Long Lines, Unhappy Passengers, Reputation Horrible - How do I fix it?

[unmerged(722193)]

So, I've built several long lines that cross the entire city. However, I can never seem to adjust the timetable and/or add enough cars to avoid delays, overcrowding, etc. And, as a result (I think), my company reputation is hovering at about 3-5%. Ticket prices are set so they are light green or white across the board. But nothing seems to work with these longer lines (tram, bus, trolley, etc.).

Is there a general limit to the number of stops a line can "handle" before there's no way you can keep passengers happy (i.e., avoid overcrowding, delays, etc.)?

Any tips on how to otherwise increase company reputation?

And, if I need to build shorter lines, or lines with fewer stops, is there a way to designate "transfer" stations between lines? Or will the people automatically be able to plan their routes to include multiple lines, as needed??

On the flip side, my long "crosstown" lines are always PACKED, and although passengers are always unhappy, I am making a monthly profit of over 150,000 with 8 bus lines, 1 tram line, 1 trolley line, and 2 water taxi lines. So, I'm PROFITABLE, but all my passengers are pissed.

 

[Zarine]

I had the same problem but I'm pretty sure the reason was more my design than real problem :

I started with a tram line on the central island and bus lines to go across bridges. This had no problem at all and made me quite a nice cash flow.
Then I built tram/bus lines gathering a medium portion of the lands across the bridges. Because of the passenger flow, I had to have departure every 30/45 minutes even at night for the "central" bus and tram. It was already limit.

Then, I got a mission to link 2 far away places, one where I had already a tram, but not the "central" one. Because the places were far away and I had some cash, I decided to build a metro with a correct coverage of the area it's passing by... This brought something like 100 passengers every hour to a tram line, which transport them (and the previous one) to the bus line (at this point, I was at 150 passengers per hour average) in order to go to the "central" tram line...

Result : reputation went from 60% to 30% despite having buses every 15 minutes (still makes about 30 passengers per hour not able to take the bus).
And like you I earned cash, but say profitable would be an understatement (+300k per weeks)


So i guess, it's more about choising the right vehicule type to transport passengers considering the connection available.

 

[PharaonKheops]

If I understand correctly, all those people tend to move toward the same final point, right?
Did you try to extend your metro station to that particular point (= the point wher people start taking different directions than each other)

 

[Lord Vetinari]

It really seems that the vehicles are balanced for shorter lines. I build a crosstown metro line that goes through multple "nighborhoods" in the city and I can't avoid overcrowding even with 15 minutes intervals all day long. Also, depots are too small to shed all the trains needed to run the line properly. Things work for now because trains are on the tracks all day long anyway, but if I'll ever change the schedule, I'll have trains queueing for miles because they can't all enter the depot.

 

[sland2000]

My preference and I think others on here, is to design longer lines but I hint you may be right that the game is optimised for lots of short journeys. Depots only really serve one route if its of any length.

 

[Dagon1]

Even shorter lines can be a mess. I have a trolley line with 8 stops, 4 in one directin adn 4 in the other. But despite having the trolleys there and almost full coverage of the town the citizens decide to use theircars and make my trolleys stand in a trafficjam for most of the day. Because of the trafficjam the people dont get their trolleys and switch to their cars to make it even worse. -.-

But i make still tons of money from this and other lines.
Strange, everybody is pissed but they still throw money at me.

 

[nyah]

I've been designing routes that focus on a central interchange within each geographical area. Each area has a central location where all routes meet, and then each route takes passengers to (or collects from) each corner of the area. If passengers want to travel from one corner to the other they will take the bus to the central interchange and then travel onwards on another route to their destination. I've then added extra lines connecting the end of each spur to ease travel across the city. I then link each geographical area (usually islands it seems) using a route from one to the other with an interchange somewhere near the boundary of the area, maybe overlapping slightly with the other routes. Then, keeping an eye on the usage of the lines I've already put in place, I may design more lines to fill in any gaps or provide additional services.

I'd like to see an interchange building that provides more facilities for passengers waiting for the next bus on their journey. There should be a large (possibly indoor) waiting area, somewhere to buy food and coffee (which will increase the quality and passenger happiness), and a waiting zone for buses so they can queue up easily.

 

[Co_Karoliina]

Long lines with vehicles that are affected by traffic can be a problem. The reputation goes down because vehicles are late and/or overcrowded, ticket prices don't affect reputation but only the amount of passengers who choose to use your vehicles. Small lines are easier to keep on schedule. You can adjust overcrowding from the Economy panel under Employees, it's right next to the drivers' salary setting. This way you can give your drivers instructions on how many extra passengers to take on board.

 

[Synthtronic]

Short lines makes no sense in the game, because we have bigger maps as in CiM1.
It must be possible to operate a line with about 30 to 40 stops on this maps.

Is it possible to make more points for schedules in the lines?
Similar to the waypoints

 

[unmerged(526885)]

Short lines are best; vehicles are dispatched by the depot according to their timetable (i.e rush hour) and will arrive to their destination quicker, and wont end up having smaller vehicles pick up the rush hour passengers. When traffic is a problem and the line is long, I usually end up having my rush hour vehicles running a night shift! :L

 

[Synthtronic]

I never use rush-hour timetables, because the day (48 minutes) is to short for this feature.

 

[unmerged(609936)]

We have bigger cities, indeed. And it is not a good thing to have long lines with many stops and frequent service snaking all the way from one side of big city to the other side (other than metro or separated heavy rail), because then you get the same issues in real life as you have in CiM2

In game they are more pronounced because of the whole time/distance issue, but problems with rush hour services on long lines are pretty much the same.

 

[Co_Karoliina]

If you want to build long lines, you should look in to the metro, building tramlines in the middle of avenues or building streets with bus lanes. Anything that helps your vehicles avoid traffic, basically!

 

[Synthtronic]

My longest lines have a duration about 8 hours, but the vehicles have a duration about over 11 hours.

 

[unmerged(609936)]

My longest lines have a duration about 8 hours, but the vehicles have a duration about over 11 hours.

It is not uncommon for long line in real world to have off-service runs over one hour, so the simulation is pretty much accurate

 

[Synthtronic]

I never wish a longer day than 48 minutes, but the game speed can be double, as example.