Factorio is such a great example of how different the visuals can be from the underlying datastructure. Conveyor belts look hugely complex / heavyweight - if you consider them as individual items each with an x/y position that needs to be updated every tick. But if you see them as a linked list with only a distance and it becomes a lot simpler.

This post also explains why compressed belts are better for performance on very large bases. But despite 1000+ hours in the game I never reached a point where performance was an issue.