This tutorial will describe how to build aesthetic, but functional, port and harbour areas using a variety of decorative objects and other techniques.
See also Industrial Station Design for similar designs for railway stations. Combine these techniques to create an intermodal terminal.
See also Seaplane Airport Design for similar designs for water-based airports.
Requirements
- Full width dock
The game does not yet support loading multiple types of dock graphics, so any dock replacement GRF will replace all docks identically. For this reason I recommend a plain, full-width dock that can blend in with other seawall tiles. Recommendations include CHIPS Custom Docks or ISR-Style Dock.
Tip: Make sure your preferred dock GRF is at the bottom of your list so that it overrides any other GRFs which provide dock graphics, such as ISR or MariCo.
- Port and industry objects
A variety of object sets provide objects that blend in with FIRS or AXIS industries, and CHIPS or ISR stations. Recommendations include FaCSO (FIRS and CHIPS Style Objects), ISR/DWE Objects II, and Auz Industry Objects.
- Water tiles
An object set which provides blank water tiles, which we can use to precisely control ship movements. Recommendations include SNO (Supercheese’s New Objects) and Auz Water Objects.
Recommendations
- Ship NewGRF
A NewGRF which provides more variety of ships, such as SHARK, is recommended.
- JGR Patch Pack
JGRPP is not strictly required, but may come in useful for custom bridgeheads, objects under bridges, and the ship collision pathfinder feature.
Ship Control
Ships in OpenTTD have a tendency to dock at awkward angles if you give them the space. This can look ugly and unrealistic, especially when multiple ships are stacked on top of one another.
Using carefully placed objects, we can force the ships to dock at the angles we want. Ships need at least two non-water tiles on either side to force them to the correct angle.
Once the layout is finished, you can upgrade the tiles to decorative ones such as seawalls and invisible water tiles. I like to use the SNO seagull objects to denote the location of ship control tiles.
Seaport Layouts
Seaports can be built to a variety of layouts to suit the local terrain and their intended usage. Here are some basic layouts that we can decorate later:
The Quay
The Pier
The Berth
Seaport Eyecandy
Decorate your seaport according to its intended usage using various object tiles.
Passenger Ferry Terminal
General Cargo Harbour with Industry
Intermodal Terminal