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First, we will start building a simple station. Before we start we want to make clear that our construction style is expandable in the future. Therefore, we construct huge mainlines (at least LL___RR or higher) and connect sidelines to this mainlines. Stations are always connected to sidelines. The number of platforms depends on the production rate of the farm/mine/forest. Take care about the pickup rating at primary industry stations. It should be between 65 and 75 per cent. Not more, since the production of the industry would fall down.

A simple resource station connected to a Sideline

You can clearly see a sideline going from south to north (lower right to upper left). As you notice, the signaling at the station is different to the simple signals on the track. This yellow signal is called "presignal" and the white signals are called "exit signals". They are more intelligent as the common signals and can be set by CTRL-click with the signal-building tool on an already built signal. If you are not used to this kind of signaling, please visit the our presignaling Guide or the OTTD Wiki for detailed information.

We usually build all stations as "RoRo"-Stations (roll-in, roll-out). This simply means no train exits a station in the same direction as it enters; as a result any departing trains won't block arriving trains. It's not necessarily needed for small stations, such as shown in our example, but let's stick to this building style wherever possible (sometimes RoRo's are simply not buildable due to space issues).

You may notice a drawback on the picture above: there may be too little space planned in for a train to wait. If all platforms of the station are occupied, you might have a train which wants to enter but has to wait in front of the station until another train departs. If there is too little space between the station and the corresponding sideline for waiting trains, the trains may jam up the sideline. Lets see if we can improve our stations a bit:

Basic Stations connected to a Sideline with extended waiting-space to avoid jams

You probably notice another important rule: never ever build a 90-degree-turn! Curves like that slow down trains quite a lot. You may ignore this rule close around a station (where trains are moving slow anyway).

Since Version 0.5, on coop servers 90-deg-turn isn't possible anymore.

The difference between 90°-turns and 2*45°-turns

Despite this, we strongly suggest never to build 2*45-degree-turns due to speed issues. Also, try to build smooth curves in order to get trains fast off and fast on the sidelines.

For more information on various train stations such as those included in the newgrfs, please see illustrated newgrf station guide

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