6 ms·

18 per HOUR!? Like… every 3 minutes? [cries in American] I thought Acela’s 20 trains a DAY was a lot.

by dmd 4y ago

iasay 4y ago
Spend a few minutes at Clapham Junction here at rush hour. Average over 24 hours (yes including night when there are no trains) is one departure every 43 seconds.
- seanp2k2 4y ago
  America, where I’m free to drive anywhere at any time because public transit doesn’t effectively exist for most people :( I miss the trains in other countries so much. They’re reminders of what we could have had here had we not let NIMBYism win. https://www.quora.com/Why-wasnt-BART-built-initially-to-loop-around-the-entire-bay https://www.quora.com/Why-wasnt-BART-built-initially-to-loop... has some of the history, there’s probably a better article out there somewhere.
  - jlarocco 4y ago
    It had less to do with NIMBYism and more to do with car company profits. [1] Here in the Denver metro area, we used to have trains running all over the place, and 100 years ago, there were daily trains between Denver, Boulder, Golden, and Longmont. Then they ended service and tore up most of the tracks. Fast-forward to 2022, and now they're trying again to put rail between Boulder and Denver, but it's a $1+ billion boondoggle that hasn't gone anywhere in 15 years. [2] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-I8GDklsN4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-I8GDklsN4 [2] https://www.cpr.org/2022/03/01/rtd-fastracks-commuter-rail-buses/ https://www.cpr.org/2022/03/01/rtd-fastracks-commuter-rail-b...
inferiorhuman 4y ago
Alacatel/Thales promised Muni something like 48 trains per hour (across two tracks and five lines) with their new fangled train control system. For the most part that never happened. For the time being BART and Muni run 2–3 minute headways during peak hours (so somewhere around 25–30 tph). One of the big things BART remedied with the new cars was the lack of doors (which slows down boarding and increases dwell time).
blibble 4y ago
the victoria line on the London underground has 36 per hour in the peak the next train comes into the station as the previous one is leaving
- pooper 4y ago
  Is this local transit? It is England so practically everything feels like local transit, right? It is better than what we have, sure but it isn’t as impressive as long distance routes. > The schedule offers trains every 3 to 5 minutes on the most used sections during rush hours. During other traffic periods, intervals range usually from 4 to 12 minutes or up to 20 minutes on outer sections. During late nights, only selected express services are operated and all late-night services usually run every 20 minutes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_New_York_City_Subway_services https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_New_York_City_Subway_s...
  - iso1631 4y ago
    Yes, the core parts of most tube lines are 25tph+ in the peak. I believe that the 1, 2 and 3 lines in NY share the same tracks in the core and can hit about 30tph in the peak
  - blibble 4y ago
    note this is stopping services on a 2 track railway (not total trains) if you're talking about total trains then somewhere like clapham junction is way, way higher (something like 180/hour) back to stopping services: thameslink core manages 24, and that entire route is several hundred miles long and crossrail core will do 24 on opening, designed upto 30 (the railway on either end is also several hundred miles long)
astrange 4y ago
Yamanote Line frequency in Tokyo is about every 2 minutes.
- iso1631 4y ago
  That's a short metro line with identical destinations and stopping patterns and slow top speed more akin to a subway service
  - flemhans 4y ago
    I think 60 s is the lowest feasible headway for such subway services, assuming a single platform.
    - iso1631 4y ago
      Victoria gets upto 36tph / 100 seconds headway with 133m length trains. Wikipedia suggests the Wenhu line in Taipai was testing upto 50tph, and a post from 2006 on District Dave's forum said Lille Line 2 was at 47tph [0] Both of those lines are short vehicles though - 52tph. The forum does post that many Moscow lines are 38tph (95 seconds) at long trains (140-160m) [0] https://districtdavesforum.co.uk/thread/5210/worlds-most-frequent-metro-systems https://districtdavesforum.co.uk/thread/5210/worlds-most-fre...
Symbiote 4y ago
17 says Wikipedia, but the information might be out of date. See [1]. The existing quad-track line carries 15 trains per hour [2], and is full, but this is because it carries trains of varying speed -- express passenger trains, commuter/regional trains and freight. (The Victoria Line is a metro line, pretty irrelevant comparison.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#Proposed_service_pattern https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#Proposed_service_... [2] https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/how-many-trains-run-per-hour-between-milton-keynes-and-london-euston.140441/#post-2847202 https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/how-many-trains-run-per...
iso1631 4y ago
If you maintain similar stopping patterns you can get higher than that on a two-track railway - metro services can do 25tph,30tph or even slightly more. From December the west coast mainline is bringing in a roughly pre-covid timetable. The railway is a 4 track railway, but looking at just the fast tracks leaving Euston, there will be 13 departures an hour on the fast lines 3tph Manchester 3tph Birmingham fast 2tph Liverpool 1tph Chester and North Wales 1tph Glasgow 1tph Crewe via Trent Valley stops 2tph Birmingham via Northampton (switch from the fast lines to the slow lines after about half an hour) None of these are high speed - I'm currently on a train to Manchester and my phone says we're doing about 125mph (200km/h). HS2 is a more reasonable 200mph. To be fair, Accela Washington-New York-Boston is more akin to the London-York-Edinburgh services which are only 2tph, or 31 trains per day (44 run as far as York, but only 31 continue to Edinburgh) The frequency on the WCML can't be higher as some of those trains are non-stop as far as places like Stoke, Crewe, or even Warrington (about 90-110 minutes out of Euston), where others do stop at places like Watford, Milton Keynes and Rugby. The full proposed timetable from Dec 2022 is here: https://railforums.co.uk/threads/december-2022-timetable-changes.231835/page-7#post-5702664 https://railforums.co.uk/threads/december-2022-timetable-cha... which might be at https://files.smallpdf.com/files/e54b2d4e9c7a08be02a4be30522b0902.pdf?name=December-2022-West-Coast-Mainline-timetable-Changes-by-Route-06-2227.pdf https://files.smallpdf.com/files/e54b2d4e9c7a08be02a4be30522... (In addition to the 5 trains per hour to Birmingham above, there is another one or two from a different London station - Marylebone, and there's a handful of additional trains from Euston to Edinburgh via Birmingham)
- dmd 4y ago
  Meanwhile the average speed of our best attempt at high speed rail (Acela) is 84 mph.
  - RX14 4y ago
    Long-distance trains in the UK manage about the same, with 200km/h max, but for more of the track (and higher accel/decel)
    - iso1631 4y ago
CydeWeys 4y ago
This is not a like to like comparison. If you want to compare like to like, look at how many trains per hour leave from, e.g., Grand Central.
- Symbiote 4y ago
  I think it's fair: High Speed 2 will be two tracks leaving London Euston. On those tracks, 17-18 trains will run every hour in each direction.
jcranmer 4y ago
I suspect that's counting both the intercity trains and the regional trains. If so, the Northeast Corridor in New Jersey and southern Connecticut will be hitting roughly those numbers already--NJT and Metro North add a lot of traffic to the NEC.
- martinald 4y ago
  No it's not. This is purely new high speed intercity services. If you include the WCML out of Euston ("legacy line" - can still do 125mph/200kmh - which will have increased regional services as space is freed up by moving the intercity ones to HS2), then you can at least double that number. Probably triple given it is a 4 track railway.
- dmd 4y ago
  Oh for some reason I interpreted this as that many trains departing to the same place. Like as if there were a train from New York to Boston every few minutes.
  - Symbiote 4y ago
    I already posted this, but I'll repeat it [1]. These are all intercity trains to cities north of London. There will be 6 trains per hour to Birmingham (120 miles from London), three of which continue beyond Birmingham. An additional 11 trains don't stop at Birmingham, but cities beyond it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#Proposed_service_pattern https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#Proposed_service_... and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#/media/File:HS2_vector_map.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#/media/File:HS2_v...
    - IIAOPSW 4y ago
      The thing that you're counting as "intercity" is roughly comparable to what is classified as regional service in the North East US. Destination | Operator | Distance from NYC Camden / Philly | NJT / Amtrak | 82 mi Montauk | LIRR / Amtrak | 110 mi New Haven | MNR / Amtrak | 67 mi Except for Montauk, these places are cities in their own right, but we don't really think of them as intercity trains because the primary reason someone would board is as a commuter not as a traveler.
erispoe 4y ago
LGV Sud-Est, France's first and Europe's most used HS line, sees 240 trains/day/direction, with a capacity of 13 trains/hr, to be improved to 16 tr/hr in 2030. It's a trunk line with many different service patterns though, mostly linking Paris to southern destinations.

18 per HOUR!? Like… every 3 minutes? [cries in American] I thought Acela’s 20 trains a DAY was a lot.

by dmd 4y ago

18 per HOUR!? Like… every 3 minutes? [cries in American] I thought Acela’s 20 trains a DAY was a lot.

Spend a few minutes at Clapham Junction here at rush hour. Average over 24 hours (yes including night when there are no trains) is one departure every 43 seconds.

seanp2k2 4y ago
America, where I’m free to drive anywhere at any time because public transit doesn’t effectively exist for most people :( I miss the trains in other countries so much. They’re reminders of what we could have had here had we not let NIMBYism win. https://www.quora.com/Why-wasnt-BART-built-initially-to-loop-around-the-entire-bay https://www.quora.com/Why-wasnt-BART-built-initially-to-loop... has some of the history, there’s probably a better article out there somewhere.
- jlarocco 4y ago
  It had less to do with NIMBYism and more to do with car company profits. [1] Here in the Denver metro area, we used to have trains running all over the place, and 100 years ago, there were daily trains between Denver, Boulder, Golden, and Longmont. Then they ended service and tore up most of the tracks. Fast-forward to 2022, and now they're trying again to put rail between Boulder and Denver, but it's a $1+ billion boondoggle that hasn't gone anywhere in 15 years. [2] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-I8GDklsN4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-I8GDklsN4 [2] https://www.cpr.org/2022/03/01/rtd-fastracks-commuter-rail-buses/ https://www.cpr.org/2022/03/01/rtd-fastracks-commuter-rail-b...

inferiorhuman 4y ago

Alacatel/Thales promised Muni something like 48 trains per hour (across two tracks and five lines) with their new fangled train control system. For the most part that never happened. For the time being BART and Muni run 2–3 minute headways during peak hours (so somewhere around 25–30 tph). One of the big things BART remedied with the new cars was the lack of doors (which slows down boarding and increases dwell time).

blibble 4y ago

the victoria line on the London underground has 36 per hour in the peak the next train comes into the station as the previous one is leaving

pooper 4y ago
Is this local transit? It is England so practically everything feels like local transit, right? It is better than what we have, sure but it isn’t as impressive as long distance routes. > The schedule offers trains every 3 to 5 minutes on the most used sections during rush hours. During other traffic periods, intervals range usually from 4 to 12 minutes or up to 20 minutes on outer sections. During late nights, only selected express services are operated and all late-night services usually run every 20 minutes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_New_York_City_Subway_services https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_New_York_City_Subway_s...
- iso1631 4y ago
  Yes, the core parts of most tube lines are 25tph+ in the peak. I believe that the 1, 2 and 3 lines in NY share the same tracks in the core and can hit about 30tph in the peak
- blibble 4y ago
  note this is stopping services on a 2 track railway (not total trains) if you're talking about total trains then somewhere like clapham junction is way, way higher (something like 180/hour) back to stopping services: thameslink core manages 24, and that entire route is several hundred miles long and crossrail core will do 24 on opening, designed upto 30 (the railway on either end is also several hundred miles long)

astrange 4y ago

Yamanote Line frequency in Tokyo is about every 2 minutes.

iso1631 4y ago
That's a short metro line with identical destinations and stopping patterns and slow top speed more akin to a subway service
- flemhans 4y ago
  I think 60 s is the lowest feasible headway for such subway services, assuming a single platform.
  - iso1631 4y ago
    Victoria gets upto 36tph / 100 seconds headway with 133m length trains. Wikipedia suggests the Wenhu line in Taipai was testing upto 50tph, and a post from 2006 on District Dave's forum said Lille Line 2 was at 47tph [0] Both of those lines are short vehicles though - 52tph. The forum does post that many Moscow lines are 38tph (95 seconds) at long trains (140-160m) [0] https://districtdavesforum.co.uk/thread/5210/worlds-most-frequent-metro-systems https://districtdavesforum.co.uk/thread/5210/worlds-most-fre...

Symbiote 4y ago

17 says Wikipedia, but the information might be out of date. See [1]. The existing quad-track line carries 15 trains per hour [2], and is full, but this is because it carries trains of varying speed -- express passenger trains, commuter/regional trains and freight. (The Victoria Line is a metro line, pretty irrelevant comparison.) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#Proposed_service_pattern https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#Proposed_service_... [2] https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/how-many-trains-run-per-hour-between-milton-keynes-and-london-euston.140441/#post-2847202 https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/how-many-trains-run-per...

iso1631 4y ago

If you maintain similar stopping patterns you can get higher than that on a two-track railway - metro services can do 25tph,30tph or even slightly more. From December the west coast mainline is bringing in a roughly pre-covid timetable. The railway is a 4 track railway, but looking at just the fast tracks leaving Euston, there will be 13 departures an hour on the fast lines 3tph Manchester 3tph Birmingham fast 2tph Liverpool 1tph Chester and North Wales 1tph Glasgow 1tph Crewe via Trent Valley stops 2tph Birmingham via Northampton (switch from the fast lines to the slow lines after about half an hour) None of these are high speed - I'm currently on a train to Manchester and my phone says we're doing about 125mph (200km/h). HS2 is a more reasonable 200mph. To be fair, Accela Washington-New York-Boston is more akin to the London-York-Edinburgh services which are only 2tph, or 31 trains per day (44 run as far as York, but only 31 continue to Edinburgh) The frequency on the WCML can't be higher as some of those trains are non-stop as far as places like Stoke, Crewe, or even Warrington (about 90-110 minutes out of Euston), where others do stop at places like Watford, Milton Keynes and Rugby. The full proposed timetable from Dec 2022 is here: https://railforums.co.uk/threads/december-2022-timetable-changes.231835/page-7#post-5702664 https://railforums.co.uk/threads/december-2022-timetable-cha... which might be at https://files.smallpdf.com/files/e54b2d4e9c7a08be02a4be30522b0902.pdf?name=December-2022-West-Coast-Mainline-timetable-Changes-by-Route-06-2227.pdf https://files.smallpdf.com/files/e54b2d4e9c7a08be02a4be30522... (In addition to the 5 trains per hour to Birmingham above, there is another one or two from a different London station - Marylebone, and there's a handful of additional trains from Euston to Edinburgh via Birmingham)

dmd 4y ago
Meanwhile the average speed of our best attempt at high speed rail (Acela) is 84 mph.
- RX14 4y ago
  Long-distance trains in the UK manage about the same, with 200km/h max, but for more of the track (and higher accel/decel)
  - iso1631 4y ago

CydeWeys 4y ago

This is not a like to like comparison. If you want to compare like to like, look at how many trains per hour leave from, e.g., Grand Central.

Symbiote 4y ago
I think it's fair: High Speed 2 will be two tracks leaving London Euston. On those tracks, 17-18 trains will run every hour in each direction.

jcranmer 4y ago

I suspect that's counting both the intercity trains and the regional trains. If so, the Northeast Corridor in New Jersey and southern Connecticut will be hitting roughly those numbers already--NJT and Metro North add a lot of traffic to the NEC.

martinald 4y ago
No it's not. This is purely new high speed intercity services. If you include the WCML out of Euston ("legacy line" - can still do 125mph/200kmh - which will have increased regional services as space is freed up by moving the intercity ones to HS2), then you can at least double that number. Probably triple given it is a 4 track railway.
dmd 4y ago
Oh for some reason I interpreted this as that many trains departing to the same place. Like as if there were a train from New York to Boston every few minutes.
- Symbiote 4y ago
  I already posted this, but I'll repeat it [1]. These are all intercity trains to cities north of London. There will be 6 trains per hour to Birmingham (120 miles from London), three of which continue beyond Birmingham. An additional 11 trains don't stop at Birmingham, but cities beyond it. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#Proposed_service_pattern https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#Proposed_service_... and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#/media/File:HS2_vector_map.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Speed_2#/media/File:HS2_v...
  - IIAOPSW 4y ago
    The thing that you're counting as "intercity" is roughly comparable to what is classified as regional service in the North East US. Destination | Operator | Distance from NYC Camden / Philly | NJT / Amtrak | 82 mi Montauk | LIRR / Amtrak | 110 mi New Haven | MNR / Amtrak | 67 mi Except for Montauk, these places are cities in their own right, but we don't really think of them as intercity trains because the primary reason someone would board is as a commuter not as a traveler.

erispoe 4y ago

LGV Sud-Est, France's first and Europe's most used HS line, sees 240 trains/day/direction, with a capacity of 13 trains/hr, to be improved to 16 tr/hr in 2030. It's a trunk line with many different service patterns though, mostly linking Paris to southern destinations.