La Parenzana

Neanderthal mentioned in https://tsforum.forumotion.net/t1768-rimini-to-san-marino that his browser warned him off  "Il Deposito" for which reason he was reluctant to download La Parenzana. I can assure you Roger that having downloaded files from Il Deposito for as long as I can remember that the site is thoroughly reputable, and is among the best. I have downloaded and used La Parenzana often, and just to make sure I downloaded and installed it again this morning. Roger I know you'll enjoy it! There are a number of historical lines available from the site, so get in there and start browsing. (Hint:there is an English language version available).

While I'm at it I have a couple of remarks about La Parenzana and the Open Rails/MSTS route. Its name is the affectionate name given by Italians (or at least people from Trieste of a much earlier generation) derived from its destination Parenzo. The OR/MSTS route has a couple of quirks, for example a 100m wall rising from the sea at Muggia. Having visited Muggia on many occasions I can assure everyone that this is some sort of artefact. One day when I get a round tuit I'll have a go at removing it, if only for myself.

The author has quite clearly made extensive use of the book by the famous (in Italian Railway literature) author Giulio Roselli.(1967)



Giulio was born in the little town of Montona in Istria (now Motovun in Croatia) just a few years after my mother-in-law was born in the same place. A relative sent her a copy of the book, which now rests on my bookshelf. Another recommendation - go visit it, or at least have a look at it on the town website. The book is everything a railway book should be and has served as a model for other railway books for example



The Transalpina is the railway from Vienna to Trieste through Austria and Yugoslavia, a beautiful route that was inaccessible after the war but happily has now been reopened!

And another thing .. Giulio wrote another book "Cara Parenzana" in 1987 covering the same and more with bigger pictures. This I think is still available, I bought a copy in Trieste last year. It was on Amazon but is now noted as not available.



The painting on the cover is a picture of the "Parenza" at Montona Station, with the town perched on the hill behind.

Anyway my point is that the book has detailed drawings of rail layouts, rolling stock, railway buildings etc., and the route author Vittorio Dell'Aquila (who is well known on Italian Rail Forums as Robitaille-Fan) has done a superb job of recreating all the detail. However, the detail does get sparse after Buie, although the line does make it to Parenzo. The route is slow, quoting Vittorio it takes 7 hours to do 123 km. (Not surprisingly the advent of buses and metalled roads spelled the death knell of the parenzana.

Roger I hope I've whetted your appetite sufficiently to try out "La Parenzana' If you have any problems with the installation (especially the bits in Italian) just let me know and I'll be happy to help you get it running. Buon' viaggio!

Regards

Tony

The "Il Deposito" version of La Parenzana is Version 1 of 2008. Don't download it, there is a much improved and updated OR compatible (including movable turntables) dated Sept 2022 available on the Italian site Trainsimhobby.net. The direct link is

https://www.trainsimhobby.net/infusions/pro_download_panel/download.php?did=1998

This gets you to the download screen for this version, shown below. Caution the 2009 version is also available on this page.
Click on first file. to download it. Youw will be presented with the following screen:
Click the tick box (to say you agree with the download conditions)
Click the orange box (it says “Inizia il Download”)
The file PARENZANA2.part01.rar will download. Download to a temporary folder, or wherever it suits you.
Use your Back button (arrow pointing left on browser)
Then repeat for the reaining files.
You will end up with the downloaded files in the directory.

Select all the RAR files and select “Extract here” using WinRAR or 7zip.
You end up with the following:



Now copy these folders and files to your OR directory and you are good to go!
The file “Note del tester – DA LEGGERE.txt simply says that you must have the following MSTS locos in your TRAINS folder
- 380 Golsdorf
- SCOTSMAN

This really is worthwhile installing. The scenery (terrain) is perfect, DTM in use I presume. I can recognise the landforms they are so good. Terrain textures are very good. The cab is very good. No terrain aretefacts as in V1. There is now a second activity. I don't know off hand if they are included with the route, but I noticed a couple of items of rolling stock on TSH site.

Ascending the ramp towards Scalo Legnami gradient 2.5%! The main line to the left goes to Opicina, then from there it used to go to Vienna. It is no longer in use.

Hi Roger,
I'm pretty sure it's NOT your fault, mate.
There's no GLOBAL folder in the Parenzana2 download, therefore no track shapes and no tsection.dat file.
I can't see anything in the instructions, either, but suggest that you add XTracks and tsection.dat build #60 file from trainsim.com.

I haven't installed this route yet and am going out soon, but will check it again later today.

I'd also like to apologise for an error in my post in the RSM thread - I hadn't appreciated that TrainSimHobby had a NEW 7-part download which replaced the old 10-part download.

Cheers,
Ged

Thanks Ged for doing the problem solving and sorry to Roger that he had problems. I used an existing OR root directory that houses all my Italian routes, and of course that contained all the necessary auxiliary files. I think that Vittorio would have assumed that it would be installed in a working directory, but he did mention somewhere (in Italian naturally) that X tracks is required. I'm pleased that it works for you Roger, I haven't bothered to look at any log files, so I can't comment on those. The locos seem very lively but the real ones did have that reputation too! Driving them takes a lot of concentration, and those hills are steep! Hope you are enjoying it, maybe regale us with a couple of pictures? BTW there are a number of historical buildings accurately represented, as well as the railway buildings. The station is no longer in use, but is now a railway museum. It has been closed for the past few years for refurbishment, and I believe it should be reopening this month or next, but sadly opening dates in Italy cannot be relied upon.

Regards

Tony

Hi,
@Tony :  Thanks, mate Although I scanned through the .pdf file, I failed to notice the paragraph in RED!!

@Roger : As Tony mentioned, the author of this route seems to have assumed that it will be installed into a 'normal' MSTS installation!
For use in a purely Open Rails installation, you need to add the following :
The MSTS default TRAINSET 380 folder            
The MSTS default TRAINSET SCOTSMAN folder
The above are mentioned in the note del tester .txt file
Install XTracks v3.20 into the same folder as that containing the ROUTES folder (= root folder). There is a later version of XTracks but this will do fine!
Install New Roads v4.0 into the same folder.
To avoid the 'blocky' smoke from the steam loco, create a new folder in GLOBAL named TEXTURES and add smokemain.ace from the MSTS default GLOBAL/TEXTURES folder into it.
Many MSTS default sounds are missing - the simplest way to solve this is to copy the whole MSTS 'global' SOUND folder into the root folder of the Parenzana2 installation.

Doing the above will remove most of the messages currently shown in your OR log.

In the end you should have the following in the 'root' folder (I've called mine Parenzana2 - original, don't you think!!) of your Parenzana2 route  :
GLOBAL - containing SHAPES (for XTracks and New Roads) and TEXTURES (containing smokemain.ace) folders and the tsection.dat file
ROUTES - containing the Parenzana2 folder and all its required sub-folders and files.
SOUND -  The default MSTS 'global' sound folder.
TRAINS - containing CONSISTS and TRAINSET folders.  The latter MUST contain the MSTS default folders 380 and SCOTSMAN.

NOTE : tsection.dat #38 is (?was) the standard but, especially with newer routes, but's better to use the latest version - they are all backwards-compatible.

Hope this helps :

Cheers,
Ged

Hi Ged and Roger

Just wanted to mention that the late Brian Bere-Streeter wrote a guide "Transitioning from MSTS to OR.pdf " which is on the download page and gives a thorough explanation of the required OR installation folder. He also gives a suggestion about how to organise routes into different installations. Briefly

1. Once you have a working OR installation, including the files Ged mentioned, make a copy of it and use this as a template for new installations. Give it a name eg ORTemplate, and remove all the route files. You might also find it convenient to remove all the files contained in TRAINS and CONSISTS (or just leave them if you intend making use of them.

2. You can use the ORTemplate file to create new OR installations as follows:

3 . Copy the ORTemplate to a convenient place and name it, eg "ORItaly"

4. Install the routes, Consists and rolling stock you want - and there you go! (But add the installation to the Content tab of OR preferences)

5. If you want to you can use MSTS Actman to remove any rolling stock you don't need.

It is convenient to have the installations contain routes that are related, eg an Italian installation doesn't need to have all the UK rolling stock, or MSTS rolling stock (except where needed) in it.

Brian also included suggestions on how to organise your routes in the documentation that comes with some of his routes.

Regards

Tony

PS Roger thanks for the screenshots. Bottom right quadrant Scalo Legnami is covered by goods yards and branches to the docks on the east side, and on the west where the land starts to rise it is all commercial and dense residential. All tarmac and no grass.

Hi Roger,
In the GLOBAL folder. The file name must be tsection.dat - don't include the build number in the file name.
PLEASE do not touch the tsection.dat file in the Parenzana folder (unless you want a lot of trouble)!!

Cheers,
Ged

Hi Roger
Just got out of hospital ('flu) so I only got to see your screenshots now, Very nice - I like the one on the turntable. I also had a look at your previous screenshots (msts?)  the quality on the latest "parenzana" seem s to be much improved.

Regards

Tony