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If you're at a bad rail stop (like the first one outside of the central part of a city going outbound at rush hour) it's not uncommon to have to wait two or thr

If you're at a bad rail stop (like the first one outside of the central part of a city going outbound at rush hour) it's not uncommon to have to wait two or three trains just to be able to board. In a city like Singapore or London it might not be too long since many of their trains are automated (in Singapore they're all automated/driverless) and the busy lines are allocated enough cars to arrive 1 minute apart or less apart. Even in cities like Chicago where they arrive 3~5 minutes apart at rush hour, you might still be waiting 30 minutes .. like I was yesterday. ... I really prefer finding crap to do in the city or people to hang out with so I can wait out the rush.

jpatokal 8y ago
I'm not aware of any metro system in the world that has scheduled headways of under a minute. The Moscow Metro was tops for a long time with 95-second headways on some lines at peak (without full automation, mind you), but Paris Metro Line 1 was recently fully automated and can go as low as 85 seconds. Singapore currently has 120 second headways on its busiest line (East/West, which is not automated) and is working on getting that down to 100: https://medium.com/from-the-red-line/36-just-a-number-21011a9ff9a6 https://medium.com/from-the-red-line/36-just-a-number-21011a... Note that headway is measured between the arrival of trains, meaning the train has to come to a complete stop, let people get on & off, close doors, speed off and have another train stopped all within that period! So a 90-sec headway will feel like less than a minute to users.
- mattlondon 8y ago
  Victoria line on the London underground does 100 seconds, with plans for the Northern Line to reach that too FWIW. Doesn't really help much though. Sometimes you still have to wait 2 or 3 (or more!) trains before you can get to the front of the platform edge so that you can actually get on though!
  - Mvandenbergh 8y ago
    TPH on Victoria line is now limited by platform constraints I think, you literally can't move passengers through stations like Stockwell any faster because of the size of the passageways.

jpatokal 8y ago

I'm not aware of any metro system in the world that has scheduled headways of under a minute. The Moscow Metro was tops for a long time with 95-second headways on some lines at peak (without full automation, mind you), but Paris Metro Line 1 was recently fully automated and can go as low as 85 seconds. Singapore currently has 120 second headways on its busiest line (East/West, which is not automated) and is working on getting that down to 100: https://medium.com/from-the-red-line/36-just-a-number-21011a9ff9a6 https://medium.com/from-the-red-line/36-just-a-number-21011a... Note that headway is measured between the arrival of trains, meaning the train has to come to a complete stop, let people get on & off, close doors, speed off and have another train stopped all within that period! So a 90-sec headway will feel like less than a minute to users.

mattlondon 8y ago
Victoria line on the London underground does 100 seconds, with plans for the Northern Line to reach that too FWIW. Doesn't really help much though. Sometimes you still have to wait 2 or 3 (or more!) trains before you can get to the front of the platform edge so that you can actually get on though!
- Mvandenbergh 8y ago
  TPH on Victoria line is now limited by platform constraints I think, you literally can't move passengers through stations like Stockwell any faster because of the size of the passageways.