Signals

Keeping trains apart.

Signals divide a line into blocks so that trains wait for each other and do not collide. You need none to start: junctions and passing loops keep trains apart by themselves. Signals let more trains share a busy line.

Placing signals

Pick Signal (9) in Railways and click a piece of track. Each costs $600.
Signals go on straight or diagonal track, not on bends, junctions, platforms or level crossings.
Click a signal again to make it one-way, again for the other way, and once more for two-way.
Remove a signal with the bulldozer.

Which way does it point?

While Signal is picked, an arrow lies over each signal: a head at each end for a two-way signal, one head for a one-way signal, pointing the way trains may pass.
The signal under the mouse shows in white what a click would make it, and the note beside the mouse says it in words.
Without the tool, look at the lamps: a two-way signal has a lamp on both faces of its post; a one-way signal has one, facing the trains it lets through.

Blocks

The track between two signals is a block. A train passes a signal only when the block beyond it is empty; otherwise it waits.
Every junction is a block of its own, signals or not. A train drives onto a junction only when it is clear, and so is the track the train leaves it by, up to the next junction or signal.
Trains wait only at signals and in front of junctions. Elsewhere, trains on the same track run into each other: both are wrecked, with all they carry, and the wreck blocks the line for a few weeks.
A one-way signal lets trains through in its direction only, and trains plan their route around it.

Train crashes

When two trains run into each other, both are wrecked with everything on board, and nothing is paid back. The news reports it, and smoke rises from the spot for a few days.
A train in a depot can't be hit, nor one passing under a bridge another train is crossing. Buses and trucks never crash.
Wagons outside a depot keep the track they stand on occupied during servicing.
A crash near a town lowers the council rating of each company involved. See Town councils.
To run more than one train on one track, give it passing loops where the trains meet.

Next: Passing loops.