High Speed Trains | 76 comments (76 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 1)

The main problem with what you call MHS (and what I'd call state-of-the-art conventional fast train) is sharing tracks with 'normal' trains, which go even slower. Especially slow and long freight trains, which would have to make way mid-way along the route, yet accelerate slowly. So an upgrade-only option is really cheaper only if the capacity limit is not hit, and freight railroads won't protest. But once you build a new line, it makes little sense to not build one suited for 200 mph -- the WCML in Britain and similar projects have showed that trying to squeeze more tracks into existing infrastructure can be even more expensive. (BTW, given population numbers, Washington-Pittsburg would justify a real high-speed line.)

I suggest to you that there is a better reason to have both 'MHS' and 'VHS' than getting branchlines for trunk lines. Conventional fast trains could have more frequent stops , e.g. serve more stations, along the same corridors (even if not necessarily on the same lines), too.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Jan 23rd, 2007 at 05:14:32 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

Much corridor in the US that was originally double line is now single line with passing loops. Adding the track in existing corridor for a high speed dedicated passenger line and low speed freight/suburban local line with common passing loops can make the crossing problem a lot more straightforward. Especially if the passenger trains are sparkies, like the electric tilt trains they have been promoting in Queensland.

However, this is more focused on competing with the car for transport mode share rather than competing with air ... the higher speed to allow it to more effectively recruit "right angle" park and ride patronage with a lower total trip time. IOW, more for Cleveland to Columbus than Cleveland to New York.

Where, as in Sydney for example, the existing rail corridor is often completely built out, that changes the balance dramatically.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Wed Jan 24th, 2007 at 01:44:48 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

Adding the track in existing corridor for a high speed dedicated passenger line and low speed freight/suburban local line with common passing loops can make the crossing problem a lot more straightforward.

I'm not sure I understand your argument. Do you mean turning a single-track line into two parallel single-track lines, with shared passing loops? Or do you mean turning a single-track line into one double-track line, with all train types using both tracks? In either case, I note that the very use of passing loops is a limiting factor (making freight much slower), and you need the more the bigger the difference between top speeds.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Wed Jan 24th, 2007 at 05:35:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

How can the use of passing loops make freight trains slower? This is not Europe I am talking about, its the US ... they presently run on single track with passing loops.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Wed Jan 24th, 2007 at 11:01:52 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

One passing loop is one slow-down and stop followed by one waiting for a train to pass followed by one acceleration. Many passing loops due to the need to make way for frequent passenger trains multiplies the loss in time. (BTW, the corridors where fast train service would be likely are in large part still double-tracked in the US, including the main trans-Appalachian lines.)

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Wed Jan 24th, 2007 at 12:24:25 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

Not that with that system, the freight trains do not have to make way for the passenger trains, given that the main passenger line is not used by the freight trains at all, and the passenger line can effectively use nearly stretch of the freight line as a passing loop, with the single line and passing loop system ensuring that individual stretches of the freight lines are vacated for long periods of time.

As to the suggestion that the main focus of medium high speed rail should be to duplicate the route of very high speed rail, I don't get it ... you raise the problem caused if the approach is used where it would not provide an effective supplement to a VHS trunk and where it does not offer substantial real reductions in required capital works, when the simple answer would seem to be, don't use the approach in that context.

However, in the US we have to get out of the old encrusted habits of thought that see real long distance passenger rail as a matter for the two coasts with flyover country receiving slow, infrequent, heavily subsidized, and poorly performing services suffering from delays that can exceed the planned travel time due to the priority enjoyed by freight.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Wed Jan 24th, 2007 at 12:53:39 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

This doesn't make any sense to me. How is two single-track lines more capacity than one double-track one?

the main focus of medium high speed rail should be to duplicate the route of very high speed rail

Not dublicate. The VHR has less frequent stops, its new line is built much straighter, and away from smaller cities where it doesn't stop. Say, you build a VHR with stops in Philadephia, Harrisburg and Pittsburg, and upgrade the old Pennsy mainline with some cutoffs and tunnels, to run MHS with further stops in Merion, Coatesville, Lancaster, Lewistown, Johnstown and Greensburg.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Wed Jan 24th, 2007 at 06:16:50 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

The constraint is not capacity, the constraint is cross mode interference. If capacity is the constraint, double track with central passing loops is the go.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Wed Jan 24th, 2007 at 08:17:57 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

Now you lost me.

What is a central passing loop? Some sort of round-abouts for trains?

If the constraint is crossing tracks, would not bridges be the solution?

Sweden's finest (and perhaps only) collaborative, leftist e-newspaper Synapze.se

by A swedish kind of death on Thu Jan 25th, 2007 at 07:12:27 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (4.00 / 2)

No, the constraint is the fact that all except a few trunk freight lines are designed for relatively infrequent and long freight trains, with a single line with "passing loops" (this may be an aussie phrase) or sidings that the train going one way sits on until the train going the other way has passed.

Since the freight has priority, once a passenger train in the US leaves the passenger only lines in the Northeast, small delays cascade into massive delays as it sits in a passing loop, waiting for train A to go past a passing loop further up the route so that train B can get off the passing loop and go by the Amtrak so that the Amtrak can move. A delay of 15 minutes can easily spill over into a delay of three to five hours in tack access delays.

Now, most of these are in rail corridors that once had two way track (because there used to be far higher frequency of passenger trains and much more local freight travelling by rail). So in these corridors, you can take advantage of the existing rail right of way to put in a dedicated passenger service track.

If the frequency is brought up to the level where passing loops are needed at all, the passenger line can take advantage of the long stretches between freight trains by having switches that allow either the existing freight track or existing freight passing loop to be used as a passing loop for the passenger services.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Thu Jan 25th, 2007 at 10:53:30 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (4.00 / 1)

Ah, so for your MHS, you were thinking in train frequencies like Amtrak long-distance?

I think if one bothers about speed at all, then only when passengers can rely on frequent trains. I mean, it makes little difference if a travel takes 3 or 5 hours when you would leave at 8 o'clock but the only trains are at 6 and 18 o'clock.

Regarding two single track, use the other for passing vs. one double-track operation, let me demonstrate that the difference is significant with the following virtual train scheme I generated.

This is a 50-mile line between two major cities, with 12 sections. The borders of the sections are considered both crossover points and stations for local trains. I put paths of twice-hourly passenger trains with 50 mph travel speed and once-hourly medium-high-speed trains with 133.3 mph top speed on it in both directions. (For simplicity, different gradient lines represent acceleration/braking for the fast trains, I didn't bother to resolve that for the local trains.)

The second line for each path represents a 2.5-minute buffer for lateness. Then: the orange fields show time-distance zones when trains can pass each other, while the grey zones represent a train travelling 'on the wrong track'. In the first mode of operation, all the grey squares must be kept free, and there is room left for only one long non-stop freight train with 50 mph per direction. In a double-track operation, you only have to watch out for the fast trains and their crossing of same-directional trains, room for around four freight train paths in both directions.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Sat Jan 27th, 2007 at 06:18:27 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

If the VHS and MHS route share the same corridor, that has to be a new alignment ... at least in the parts of the country where VHS routes will be most lucrative.

If VHS routes in the US are laid out so that the corridor also runs through towns that are the target for MHS interurbans, that means a substantial reduction in the effective trip speed of the VHS route as it deviates further and further from the direct route between its target markets ... and also as it makes accommodation for the existing built environment.

And meanwhile in many areas of the country there are freight corridors in use that were allocated to serve dual track systems and are in use by single-track plus passing loop systems. Because of the byzantine complexity of the access rights on the corridor ... strategic parcels that were bought outright, easements, perpetual roll-over leases, etc. ... the owners of those access rights rarely narrowed the corridor when they switched to single track ... that normally does not happen unless the entire corridor has been abandoned (and sometimes not even then ... it can sometimes take a while for an abandoned route to make its way through the system and lose its corridor status).

And because of the time that they were laid out and their importance in the development of population centers, they often run exactly where we would want an interurban branch line to run. That is especially the case for Dixie and the Great Lakes States, which are politically critical to ensuring the an expanded passenger rail system is not seen as a pure subsidy to the "urban east coast".

Get an new track on that system that relies on stretches of the freight track for its passing loops, and enact priority for the passenger services, and you have a substantial savings compared to the cost of acquiring the right of way for a new alignment.

And, as in the above thread, that is not the conditions that are in place in another area, then don't do it there.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Sat Jan 27th, 2007 at 12:01:49 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

If the VHS and MHS route share the same corridor

I realise I used confusing terminology. Sometimes 'corridor' is used to mean a general route along which several transport infrastructure lines can be built: e.g., say a highway and a canal and a local road, or a high-speed and a conventional rail line. (Or alternatively: different plan versions for a future line.)

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Sat Jan 27th, 2007 at 06:24:25 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

Then use the rail terminology. If Very High Speed rail and Medium High Speed rail share the same alignment, it will be a newly established alignment with all the costs (and political controversy) of establishing a public right of way that goes along with it.

And there is still the problem, is it the optimal alignment for very high speed rail, or the optimal alignment for medium high speed rail. It can't be both at the same time, because the very high speed rail should take the most rapid route between the centers that it is connecting, and the medium high speed rail should take the route that provides the most effective transport for potential passengers at the intermediate stops in between.

And of course there are a lot of existing alignments in the US that are not fully built out that fill the bill for a medium high speed alignment ... existing rail alignments that would be suitable for very high speed rail is much less common.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Sat Jan 27th, 2007 at 08:46:05 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

Then use the rail terminology.

This is also rail terminology here, wouldn't have used it otherwise. But from the rest of your reply, it appears to me that I still failed to completely convey what I meant. What I meant (and spelled out upthread, maybe not in the clearest way) was exactly this:

the very high speed rail should take the most rapid route between the centers that it is connecting, and the medium high speed rail should take the route that provides the most effective transport for potential passengers at the intermediate stops in between

I.e., I meant separate alignments between two major cities, which can get dozens of kilometres apart, one new and straight and avoiding smaller cities, the other an upgraded old line crossing smaller cities. To expend money on smaller-city-traversing high-speed alignments, or worse on parallel high- and low-speed lines, and have two types of service along the same line, makes sense only when population density is high anyway and concentrated along a narrow strip -- e.g. like Japan's West Coast, Taiwan's East Coast, but also the US Northeast Corridor (as in Marek's proposal).

And of course there are a lot of existing alignments in the US that are not fully built out that fill the bill for a medium high speed alignment

I would count only Washington-NYC(-Boston) and a few shorter stretches. I assumed upgrades to the existing lines, including cutoffs and tunnels, not simply different use.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Sun Jan 28th, 2007 at 06:19:42 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

Quoth I:

And of course there are a lot of existing alignments in the US that are not fully built out that fill the bill for a medium high speed alignment

To which replied:

I would count only Washington-NYC(-Boston) and a few shorter stretches. I assumed upgrades to the existing lines, including cutoffs and tunnels, not simply different use.

I am not sure what "only count" applies to here.

Cleveland / Akron / Canton / Newark / Columbus / Dayton / Cincinatti / Louisville would be usefully served by 100mph rail. Many of those legs could run on existing alignments.

Detroit / Toledo / Cleveland / Buffalo / Rochester / Syracuse / Albany / Boston would be usefully served by 100mpg rail (ditto).

Miama / Fort Lauterdale / Orlando / Jacksonville and Atlanta / Chattanooga / Nashville / Memphis, especially with a VHS Dallas / Memphis / Atlanta / Jacksonville.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Sun Jan 28th, 2007 at 12:59:02 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: High Speed Trains (none / 0)

Oop ... Jacksonville / Tallahassee.

You can tell I'm not a Suthuna.

I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

by BruceMcF (agila61 at netscape dot net) on Sun Jan 28th, 2007 at 01:12:29 PM EST
[ Parent ]

High Speed Trains | 76 comments (76 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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