4 ms·

I don't mean for it to be misleading, and I do agree with you. There is always a tradeoff between more stops and higher speeds, and if you're building high spee

I don't mean for it to be misleading, and I do agree with you. There is always a tradeoff between more stops and higher speeds, and if you're building high speed rail you do need to make different tradeoffs than commuter rail. That being said, I think even people that agree with that statement would still be surprised at the kinds of stops that successful systems make. For example, Tokaido Shinkansen, the most financially successful line in the world, makes stops in Fuji (pop. 245k), Odawara(195k), Anjo (188k), Kakegawa (117k), Nakamura-Ku (135k), Mishima (110k), Hashima (68k), Maibara (38k), and Atami (37k). There are three services: all-stop, skip-stop, and non-stop. The fastest non-stop service is about an 1:40 faster than the all-stop service, and 1:00 faster than the skip stop service. But most terminal-to-terminal customers still take the skip stop service because it has the highest frequency...enough to negate the speed advantage of non-stop service in most cases. When the CAHSR proposal first came out, the phrase "cow towns like Merced" was practically a meme. People were laughing at the stop in Gilroy, saying things like "why? so we can buy garlic on our way to LA?". Most people even thought that stops in secondary cities like Fresno and Bakersfield were entirely unnecessary. But the experts who wrote the report (who are fairly well regarded, btw) chose those stops for a reason: they are rural minihubs that aggregate a lot of traffic volume in areas that are too far from larger cities. In the words of an operations researcher I once worked with: with HSR, top speed is what sells the service, but acceleration is what makes the money. Acceleration minimizes the time loss from making more stops, and more stops means more money.

sjsamson 5y ago
I agree with your post thread. A lot of people uninitiated in railways think of HSR as an airplanes on rails. HSR =/= Airline. Trains have a number of advantages, one of which is a small time penalty for stopping at a station relative to aircraft (2-3 minutes vs ~45+ minutes on average), and the aircraft requires a lot personnel/all-hands to turn around quickly (see: Southwest Airlines). A commercial aircraft is simply not designed for lots of really short hops in rapid succession. There needs to be a new preflight check, refueling, unload/load belly cargo, some maintenance items are based on aircraft takeoff/landing cycles (tires, cabin pressurization, etc.) Trains stopping at station and continuing is trivial by comparison. A rail operator wants to collect fare paying passengers along the route they are planning on operating, it’s an easy way to boost ridership and revenue. It is a balancing act to have station stops, but not increase end-to-end trip time excessively. Basic rule of thumb: Does stopping add more riders than it costs due to the stopping time penalty? If the model/data say yes, make the stop; otherwise do not. And just because we have a station, doesn’t mean every train has stop there. We can have local, limited, and express trains. We can passing/siding tracks at stations to prevent local stopped trains from blocking the mainline for limited/express trains. We can have cross-platform time transfers between different train types and destinations. We can have multiple mainline tracks. These things do cost a bit more upfront, but it’s more about good planning and what kind of service to the public is the goal. — The Tokaido corridor (Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka) is extremely dense, both the Tokaido Mainline and Shinkansen line are effectively at capacity (which is also part of impetus for the Chuo Shinkansen). Running at very high speeds with fews stops, consumes a lot track capacity. Which is why JRs prefer running more local and limited-stop service trains, and less than “non-stop” express trains. It’s what a capacity constrained operator should do to optimize operations and maximize capacity subject to those constraints. Likewise a California HSR program, should find a way to cost effectively serve cities like Fresno, Bakersfield, Merced, etc. as part of a larger HSR network.
johnwalkr 5y ago
It is weird how many people miss the concept of express trains in this discussion. Convenience can’t be overstated either. When I take the train from Tokyo to Kyushu for work, I don’t even check the schedule. I show up knowing there will be a decently fast train within 15 minutes.
- bluGill 5y ago
  Having ridden the bus to work I've become very in tune to how much I hate having to watch bus schedule to figure out when I'm going someplace. More than once I've had to leave an interesting discussion because my bus was coming. More than once I've packed up and then needed to find something to do for the next 20 minutes. I'm surprised you consider every 15 minutes often enough to not check the schedule, but it would be much better than the every 30 minutes I had. Too bad I don't work in that office anymore.
  - johnwalkr 5y ago
    That's for a long distance train from Tokyo to Kyushu, about 500km. For that distance the timing is quite convenient. There's actually a train every 3 minutes or so, but it's prudent to wait for an express or limited express train as it will get there sooner. Within Tokyo most of the trains run every 5 minutes or so.

sjsamson 5y ago

I agree with your post thread. A lot of people uninitiated in railways think of HSR as an airplanes on rails. HSR =/= Airline. Trains have a number of advantages, one of which is a small time penalty for stopping at a station relative to aircraft (2-3 minutes vs ~45+ minutes on average), and the aircraft requires a lot personnel/all-hands to turn around quickly (see: Southwest Airlines). A commercial aircraft is simply not designed for lots of really short hops in rapid succession. There needs to be a new preflight check, refueling, unload/load belly cargo, some maintenance items are based on aircraft takeoff/landing cycles (tires, cabin pressurization, etc.) Trains stopping at station and continuing is trivial by comparison. A rail operator wants to collect fare paying passengers along the route they are planning on operating, it’s an easy way to boost ridership and revenue. It is a balancing act to have station stops, but not increase end-to-end trip time excessively. Basic rule of thumb: Does stopping add more riders than it costs due to the stopping time penalty? If the model/data say yes, make the stop; otherwise do not. And just because we have a station, doesn’t mean every train has stop there. We can have local, limited, and express trains. We can passing/siding tracks at stations to prevent local stopped trains from blocking the mainline for limited/express trains. We can have cross-platform time transfers between different train types and destinations. We can have multiple mainline tracks. These things do cost a bit more upfront, but it’s more about good planning and what kind of service to the public is the goal. — The Tokaido corridor (Tokyo-Nagoya-Osaka) is extremely dense, both the Tokaido Mainline and Shinkansen line are effectively at capacity (which is also part of impetus for the Chuo Shinkansen). Running at very high speeds with fews stops, consumes a lot track capacity. Which is why JRs prefer running more local and limited-stop service trains, and less than “non-stop” express trains. It’s what a capacity constrained operator should do to optimize operations and maximize capacity subject to those constraints. Likewise a California HSR program, should find a way to cost effectively serve cities like Fresno, Bakersfield, Merced, etc. as part of a larger HSR network.

johnwalkr 5y ago

It is weird how many people miss the concept of express trains in this discussion. Convenience can’t be overstated either. When I take the train from Tokyo to Kyushu for work, I don’t even check the schedule. I show up knowing there will be a decently fast train within 15 minutes.

bluGill 5y ago
Having ridden the bus to work I've become very in tune to how much I hate having to watch bus schedule to figure out when I'm going someplace. More than once I've had to leave an interesting discussion because my bus was coming. More than once I've packed up and then needed to find something to do for the next 20 minutes. I'm surprised you consider every 15 minutes often enough to not check the schedule, but it would be much better than the every 30 minutes I had. Too bad I don't work in that office anymore.
- johnwalkr 5y ago
  That's for a long distance train from Tokyo to Kyushu, about 500km. For that distance the timing is quite convenient. There's actually a train every 3 minutes or so, but it's prudent to wait for an express or limited express train as it will get there sooner. Within Tokyo most of the trains run every 5 minutes or so.