Narrow canal network, like you find in the England
tracked
CatalinaHunter Resident
I've not seen it in SL, but it could possibly be fun idea for the LL Moles to build. A British style canal network. Sure, on some suitable continent where there is some space available, or maybe Bellerissia. I as a boat builder would be happy to build a selection of canal boats, and I know a couple of other builders who have already built canal boats. Narrowboats as they are known, 6 foot 10 inches wide and 57 feet long (that could be scaled up by say 15% for SL avis), travel around a network of canals that are often only as wide as two or 3 boat widths. Allowing boats to be moored on the side, and others to pass. Locks that are often only one boat width take the narrow boats up and down gradients. Locks make the whole journey interesting, and could be fun in SL if done well. I'd be happy to get involved with designing and building some locks too. This could be a fun activity.
Log In
Korach Resident
The former Ville de Coeur community had exactly this. The locks worked well, raising and lowering water level as needed. Unfortunately the region no longer exists but there may be YouTube or archival Flickr, etc. out there showing it in action.
Boots Shamrock
Sounds like a great idea!
AlettaMondragon Resident
Locks are tricky, absolutely doable but it needs custom scripting for new boats or an extra script added to an existing boat. For example when the boat is moored and non-physical, it has to turn physical and detect the water prim in the lock to adjust its position to that instead of the real water level. Really easy to make and it can work with any modifiable boat, so it's not a blocker.
As for the canals themselves but without locks, more of them are always welcome, but there are indeed nice networks of them in Bay City, Horizons and the Sakura area of Bellisseria, and there are quite a few canals throughout the other parts of Bellisseria as well. :)
DittanyBelle Resident
Have you been to Bay City or Sakurasseria? They may not have locks but are certainly canals.
SarahKB7 Koskinen
I was given a landmark to a parcel in Heterocera continent which has a short decorative stretch of canal, with lock gates. It's very nice and worth a look to see what an English style canal network could look like.
CatalinaHunter Resident
Thanks for tracking the idea. I was talking to some people about this, and the solution for water is to have it basically on a prim/mesh surface. Canal water is mostly pretty calm and flat, with some turbulence around locks. It's not hard to make a boat behave as if that surface is is the water level.
Oatmeal Linden
updated the status to
tracked
Hello Catalina! Thanks for the suggestion. We're marking this as tracked for future project considerations.
Riff Gaffer
This is a great idea and I love it a lot. Locks - and more importantly, the functioning of water within them - may be something of a challenge but it could give a whole new way to live in SL.
In the UK there are many who live 247 on their narrowboat and many who also conduct retail businesses from theirs.
It might invigorate the economy of mainland significantly if handled right
SarahKB7 Koskinen
I have an idea for working locks. It may have already been made, I haven't checked, but I think this would work:
Take a prim and make it look watery and transparent and most importantly, physical.
Slice this water prim horizontally in two (so that the lower half of the prim rests on the canal lock bottom appears "missing") and then script this sliced prim to contract and expand on touch/chat/hud command so that it's upper half and surface expands and contracts to simulate rising and falling water surface levels.
Canal boats would then "float" onto this water prim while keeping their engines running to stay "physical", so that the boat "floats" while the water prim water inside the lock rises or falls, pushing the boat higher up or lower down.
Add swinging canal lock gates at either end to help contain the boat within the lock.
AlettaMondragon Resident
SarahKB7 Koskinen Something like this, but some boats keep their root or a sensor prim at the actual water level, so if they're running while they are lowered through a lock (or if they go down a waterfall) they will hover in the air at the previous water level. When they're moored you can do this, though, if you just turn them physical.
Christi Maeterlinck
SarahKB7 KoskinenJust looking in on this whole discussion (I'm not a scripter or a canal boatie myself); but just to say how impressive the SL building and design possibilities are, and how able you chaps are in bringing them to fruition. (Me, I've never even tried making prims physical in case all the builds on my island collapse...)
SarahKB7 Koskinen
A canal system near the Seogyeoshire community would be perfect!
Load More
→