I have some GOOD NEWS - well !!! .................. as good as it is going to get !!!

Like the mythical Phoenix, the 'Short West + Short South' route is arising from the ashes.

Due to an incredible stroke of luck, some months back I had sent a preliminary copy of the route to Chris Nelson, which he still has, and will be sending back to me. Chris currently has the ONLY copy of the route left in the world !!!

Now - the news is not as good as I would like it to be - it seems that all the trackwork is in place and most of the track interactives, etc. - however, from the date of the most recent file in that version, it is pretty clear that I have lost around 2 months work of work. This is much better than having lost the whole 8 months of work on the route. So, it is a major set-back.

I have lost quite a number of custom buildings that I had made and placed in the route - some of them I will probably re-make in TSM, but others will be far too time consuming to make, so I will in all probability, have to reduce the overall scope and quality of the route to compensate a bit for the lost work. Athough I am rather happy that the route is still alive (of sorts), the sheer amount of work necessary to bring it back up to the state that it was when lost, is just too heart-breaking to do all over again, so it will be a slightly lesser version - but, still exciting nontheless. In the meltdown I lost a complete 'library' of photos, and other documents that I had collected to help build the route - as these are gone, some parts of the route will have to be rebuilt only from my recent memory, and may not be as accurate as I would like - but, better to have something at maybe 90% rather than nothing at all !!!

HOWEVER, since the original route was lost, I have COMMITTED to another project (in conjunction with another route author) - so, my MSTS time for the forseeabale future will have to be split between working on two routes simultaneously, rather than just concentrating on one - so, the net result is that the 'SW+SS' will certainly not see the light of day until sometime early next year - I'm hoping maybe sometime in the first quarter, but if not, it should be done within the second quarter.

So, the Phoenix is arising out of the ashes, and within a week or so will be winging its way from Canada back to its 'home' in Queensland, where it will start to 'rebuild its nest'.

Victory has been snatched from the jaws of defeat !!!

I'll keep you informed, Brian

What an Amazing Comeback. (Partially that is)
I gotta admit Brian, That is some good news, Shame you still lost the librarys of the photos for the project.

If you need any help on this route at all, mate. Like new Scenery objects. Give me a yell, Ok?
Best Regards,

Brian, if I can be of any help in refreshing you photo lbrary then give me a yell. Only too happy to help out with the Lithgow, Mt Victoria and 'Wang end of the route.

Cheers
Pat

Gidday Josh - thanks for the offer of help, but I've pretty much got it under control for the time being. Usually when I make significant TSM structures, I do up a quick little freehand pencil 3-D sketch with the main dimensions, and a few notes about the building. I still have these filed away in the drawer, so can re-make quite a number of them again relatively quickly. However, as I said above some of the more complex time-consuming 'signature' structures simply won't get re-made.

Gidday Pat - again, thanks for the offer of help - however, the 'Blue Mountains - Steam Era V1.0' end of the route is already finished (it will be released 'sometime' on Steam4me). For SW+SS I simply merged that with the other two part routes to make up the whole SW+SS route. I'm not sure if there will be any further extentions west from Wallerawang in SW+SS, if there are, they will be in the form of extentions to Chris's Tumulla Bank route (as explained in one of my other topics), rather than being added on to the western end of SW+SS.

With my current extensive experience in merging multiple routes together, I've decided that for any future work it is just not worth the hassle - each separate route tends to get a fair bit out of whack towards the ends of the line, because of the MSTS 'track creep' problem.

With the SW+SS route, I found by measuring and plotting in Google Earth, the actual MSTS distance from the eastern end of Mike Simpson's 'Blue Mountains' route, to the western end of Peter Newell's 'Coal to Newcastle' route was out by about a mile and a half - so when they were merged, I had to fudge an extra 'fictional' section about 3/4 of a mile long between St Marys and Mt Druitt, and again between Lidcome and Flemington, to 'fill in' the unprototypical gaps. Then when I merged Chris's 'Southern Highglands' into the mix, again it was about a 3/4 mile offset in an east-west direction from the end of the track at Maldon, so I had to gradually 'slew' the lines sideways from Menangle to Maldon to get them to connect. Most of the route is OK, but MSTS track creep means there are 3 'semi-fictional' bits to enable them all to connect together. The SW+SS is the first Australian route that connects the work of three other route authors with my work interconnecting them.

By the way - if anyone is wondering why my screenshot showing the extent of the route in the first post in the original SW+SS Topic is missing - it is because the image program that goes with 'FreeForums' (who host the AMW forums) frequently 'crashes' and when that happens, all images in our forums that use that 'ImagePoster' service suddenly 'disappears' and do not return until the provider resets their server again.

Brian, it's great to hear that you have been able to rescue your route. Even if the quality is slightly diminished I still look forward to seeing your work.

Terrific news Brian. Thanks for persevering.

G'day Brian
Not a hassil. You've got my support on this project all the way mate. Good luck to you.

Before I became involved with the huge 'NSW-NW' route, I was fully engaged with another 'large route', my own 'Short West + Short South' - this was coming along quite nicely - BEFORE the 'great meltdown'. Once I had realised that the 'SW+SS' was 'lost forever', I committed to helping Chris get the NSW-NW finished - but then I got quite a surprise, Chris mentioned that I had sent him a copy of the 'SW+SS' some months back (I had totally forgotten that I sent him a copy - thank goodness for small mercies). Subsequently, Chris sent it back to me, and I now have the route again - however, I have lost around 8 weeks worth of work on the route, so it has set me back considerably time wise.

So, the current situation is - I'm working on TWO 'BIG' routes simulataneously - this means that there will be substantial delays to the ultimate completion of both routes - but I'll get them done !!! My current program is to try and get the NSW-NW to at least a Stage 1 release, then I'll move back to 'SW+SS', which will also now have to be released in stages, rather than 'all at once' - with SW+SS, I'm anticipating that the SW+SS Stage 1 will comprise the section from St Marys to Lidcombe, so that the 'Short West' section is complete - Stage 2 will complete the Picton to Lidcombe section to complete the 'Short South', and the final Stage 3 will fill in the other areas, like the Richmond Branch, the Granville to Cabramatta suburban line, the Sandown industrial branches, etc.

So the plan is, roughly:

Release NW Stage 1

Release SW+SS Stage 1

Release NW Stage 2

Release SW+SS Stage 2

Release NW Stage 3

Release SW+SS Stage 3

I can very clearly state that this will see me FULLY occupied throughout the whole of 2010, and maybe even into early 2011 - so, hang in there, have some patience and you will be rewarded with what will probably become the 'definitive' NSWGR steam era routes for MSTS.

Regards, Brian

Patience is a necessity when it comes to MSTS, I've learnt that with my own projects! Brian, I appreciate the effort you've put in and will wait happily for your current work to be complete.

Cheers,
Matt