Flight Sim X and aid to MSTS

[hecrowell]

Well, today I ran across something that I was not expecting - it was purely by accident. Let me expalin:
For years now, I have been quite heavily involved with Microsoft Flight Simulator. I recently installed the latest version FSX (Flight SImulator 10) and then installed an add-on software known as Ultimate Terrain Canada FSX. The first flight I took was out of the yarmouth NS airport (my home town) for no other reason than to check out the coastline (Ultimate Terrain has very detailed coastlines). Taking off from Runway 24 and climbing 1000ft, made a right hand turn and bagan a run straight up the harbour. AT the end of the harbour, something caught my eye. Dropping to 500 ft I saw that it was unmistakably the DAR rail line leading out of the town. Following it, I came across the turning wye situated exactly where it should have been. Continuing on, I followed the line to Hebron then on to South Ohio, Brazil Lake and Lake Anis and on to Hectanooga. Enthralled by what I was seeing, I continued up to the French Shore to Methegan, Church Point and right into Weymouth. Yes the trestle across the Sissaboo River is even there as well as the dual track in front of where the Weymouth Station used to be. I followed the old DAR line on into DIgby and back out pretty much exactly as it is marked on a map that I have. I could clearly see Joggins Bridge, Cornwallis and finally the Bear River trestle. I had to end my flight at that time but I assume (and will confirm) that the route continued to its end at Halifax.
I have no idea where the software programmers got their data to biuld this part of history, but it is all there.
What is the signifigance of this? I believe it will be an invaluable aid to me as a design enhancement in recreating my end of the old DAR line Yarmouth to Annapolis Royal. I believe I will take a few aerial photos of my finding to better accompany this post and will add them in when I have them "developed".


Following are actual shots along the route taken from Flight SImulator X

[stem]

It was my understanding that MSTS 2 was using a modified FSX engine and so they would share the same ground data. In addition it appeared they wanted to map every rail line in the world they could so that building layouts was a matter of choosing the terrain tiles, laying the track where you could actually see it and populating the area with 3d models.

Now I know this is simplistic and not totally accurate but this is the general drift and may explain why you are seeing rails lines on FSX.

If you get into edit mode and take a look, there aren't any actual track objects are there? And the trestle is really a 3D structure too?

[hecrowell]

Not knowing where Flight One Software and Scenery Solutions got their info for building Ultimate Terrain X, I decided to have a look and here is what I got:
The data that they use is from the Tele Atlas commercial data set. Here's what they say about the railroads in the scenery:
"Railroads
While the data quality in Ultimate Terrain X is similar to FSX with the Tele Atlas data, we improve the look of railroads using higher resolution textures, railroad track encasement textures, railyard ground textures, and tunnel entrances.
A 3D bridge object is also placed where all railroad tracks cross water."

My surprise was not that railroads actually appeared in the scenery, but the fact that railroads that have been torn up some 30 years ago are there and a lot of their detail was or is not available to us via the "tools" that we now use for route planning - ie: Google Earth. The old rail bed scar is simply undeterminable in the low res areas of google earth. If one took the time, lats and longs could be taken right within FSX and those points placed in Google Earth or for that matter mapping software which would indeed allow a somewhat accurate railbed path being marked. This would indeed remove many "grey areas" about where the track actually ran. I believe that mapping software is sort of pricy though.

Anyway, It was a point of interest that I discovered and wanted to share,

[Paul Charland]

Hi Harold,

If Google or Bing keeps adding good quality satellite shots you should be able to trace the entire DAR. North of Windsor you can trace the old Midland even though it was torn up in the early '80s.

I'm in Brockville ON and Google covers the old Brockville and Westport are, you can trace the line even though it was torn up in the late '50s... OK, it helps to have an idea where the line should be as several farmers have planted thing on the line or grown barns over the right of way, but still, it's fairly clear to see the majority of the route.

Paul

[stem]

Hi all.

So according to Harold then if you had FSX Paul, you should see all these bygone rail lines you spoke of aroudn Brockville with enhanced graphics so that the rail lines and tunnel entrances are clearly visable and the bridges are even there as 3D objects.

The real question is, could you use FSX to place markers and export them to a usuable format for MSTS?

Have you flown the entire line yet Harold? How is the MIdland sub and the Kingsport/Weston Branch line?

[hecrowell]

yes I have flown the entire route between Yarmouth and HAlifax and WIndsor to Truro. Although I havent done it yet I suspect the other lines you spoke of are there too (will check this out). As well, I can see the switchyards at Halifax and Truro (they are not fancy with nice smooth lines at the switch locations etc) and look sort of crude - but they are there.
Nice thing about this is I can fly in slew mode and in Top Down vview which reduces the travelling time and gives a good bird's eye view of the picture. The aircraft location is represented by a cross hair on the earth's surface and I can select to see lats and longs as I travel. Wish I had a way to save these in a GPS type format which would be able to be read into GE

UPDATE TO THE MIDLAND LINE AND THE

[stem]

Isn't there a FSX terrain editor that you can get into to cruise the terrain easier than flying it?

Wouldn't that be the place to see if you can set up markers and export them?

[downeastrailfan]

Hi Harold,

Thanks for the maps. I was able to find the DAR wye on my latest trip to Yarmouth. I had wondered if there were tracks to the Bunker Island tanks on the H&SW. Now I know!