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31 comments on Thinking Politics on Congestion Pricing

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Frugal on September 30, 2006 - 4:45pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
This initial Skytrain line was built in part because Vancouver was hosting the 1986 tranportation expo. There was enormous opposition to the initial line and several later extensions. Many believed that very few would dare riding a system that didn't have drivers. This concern was proven unfounded soon after it opened. There was also a lot of talk about crime, destruction of neighborhoods, etc. After many battles, the system was extended 3 times, the latest extension was completed in 2001.

The platforms are open, so you can easily fall onto the tracks. This happens on occasion and has led to several deaths. There are track intrusion system at station that are supposed to stop an approaching train, but I'm sure how well they work. The older stations use touch pads, while the newer ones use laser beams.

There has never been any collisions between trains, except some minor fender benders in the yard where the trains sometime run on manual.

The weird thing about riding an automated rail car is the consistent ride. The train stops a precicely the same spot at a particular station, and speeds up and slows down at exactly the same spot on the track everytime you ride it.

The system is somewhat like a sideways elevator. The train won't move if someone is jammed in a door. Passengers often take gross advantage this safety system by forcing the doors open to stop a train that is just about move. This is why the design frequency of 1 train every 90 seconds has not been sustained in practice.

I think that it's very difficult to design a system that is both frequent and fast. You can increase the frequency by simply going slower, but this doesn't sound a good thing.

Despite its many detractors, I would judge the Vancouver Skytrain system a resounding success. It has created several attractive, high density neighborhoods that would otherwise not exist.

Another automated rail system is currently being build that will connect downtown to the airport and a southern suburb. The control system will use moving blocks, but the vehicles won't be powered by linear induction motors like Skytrain. It's supposed to be ready by the time we host the 2010 winter olympics.
 

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crzwdjk on September 30, 2006 - 8:15pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
The most frequent subway service I know in the world, in Moscow, runs 39 trains per hour per direction, for a headway of 92 seconds. The top speed there is also 80 km/h, and the average line speed is about 40 km/h, so that's comparable to Vancouver. The signal system is a fixed block system with automatic speed control via coded track circuits, with wayside block signals with train stops as a backup. Trains are usually 7 or 8 cars, with some lines running 6 car trains. The train cars themselves are about as narrow as the IRT cars, but slightly longer (62 feet). The Moscow subway system of 10 lines carries around 9-10 million riders daily, with the busiest line getting somewhere between 1.5 and 2 million of that. The single busiest station (which happens to be the only cross platform subway-railroad transfer in Russia) has a daily ridership of about 250,000.
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