't reject anything. I leave that up to the downloaders.

If it's because you're concerned that it won't be a US route, as it says on the main page of the site (does anybody see that page? )

The primary goal of this site is to offer a positive environment for the development of North American content for RailWorks (although content from outside of North America is quite welcomed also),...

Mark, your routes are more than welcome with my son and I, and we are from the US.

The change in scenery, and the ability to use high speed rail is always a treat.

Hawk wrote: main page of the site (does anybody see that page? )

Site? What site? Oh crap, am I not in Kansas anymore? And where's that dog? I see a fire hydrant!

Mark: The NortheastCorridor is in development by stmbuzz here and the New York to Philadelphia section by Railsimulator.com will come as an official Expansion Pack later this year.

micaelcorleone wrote:Nice engine (DB Class 103), but compared to US Diesels it's a toy train.

Surely you are forgetting 103 118-6? Modified to develop 14,600bhp! That's seriously powerful!!

but a north american diesel still has more pulling power, those engines just don't have the weight behind them to pull such a load like over here. yes that is powerfull for any loco but if you hook that up to the back of an SD70ACe the SD70 will pull that loco around like a toy. we just have great traction to the rail with all of that weight and that is how we pull such a big load (try and hook up 3 or 4 of the stock eauropean locos to 100 cars of coal and see how well they preform to ones from northamerica.)