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[Baro]

You'd start out by building a track, this could be anything from just some grooves carved in the ground to some tracks that require metal.  Then you would have to make two stops at the end of the tracks out of mechanics.

A dwarf that was attempting to walk from A to B  would check if there was a tram path along the way and if ridig it would shorten the trip, if so they'd simply touch one end of the track then zoom at 10x speed to the other end and get off and continue on their merry way.

This is the absolute most simple bare-bones implementation I could think of.  It would be cool to go all transport-tycoon on this, but that's a whole other game.

I just get so sad seeing my dwarves spending so much time going down a single 'highway'.  We all have them, that long double wide or more hallway that goes all the way from our fort to the lava in probably a straight line.  Even in ancient times when cargo and people were moving the same path over and over and over, specially in mines, they'd set something up to make the trip easier.  heck even the ancient greeks had grooves cut in the floor to allow carts for heavy loads and such to be easily pushed and pulled.

[Xeirxes]

I like this idea a lot, but I think it should definitely be something that takes a developed industry to make. But imagine the simplification of transporting goods to a trade depot or ore to a smelter; it would be magnificent  

It might also be fun if you could use the grooved track as a trap. Imagine setting off a pressure point as you enter a tunnel, and a wall on wheels battering you off the edge of a chasm.

[schnobs]

I asked for something along these lines and here's the replies I got:

quote:# Bloat59, MORE HAULING, (Future): Animal-drawn carts and large rocks. Use carts and places to post them to do hauls more efficiently (move dozens of objects from post to post between burrows).

quote:Bloat10, WHEELBARROWS, (Future): Wheelbarrows could be made and used by haulers to do several jobs at once. The AI for this is complicated though.

Meaning those have been though of and they will be added. Sometime.

I definitely like carts / dolleys more than wheelbarrows. After all, this is a dwarfen cave, not a hobbit garden.

[scjohnno]

I like flow-based transport purely because of the engineering and planning involved. You'd create a flow of water (or magma, I guess), and send items down it to their destination. It's similar to how people used rivers to transport items downstream. Some sort of grate to stop items yet allow the flow through would be needed, though.

[Xeirxes]

Yeah, the problem I could see with that is that at the moment, channels don't really have a 'flow' to them, they're just a block of water with certain properties (i.e. when there's a floodgate nearby, if there's an empty square around me, fill it with another block of water)

[schnobs]

I also don't think it should *require* much engineering. By far the most important use of this would be to clear the cave of rubble, take ore to the smithies, that sort of thing.

Laying tracks might speed up the cart considerably, but considering how fast miners can proceed into the mountain, it should be reasonably useful even on bare cavern floor. Track construction can't possibly keep up with the digging, and carts would lose much of their shine if their cargo still has to be hauled over several screens to the next station.

One approach that might actually work with the game as it is: in the cave, the cart acts like a stockpile (or bin). Once full, it will be taken outside (or wherever) and simply upended, in due time forming an actual pile or heap. This mostly so that no dwarves have to run outside in order to unload the thing.

Although taking stuff to and from the mill, or trade depot, would also be possible uses; these won't go over well with tilting the cart, though.

If farmers start to load seeds on carts I'll weep.

[TotalPigeon]

Once ships and wheelbarrows are both in, it would be pretty awesome to be able to construct a barge which floats on the river and lets you tow huge numbers of items up and down all at once... or even on canals built into the mountain by the dwarves. Imagine - dwarves could hitch rides on the thing while moving the items to the next stockpile. That would be great.