by conductorchris
Transit Matters claims that high-level boarding and electric multiple unit cars could slash station dwell time making the impact of stops much less.
But to me, the real reason to create outer suburban express trains is better use of equipment. (Note that this line of thinking is from before CoVid and we shall see how things shake out now).
And not that purchase and maintenance of equipment is the largest cost of providing the service (roughly 40% of Amtrak's costs when I last paid attention and a great deal more than that on some commuter systems).
If you have an 8 car train stopping at every stop going an hour or so to the end of the line if it leaves Boston fully loaded, the load factor will only be roughly 50%. That is, half the seats will be empty on average (over time) even though they are all full at Boston they will empty out over the course of the trip. This is not good use of resources.
Suppose you take that 8 car train and create two 4 car trains: one outer suburban service runs express, now taking only 50 minutes or whatever and the other train turns back and serves the inner stops twice as often or with half the equipment.
Downside: you need more locomotives and crew. The crew, however is a much smaller cost than the maintenance of the equipment, so you still come out ahead. The extra locomotives will cost more, but perhaps this can be at least partially made up by the savings in coaches and extra revenue from a faster product.
But to me, the real reason to create outer suburban express trains is better use of equipment. (Note that this line of thinking is from before CoVid and we shall see how things shake out now).
And not that purchase and maintenance of equipment is the largest cost of providing the service (roughly 40% of Amtrak's costs when I last paid attention and a great deal more than that on some commuter systems).
If you have an 8 car train stopping at every stop going an hour or so to the end of the line if it leaves Boston fully loaded, the load factor will only be roughly 50%. That is, half the seats will be empty on average (over time) even though they are all full at Boston they will empty out over the course of the trip. This is not good use of resources.
Suppose you take that 8 car train and create two 4 car trains: one outer suburban service runs express, now taking only 50 minutes or whatever and the other train turns back and serves the inner stops twice as often or with half the equipment.
Downside: you need more locomotives and crew. The crew, however is a much smaller cost than the maintenance of the equipment, so you still come out ahead. The extra locomotives will cost more, but perhaps this can be at least partially made up by the savings in coaches and extra revenue from a faster product.