>Accidentally bumping into Newton yesterday

I want to stress the coincidence this happened ^^: Clonko lives in Hannover, I live in Hamburg. We met at the central station in Bremen when I came back from visiting Sven and actually, in the same (train) ride share! What are the chances of that :-D

Nice scetches, very inspiring.

Though, perhaps you remember that we talked about the rails too but came to the point that it would be easier if you only have to build the crossings and connect them somehow. So the metaphor of mechanical belts (German: Riemen) or roller chains is more fitting for that kind of construction. Also, with it animated and stuff, I can imagine that it would look quite cool. I mean, these lorry-wagons could still be propelled by steam :-).

I like this general idea so much because you can build so much cool stuff with it. You know, really big "machines" with the belts+lorries+signs you put there being the infrastructure/logic behind it. Just with the signs "drop object of type X here" and "wait here until you get an object", you could theoretically even build a computer... :-D... man, that would be awesome: Addition with rocks.  Or perhaps you could build your whole production in a deep cave with just a slot to throw stuff in and a hole from which the result drops. Then you control what you want to have by a lot of switches and levers in some kind of control room ^^.
I could imagine that Sven would build some cool puzzle scenarios with it ("you have only this belt, where will you put it in this complicated machine to get object X to Y (in order to do Z with A by simultanously pressing down the pressure plate B with that table that drops down if the explosive C is incinerated by explosive arrow D which is found only if lever E is pushed exactly when above lorry F passes over that other lorry G....")?

I think, the main fun part of this rail-system would be to build cool stuff with it, not primarily it's function to make things more "convenient" :-). For that reason, I think it could be a letdown if the lorries would find through the net only autonomously (=dynamically) without levers, buttons, signs and stuff... I mean, the game can't be about making stuff so easy (with little effort) that there is less and less of the actual game left. In my opinion, the primary function of stuff in the game should be to be fun and be able to do or build cool stuff out of it, not necessarily to make things easier. If this means that base/settlement melees are not really sufficient without modifications, then base/settlement melees are not really sufficient without modifications. *shrug*
Perhaps, if the lorry is "driven" by a clonk, it can go into any direction.

Signs:
I can think of a few more, we also talked about that a bit: It is possible to deactivate/activate a sign by either manual control (interacting with it) and by levers. You put a lever somewhere, then connect the lever with the sign through a power line. If a lever is pushed, an electric impulse is send and the sign is activated/deactivated. Or since it is a power line: You connect the coal plant with a sign that says: "drop coal" at a track above the plant - if the power goes out, the shield is activated and the next lorry that comes by drops a coal (if it has one) :-)
Another one: a lever-sign - like a lever: sends an electric impulse down the connected power line if a lorry passes this track
Even another one: a stop-sign - the lorry stops here until the sign is deactivated (a lever is pushed / connected power line switches from 'no power' to 'power' or other way round)

With all this electric-impulse stuff, one could do much more: Open/close gates and doors (a big steel door that opens and closes automatically to let a lorry in), activate traps, shoot cannons, do magic (some automatic-caster-machine), turn on and off lanterns on the walls (or create an animated chain of lights), activate production of a production building and dunno what more. Probably, much more ^^