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SPATE of speed restrictions?

You are here: Home > Forum > Simulations > Released > Salisbury > SPATE of speed restrictions?

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 10:12 #72453
Mattyq
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Having just started a new game with V1.1, I opted for one TSR in the options. The TSR I got was this:-

"00:00:00 TSR: Wilton Jn area (all lines) SPATE mph".

OK, so SPATE means nothing in Aussie railways but Uncle Google told me it means "Speed previously advised terminated early". How does that relate to Simsig? To me, this means a previously posted TSR has now been lifted? Have I been dealt a reprieve?

Not fat ..... fluffy!! (G Iglesias)
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 10:25 #72454
58050
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SPATE Indicators mean that a speed restriction has been withdrawn or will not be imposed. The SPATE Indicator is on a yellow reflected square board with a black diagonal line running across it. No doubt trains will now run at normal speeds over the affected bit of line where a TSR was previously planned to be in place. I'd say it a pretty realistic aspect of the sim as this happens in the real world & as result the same thing occurs here. ALL TSRs when I was on the footplate back in the 1980s were published in the Weekly Operationg Notices along with the dates they were imposed for. Also those TSRs which were subsequently cancelled for whatever reason were also listed. I suspect its still the same today. When I last looked at a WON back in my last year on the railways in 2005 they were still shown in the WON.
Last edited: 19/05/2015 at 10:37 by 58050
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 10:50 #72457
Steamer
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This appears to be a new feature, I've never seen it mentioned before. Is it Salisbury-specific, or can it crop up anywhere?
"Don't stress/ relax/ let life roll off your backs./ Except for death and paying taxes/ everything in life.../ is only for now." (Avenue Q)
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 11:19 #72460
KymriskaDraken
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" said:
This appears to be a new feature, I've never seen it mentioned before. Is it Salisbury-specific, or can it crop up anywhere?
I haven't seen it before either. I've started up Salisbury five times in a row now and not had the spate TSR. My money is on it being something that Andy has coded into the sim as part of the random setting of TSR speeds.

Do trains run at line speed through that TSR?


Kev

Last edited: 19/05/2015 at 11:20 by KymriskaDraken
Reason: plurals

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 11:22 #72461
AndyG
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Not my doing to best of my knowledge, I just coded in some TSRs and never got 'SPATE' when testing.
I can only help one person a day. Today's not your day. Tomorrow doesn't look too good either.
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 11:31 #72462
mfcooper
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A published speed restriction has been cancelled, but because it has been published all the boards on the ground need to be there, otherwise drivers would report a missing speed.

The SPATE symbol is a diagonal black line placed on the Warning and Commencement boards instead of the speed limit figure.

Therefore all the boards are still in place where drivers are expecting them, but they don't have to adjust their speed for them.

EDIT: As Pascal said, planned Temporary Speed Restrictions are published in the Weekly Operating Notice so drivers are aware of them.

NB: Emergency Speed Restrictions are not published, and have an additional indicator on approach to the speed boards so drivers are ready to look out for them.

Last edited: 19/05/2015 at 11:34 by mfcooper
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 14:42 #72467
clive
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(1) It's a core code feature. If the TSR is set to the actual line speed, the core code describes it as SPATE rather than a number. I presume Andy put in a range of random numbers that included the line speed.

(2) "SPATE" DOES NOT MEAN "Speed previously advised terminated early". This is an invention of somebody who doesn't understand telegraphic codewords. "SPATE" is not an acronym.

Back when the telegraph was invented, people realized that sending long messages was slow and (on paid links) expensive, so they looked for ways to shorten messages. One approach was to come up with English words or neologisms that were very unlikely to occur in a message and use them to mean something else. Thus, for example, if you wanted to send a telegram to the Metropolitan District Railway, instead of addressing it to METROPOLITAN DISTRICT RAILWAY SOUTH KENSINGTON STATION LONDON (7 words) you could just send it to CIRCUMITION LONDON (2 words). Similarly the Metropolitan was UNDERGROUND and then METELECTRO, the Central was RHEOMOTOR, the C&SL TUNNELLING, and the Bakerloo UNDERSOIL.

The railways had a lot of messages to be sent and they wanted them to be unambiguous, so they did a lot of these codes. So:

CAPE Train will not run (followed by train identities)
PINE Service terminated early (followed by train identities and possibly a place name)
SPATE TSR withdrawn (usage SPATE SHELFORD WHITTLESFORD FROM JUNE 1ST)
FOCUS Arrange to strengthen trains (followed by train identities)
CICERO Special trains to run as follows
CORAL Glass-carrying wagon
GOOSE Stop accepting the following traffic until further advised
GOSLING Stop forwarding the following traffic until further advised

There doesn't seem to be a good UK list on the web.

There's a Victorian (Australia) list here. Much of it applies throughout Godzone. Thus the Oz version of CAPE is AMEX and the equivalent of SPATE is ZUBO.

Last edited: 19/05/2015 at 14:43 by clive
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 14:58 #72472
AndyG
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You are correct insofar as I did put in a random speed, but assuming the reported location is Wilton Jn the TSR was random 15-30mph {tsrAll,TSR_C,randomMPH,15,30,TSR_C} with the line speed being 40 on the diverging route and greater on the other routes over the junction.
I can only help one person a day. Today's not your day. Tomorrow doesn't look too good either.
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 19/05/2015 at 15:37 #72476
clive
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Forget what I said about actual line speed; you get SPATE if you set both passenger and freight speeds to a negative number (which means "no limit"). Are you doing that somewhere?

(The message comes from writing <en>TSRNAME<en> in a MSG etc. value, if that helps you locate things.)

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 20/05/2015 at 00:28 #72504
Mattyq
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" said:
(2) "SPATE" DOES NOT MEAN "Speed previously advised terminated early". This is an invention of somebody who doesn't understand telegraphic codewords. "SPATE" is not an acronym.
I'm only quoting what I found on the interweb thingy.


" said:
There doesn't seem to be a good UK list on the web.

There's a Victorian (Australia) list here. Much of it applies throughout Godzone. Thus the Oz version of CAPE is AMEX and the equivalent of SPATE is ZUBO.
This is the one used in NSW. As you'll see, it is almost identical to the Victorian one (and the Queensland one). Each state has their own with only a couple of minor (localised) differences. I can't speak for any other state but QLD and NSW both still use a few Uniform Telegraph codes for train operations...... except concluding messages with "ZANY ZEBU"!!

"ESAU EDNA PEON ROSY". :doh

Not fat ..... fluffy!! (G Iglesias)
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 20/05/2015 at 08:02 #72511
clive
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" said:
" said:
(2) "SPATE" DOES NOT MEAN "Speed previously advised terminated early". This is an invention of somebody who doesn't understand telegraphic codewords. "SPATE" is not an acronym.
I'm only quoting what I found on the interweb thingy.
Oh, I'm aware of that. It's not you I'm cross at, it's whichever idiot invented this backronym.

As I wrote on Usenet many years ago:

I'd love to see the "explanations" for CICERO (special train will run as follows), FABRIC (must not exceed speed of ... between ...), FALCON (no trace of receiving the following), or especially JOAN (running lines and/or sidings mentioned on the left-hand side of the load looking in the direction of travel must be clear, and no train signalled 2-6-2 or 2-6-3 must be allowed on the running lines and/or sidings on the right-hand side of the load; to be signalled by the special 'Is Line Clear?' signal 2-6-3).

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 20/05/2015 at 09:25 #72516
Splodge
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Presumably in that case acronyms developed to meet the codeword; I was under the impression that CAPE was Cancelled At Point of Entry.
There's the right way, the wrong way and the railway.
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 20/05/2015 at 09:38 #72519
Sacro
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" said:
Presumably in that case acronyms developed to meet the codeword...
Also known as a backronym.

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 20/05/2015 at 09:39 #72520
Danny252
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CAPE may make sense in a post-TOPS era, when "point of entry" could be associated with a location ID on the computerised systems, but I think you'd get some very strange looks in the 1950s or earlier if you tried to talk about a train's "point of entry".
Last edited: 20/05/2015 at 09:39 by Danny252
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 21/05/2015 at 10:44 #72553
nnr
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Some of these codes were quite bizarre! These are some GW ones.

"CHOPPER" - Fog here - instruct Drivers and Guards of following trains to light their head and tail lamps.

"ASMO" - Covered goods motor truck 32ft 8in long, fitted to run in passenger trains.

"COLUMBIA" - No extra engine required (as in "COLUMBIA 10.30am Paddington")

"HEBREW" - Following train is leaving here with assisting engine (as in "Hebrew 10.30am Paddington")

"PRUNE" - Bank engine required to assist following train. (as in PRUNE 1.10pm Pontypool"

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 21/05/2015 at 13:25 #72560
Zoe
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Does EROS officially stand for Emergency Restriction Of Speed or is it another one of these words? The EROS board of course often gets called a dalek.
Last edited: 21/05/2015 at 13:31 by Zoe
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 21/05/2015 at 13:27 #72561
Mattyq
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" said:
Presumably in that case acronyms developed to meet the codeword; I was under the impression that CAPE was Cancelled At Point of Entry.
Actually, that would make more sense here in Australia where tracks are managed by different companies (be they GOC's or private). NSW is managed by 3 different companies, namely Transport for NSW (TfNSW), ARTC and John Holland CRN. It is not uncommon for a train that was scheduled to run via a John Holland corridor to be diverted via an ARTC corridor, resulting in that train still running, just not over JH/CRN tracks. The JH/CRN cancellation report will read "Train 1234 AMEX" (train will not run) even though it will. In this situation, "Cancelled at point of entry" would be more fitting.

Mind you, NSW is the only place where such a thing could happen.

Not fat ..... fluffy!! (G Iglesias)
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SPATE of speed restrictions? 21/05/2015 at 14:36 #72569
clive
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" said:
CAPE may make sense in a post-TOPS era, when "point of entry" could be associated with a location ID on the computerised systems, but I think you'd get some very strange looks in the 1950s or earlier if you tried to talk about a train's "point of entry".
"CAPE" always made sense, so long as you realize that it was never an acronym, just a codeword.

Similarly, those of us who were in the Royal Signals will remember the standard Army codewords seen here. None of those were ever acronyms either.

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 21/05/2015 at 14:37 #72570
clive
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" said:
Some of these codes were quite bizarre!
When you remember that the idea was to have words that wouldn't normally appear in a message, it all makes sense. It would be silly to use BRISTOL for "train cancelled" and SWINDON for "need restaurant car".

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 21/05/2015 at 14:42 #72571
clive
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" said:
Does EROS officially stand for Emergency Restriction Of Speed or is it another one of these words? The EROS board of course often gets called a dalek.
The Rule Book, module SP section 4, talks about an Emergency Speed Restriction and uses the abbreviation ESR. The board is officially an "emergency indicator" or "emergency speed indicator". "Dalek" comes from its appearance and is *not* a code word!

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SPATE of speed restrictions? 21/05/2015 at 14:53 #72572
Zoe
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" said:
The Rule Book, module SP section 4, talks about an Emergency Speed Restriction and uses the abbreviation ESR. The board is officially an "emergency indicator" or "emergency speed indicator". "Dalek" comes from its appearance and is *not* a code word!

So was EROS ever a code word/acronym or has it always just been used unofficially?

Last edited: 21/05/2015 at 14:58 by Zoe
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