Public Wormhole NEtwork

            The wormhole network that links the Federation worlds is not some museum piece to technological sophistication, rather it is in continuous heavy use, and not just  by specialist cargo transporters, wormhole networks also serve the public and provide its main means of going interstellar.

            The wormhole conduits generated by Federation wormholes are benign to their human users, as long as they can step through one gate and on to the ground on the other side any wormhole could be used to move people, however the wormhole system moves tens of millions of people each day, and a self service system would be inefficient as busy gates would soon be overwhelmed with connection requests. Instead an organised system has been created offering not only individual flexibility, but also reliability for the millions that use the system every day.

            The public wormhole network is a complex mixture of services, catering not only for pedestrian traveller, but also linking train and vehicle routes through wormhole networks, the main regulating bodies are Federation Transport Services (FTS) which oversees the integrity of the public network and the integration of other system within the wormhole network, the Galen Advanced Technology Group (AGATE) which oversees the traffic routing and gate usage, and the network stations which serve the public using them.

            A typical journey might consist of going between a small town on one world, where the person lives, to a facility on another world, perhaps for social reasons or part of their work activities. If there is a gate complex in the town then that person can use local transport to get gate station where he can put in a request to his destination at station services. If the town is small then it is likely that no traffic will be queuing for that gate and they can immediate get to the next node in the route to the destination. Some journeys may only require one gate jump, for example going between local towns and cities on the same continent on the same world, longer journeys however often require jumps between several stations.

            If the route requires multiple jumps then the first jump is likely to be to one of the main stations on that world. If the station moves a lot of traffic the pedestrian traveller might expect to board a small vehicle on the other side which will then move them through the gate complex. Because station services have already logged the route plan for than individual, all subsequent transport services require no prompting. If the outgoing wormhole to the next world is busy, vehicles all going to the same destination will be banded together, when the gate clears, this train of vehicles will pass through to the next station in there route. Some journeys may require several transitions like this, indeed if the person originally lived far from the first gate complex, they might have been sitting in the same vehicle throughout their journey. The final gate jump will take them to the gate closest to their destination, whereupon the traveller may use other transport services to complete their journey.

            Because the FTS coordinates all public transport a journey can be planned in its entirety before it starts, and where one transport system hands over to another it can usually be arranged that handover requires no waiting. Of course the user can change route at any time, or get off at any point, and because these changes can be disseminated throughout the services, the vehicles can be reassigned according to other priorities.

            Local gate stations are generally small only having a few gates, quite often only one. Though foot passengers can use the gate system, the gate is also likely to be tied into local transport systems such as train, or small vehicle systems. Large central gate stations may have a great many gates, situated in a large complex, though a passenger could navigate this by foot, it is quicker to take one of the small vehicles waiting at the gate complex, passengers already travelling by vehicle can of course seamlessly transit the wormhole onto their next destination. Gate stations tend to be located centrally in settlements, and it is often quite unnecessary to board further transport to get to the town centre, however because of this convenience, many people have taken to visiting the settlements of the Federation in any spare time because the journeys are swift, and they can generally get to all the really interesting attractions just by stepping outside the station. However the majority of the traffic passing through a main gate station are passengers travelling to other worlds for personal errands or activities related to their current work.

            The current efficiency of the public wormhole network is near optimal, although millions of people use the system everyday, the simple task of banding together people going in the same direction greatly reduces the number of wormhole operations, and even if the number of people travelling each day were to triple, there would hardly be a change in service, especially at the main stations because of these simple protocols. Because the journey time is dependendent on the number of gate transitions it is often the case that travelling to one end of the Federation from another need only take a little longer than a local transit. A typical journey starting at the start gate station, to the destination station will perhaps only take five or ten minutes, a more convoluted route maybe another five minutes more.