Trolleys on Regional Rail

I don't think that this thread is nonsense, nor do I believe that the idea of converting the RRD to Light Rail is totally without merit. I don't think that the idea is workable, or that it will ever happen, or that it necessarily ought to happen, but that's a different thing. The biggest advantage for Septa that would come from such a conversion would be the ability to run one man LRV's, rather than equipment requiring the railroad style multi-member crews presently used. It is possible to build LRV's which would be every bit as comfortable for passengers as present commuter railroad type equipment. Also, the lighter LRV's would probably consume less electric power than the current railroad type equipment.---- This is not to say that these factors make such a conversion worth doing, even with Septa's present financial problems ( which, by the way, it shares with a number of other rail passenger operators, including WMATA), but the idea is not totally bogus.

Hal equivocated when he wrote:New Jersey's River Line has worked out time separation

Worked out? No. It was imposed.

If the River Line were able to be converted to commuter rail mid-project, then trains could run the whole length of the route at all times of day, not to mention also be able to use the existing Northeast Corridor Trenton Station instead of building a brand-new one as they did. What prevents this for the most part is the street-running in Camden (not the wisest choice of alignment) and whatever agreements exist between BBD/Bechtel and NJT.

So you want the same problem-ridden situation that the River Line suffers from to afflict what are now SEPTA RRD lines that could run at any time of day? And people complain about the service now? And where will the LRVs go in Center City? (Certainly not to 30th Street anymore. Don't fix what's not broken.)

And don't ever accuse me of equivocating again, something I did not do. That seems to be your domain.

There's nothing wrong with striving for better or more efficient. But the nature of our system will never allow such a operation. SEPTA intermixes with Amtrak, NS and CSX. The biggest hurdle are routes along the NEC and Keystone Corridor. I could see attempting to convert the Chestnut Hill routes or the Ivy Ridge Branch, but they would probablly have to convert to street running at some point to avoid mixing with standard railroads. But striving to convert a system that can barely support itself as it is, is not a great solution at the moment. We're talking about light rail, and I'm still waiting for the 15 trolley which is still no where in sight!

Irish Chieftain wrote: And don't ever accuse me of equivocating again, something I did not do. That seems to be your domain.

• Ok, you certainly didn't equivocate when you take a complex question:
  

  the initial question that flynnt wrote: I would kind of like to get a discussion going on the possiblity of running trolleys on the regional rail lines.

  
  
  and gave a simple wrong answer.
  

  Irish Chieftain wrote: IOW, it's either/or. You either run LRT on the tracks or regional rail, but never both. And if you run LRT on there, you have to cut it off from the FRA railroad network.

Now, I didn't have a perfect answer, to give, but at least I didnt' make sweeping all or none pronouncements -

I simply answered the question posed

Whether trolleys can run on train tracks.

• - I said YES they can share track.

  the better answer Hal wrote: Generally, the limits are that you can't run {trolleys} on railroad lines that share space with Amtrak or freight without working out time separation.
  
  Despite all the statements to the contrary, it is doable, since New Jersey's River line is doing this

  
  -I take it you said NO, it's either or.
  

  Irish Chieftain wrote: IOW, it's either/or. You either run LRT on the tracks or regional rail, but never both. And if you run LRT on there, you have to cut it off from the FRA railroad network.

It's also not equivocation when make a non sequitor.

That would be taking a 2 line statement about time separation

Hal wrote: New Jersey's River Line is running trolleys on railroad tracks.
New Jersey's River Line has worked out time separation.

Distoriting it by only quoting half of it, then diving into a diatribe about magically converting railroad lines into trolley lines like some Philospher's stone turning lead into gold. That's something I'd never mentioned, so why qoute me?

Irish Chieftain wrote:

Hal equivocated when he wrote:New Jersey's River Line has worked out time separation

Worked out? No. It was imposed.

If the River Line were able to be converted to commuter rail mid-project, then trains could run the whole length of the route at all times of day, not to mention also be able to use the existing Northeast Corridor Trenton Station instead of building a brand-new one as they did.

So, do I detect that somebody is willing to back away from

You either run LRT on the tracks or regional rail, but never both.

And admit the River Line tracks have trolley and train running over them?

I can see how you'd like to rescue that unchangable statement by relying on the Cinderella-esque fiction that the raliroad track converts to a trolley track every night at midnight, but I don't see your FRA-godmother coming to the rescue on this one.


Hal

<i>Passenger train running into a freight train is a fair fight</i>

Bwwwahahahahahahaha!!!!!!

Try this - go calculate the energy of a 2000 ton freight going 40 mph, then contrast this to what even Tier II requires.

For giggles:

P = 1/2 M V^2

40mph -> 64 km/h -> 0.0177 km/s -> 17.8816 m/s

2000 tons -> 4,000,000 lbs -> 1,814,400 kg

Thus P (in Joules) is:

1/2 * 1814400 * 17.8816^2

I get 290078668.35 joules.

290,079,000 is a fair round off. That's 290 MEGA joules. For reference, the power cars on the Acela have to absorb about 12 Mj, or about 4% of the energy. Guess where the rest goes...

Increase the speed to 60mph, this becomes 650+ MJ (Acela - 1.8% of this). Drop it to 15mph, it drops to 40 MJ at 10, it becomes about 18 MJ, and finally, an Acela would stand a chance against it. Thus, the best time to get rid of the engery is BEFORE the crash, i.e. through emergency braking. Dropping the speed by even 10mph before collision removes a significant amount of it - 20 mph, even more, 30mph - almost all of it.

Granted, this is a freight hitting a passenger train. FWIW, a 12 car train of Silverliners would be about 240 MJ to deal with. 12 cars of LIRR M-1s would be 175 MJ at that speed. 12 cars of BART type equipment would be 120 MJ.

BTW, in FRA tests, a 30 mph 3 car train of Silverliners crashing into an equal weight freight train (which only exists in the laboratory), will result in the first car being effectively obliterated. I.e., expect a decent chunk of the riders in there to be ex-riders. This isn't the same as a heavy freight hitting a stopped passenger train.

I could go on, but the upshot is, no matter what you're in, you won't win Vs a freight train. That's why the rest of the world focuses on simply not crashing into everything - it works a lot better.

As far as running LRT on mainline tracks? It's done in Germany, and they mix with regular traffic (i.e., no time sepperation). In any case, it's technically possible to do on Septa, but the FRA really doesn't like it, unless you time sepperate with freight, which if the level is typical US branch line (non existant), is perfectly acceptable for the 3 or 4 freights a day the line gets. But you still can't mix with regular passenger, even with ASC, etc.

Which makes no real sense from a technical standpoint.

BTW, the River LINE (anyone else notice NJT's spelling of it?) cars are considered regular mainline trains in Europe - they're UIC compliant and could run anywhere over there.

Nasadowsk wrote: <i>Passenger train running into a freight train is a fair fight</i>

Bwwwahahahahahahaha!!!!!!

{snip}
I could go on, but the upshot is, no matter what you're in, you won't win Vs a freight train. That's why the rest of the world focuses on simply not crashing into everything - it works a lot better.

Correct, lemme fix that by putting in the unstated assumptions-

Moving passenger train running down the wrong switch into a sitting freight train is a fair fight.

Moving passenger train running down the wrong switch into a sitting trolley isn't even close.

Nasadowsk wrote: Try this - go calculate the energy of a 2000 ton freight going 40 mph, then contrast this to what even Tier II requires.

For giggles:P = 1/2 M V^2
40mph -> 64 km/h -> 0.0177 km/s -> 17.8816 m/s
2000 tons -> 4,000,000 lbs -> 1,814,400 kg
Thus P (in Joules) is: 1/2 * 1814400 * 17.8816^2
I get 290078668.35 joules.

290,079,000 is a fair round off. That's 290 MEGA joules. For reference, the power cars on the Acela have to absorb about 12 Mj, or about 4% of the energy. Guess where the rest goes...

Good calculations, but it might be an imperfect analogy.

I remember this from physics class.
You can't do an accurately model of cruching energy when there are 3 simultaneous changes as one train slows, metal bucklse and the other train skids. A mass/velocity framework is hard because two trains become one rolling wreck and the center of mass changes. Probably can do with a computer, but not with a pencil and paper, unless like you said, you imagine a perfect weight match and perfect velocity match so both trains come to a perfect stop so momentum cancels and you've got maximum destruction.

You've got to switch to momentum/impulse framework because lots of energy is goes into the change of accelleration and change of mass as the the passenger train cars accellerate in the other direction and essentially become part of the freight train's motion.

The analogy is the impulse problem they give you which is almost unsolvable by mass/velocity. It's something like "calculate the change in veolocity of 2000 ton train of hopper cars coasting at 10 mph which passes under a coal chute discharging 5 tons/second."


But, you're right, whatever the calculations, the freight train wins,
it's just a question of whether its' the immovable object or the irresistable force.

Hal

Yeah, I was looking at it in general terms of energy, in part because it is difficult to go beyond that.

The other thing being, rail, collisions really don't follow the physics textbook anyway.

But, the big thing is that the energy is still there, and that in itself is a problem.

At X speed, train A hitting train B is a problem, period. With a heavy freight, X doesn't have to be very big.

The trouble is the FRA doesn't look at rail safety in terms of the entire system, but rather a few loosely related elements. This results in their rulemaking not making any rational sense - the LIRR's M-1 cars are rather light, not FRA compliant (they were when built, however), yet have an overall safety record that's excellent, mostly because high speed (i.e. 30mph or more) train rain collisions on the LIRR simply don't occur very often (I can't think of any in ASC territory since ASC was installed). Further, with even minimal cab signals / ATC, train train collisions of any consequence can be virtually elimanated. Thus, while the M-1 may not survive a 50mph crash into a standing train, it doesn't have to because the system it exists in doesn't allow this at any frequency worth worrying about.

But the FRA doesn't promote this via rulemaking, rather, they push crash safety as a function of buff strength (though the two are poorly related at best), and research 'safer' grade crossings, even though it's quite reasonable to say that grade crossing accidents in general can NOT be prevented. Rationally, the FRA should focus on elimanating train-train collisions - where the technology exists and is proven by 1/2 a century of use, and focus on grade crossing collision safety, where US equipment (particularly double decker push pulls in push mode) fares poorly, and the technology to eliminate doesn't exist. Reduce, reduce the severity of, yes Get rid of them totally, no. There's little reason a grade crossing accident should derail a train, yet it's a common outcome of accidents in the US, where we've seen even vehicles as small as the ubiquitous F-150 pickup cause numerous cars to leave the track and overturn.

Nasadowsk wrote: Yeah, I was looking at it in general terms of energy, in part because it is difficult to go beyond that.
....
But, the big thing is that the energy is still there, and that in itself is a problem.

Nasadowsk wrote:
Reminds me of an interesting comment-
"Since the black box / data recorder always survives, why don't you make the whole darn plane out of whatever the black box is made out of?

The trouble is the FRA doesn't look at rail safety in terms of the entire system, but rather a few loosely related elements. This results in their rulemaking not making any rational sense - the LIRR's M-1 cars are rather light, not FRA compliant (they were when built, however), yet have an overall safety record that's excellent, mostly because high speed (i.e. 30mph or more) train rain collisions on the LIRR simply don't occur very often.

Nasadowsk wrote:
Which reminds me- now that you can get ethernet through a electric plug's ground wire, shouldn't there be some mechanism to identify where trains are on the rail simply by the "echo" of their engines.

I'm thinking of the sophistication available with doppler radar, ground penetrating radar, all that fourier transformation and information processing- there's got to be a simple way for trains to broadcast some kind of status at high carrier frequency to carry "hey, I'm at mile post 15 moving at 35mph." Heck SUVs are halfway to driving themselves around the block, isn't there a "hey I'm here" signal that you could "ping" into the rails. Optical fibers have a phase dispersion problem- different frequencies travel slightly different speeds- something like that in trains should be workable, and provide some doppler "crash avoidance" feedback.

But the FRA doesn't promote this via rulemaking, rather, they push crash safety as a function of buff strength
...
Rationally, the FRA should focus on elimanating train-train collisions - where the technology exists and is proven by 1/2 a century of use

Nasadowsk wrote:
Yes, actually, I'd read a book, something like Juran's Quality Control, and the chapter on systems errors and error trapping mentioned the great Ambler trainwreck as an example of paridgm shift to manageing problems
and designing for the problem you don't anticipate.

There's little reason a grade crossing accident should derail a train, yet it's a common outcome of accidents in the US, where we've seen even vehicles as small as the ubiquitous F-150 pickup cause numerous cars to leave the track and overturn.

Nasadowsk wrote:
More likely it's the F-150 combined with DUI or I.Q. 80 to cause the crash.
Hmm, guess instead of cow catchers you need car catchers.

Or a really big train airbag to bounce the car off the track and out of your way.



Hal

<I>
Reminds me of an interesting comment-
"Since the black box / data recorder always survives, why don't you make the whole darn plane out of whatever the black box is made out of? </i>

Well, besides the fact that the black box doesn't always survive, planes wouldn't crash if they were made like black boxes because they'd never be able to leave the ground.

What's really stupid about the tank approach to vehicle construction is that it pushes the energy use up. Right now, as it stands, commuter rail in the US tends to be only marginally more efficient than passenger automobiles. And cars will eventually (and likely soon) get more efficient. Every recent generation of rail equipment in the US has been less efficient than what it's replaced, yet often no faster or higher capacity.

<i>Which reminds me- now that you can get ethernet through a electric plug's ground wire, shouldn't there be some mechanism to identify where trains are on the rail simply by the "echo" of their engines. </i>

Interesting idea. I don't know how practical or even possible it is. There's already a LOT of interesting things electrically, even on diesel tracks, floating in the rails.

<i>I'm thinking of the sophistication available with doppler radar, ground penetrating radar, all that fourier transformation and information processing- there's got to be a simple way for trains to broadcast some kind of status at high carrier frequency to carry "hey, I'm at mile post 15 moving at 35mph."</i>

The latter 1/2 of that is rapidly approaching - the NYCTA is testing so called 'communications based train control', where trains litterally do talk to each other, to an extent. With passive track beacons, and progressively more reliable communications, it's possible, but does open a few new failure modes, and possibly a few unanticipated ones (which is probbably why the NYCTA is going VERY slowly with the rollout).

BTW, I believe track circuits are no longer used in parts of Europe, at all, rather axle counters and other means.

<i> Heck SUVs are halfway to driving themselves around the block, isn't there a "hey I'm here" signal that you could "ping" into the rails. Optical fibers have a phase dispersion problem- different frequencies travel slightly different speeds- something like that in trains should be workable, and provide some doppler "crash avoidance" feedback. </i>

An actively transmitted signal would only be a redundant measure - it could easily be rendered useless by a transmitter failure. However, it COULD be useful as a backup, much like the collision avoidence systems on comercial aircraft (i.e., they do nothing until they're sure they should be doing something).

<I>Yes, actually, I'd read a book, something like Juran's Quality Control, and the chapter on systems errors and error trapping mentioned the great Ambler trainwreck as an example of paridgm shift to manageing problems
and designing for the problem you don't anticipate. </i>

It's interesting to note that by far the safest rail system in the world, noteably the Japanese Shinkansen network, also has no crash standards, and equipment that's considerably lighter than even European spec stuff. They operate under an extreme form of not crashing. But realize, crew discipline is extreme too - 2 minutes late is a serious offense (which, given how much it disrupts operations, it should be), and even not having your uniform all in tip top shape is. And the system is highly automated.

<i>
More likely it's the F-150 combined with DUI or I.Q. 80 to cause the crash.
Hmm, guess instead of cow catchers you need car catchers. </i>

Actually, designing for grade crossing accidents SHOULD be required. And it shouldn't add weight - lots of European equipment does well in grade crossing accidents, and even the TGVs have hit some impressively heavy objects without disaster.

The primary concern of the FRA ( from reading the Regs.) is the difference in construction standards ( not just weight) between "conventional railroad equipment" and "urban rapid transit" equipment ( ie LRV's and "subway" type equipment). While all of the comments in the posts above have much merit, there is some history to support the FRA's concern. The history of the old electric interurbans is filled with examples of fatal collisions in which the fatalitites were primarily the result of the difference in construction between older "heavyweight" equipment and the newer lightweight cars. ( Telescoping of cars was a major problem) It seems that this was uppermost in the minds of those who wrote the FRA Regs.

<i>the history of the old electric interurbans is filled with examples of fatal collisions in which the fatalitites were primarily the result of the difference in construction between older "heavyweight" equipment and the newer lightweight cars.</i>

That was 100 years ago. If the FAA regulated the way the FRA regulated, you wouldn't see twin engine airliners at all, because nobody could build one that could go over the Rockies with one motor off*.

*(Of course, the DC-3 proved this was in fact possible. When the 777 was being designed, Boeing got ETOPS certification from day one because they were able to prove that there just weren't enough in flight failures of modern engines to justify a 4 engine requirement for crossing the ocean)

Nasadowsk wrote:<i>the history of the old electric interurbans is filled with examples of fatal collisions in which the fatalitites were primarily the result of the difference in construction between older "heavyweight" equipment and the newer lightweight cars.</i>

That was 100 years ago.

Actually that problem lasted as long as the interurbans did. You could see the potential for this kind of problem on the Philadelphia & Western ( Septa Route 100) as late as the 1980's, or until work car No. 446 was retired. No. 446 was one of the original 1907 St. Louis P&W passenger cars ( No. 46) which was coverted into a work car back in the 1930's. It rode several inches higher than the Bullet Cars, which ran until 1990. Though, fortunately this never happened, if a Bullet had collided with No. 446, No. 446 would have telescoped the Bullet Car. Rightly or wrongly-- this is what the FRA regulations are intended to prevent.

Irish Chieftain wrote:Diesel LRVs on the River Line are restricted to operating between the hours of 6 am and 10 pm at all days of the week

No they aren't. They run late Saturday night, but the rest of your post was correct.

I don't know the Ins & Outs of the railroad like most of you guys, but I say keep the commuter trains.

That means more jobs that would be cut from a city that does not have a prospering economy as we speak.

Also that would just give SEPTA another green light to raise fares to pay for the re-construction of what would be a foolish project.

I mean think about it, it would be like opening up Pandora's box, because
then the lines might run as LRV for a few years, then somone get's the idea "Hey we might as well run buses over the line instead" then no train or LRV line anymore, it's just not worth it to me.

I like our commuter rail system & I wish it would expand, but since we have such a corrupt government in PA that will never happen.

The regional rail line needs to expand it's service instead of decreasing it.

I don't know if anyone may have seen an article published several years ago....I think it may have been in the Phila. Inquirer....
about a guy around the Washington Crossing area of Bucks County, who was digging around his property, when lo and behold, he discovered some very old trolley tracks. He dug more and found more track. I believe the track may have run parallel with the Delaware Canel.

At one time, one could travel from Phila. to Easton on trolleys alone, so I've been told by a well-informed rail historian. Maybe trolleys could be set up to run along some very old ROW's.