Let's not forget the curve near Frankford Jct. in Philadelphia where 188 derailed and where speeds are now slowed down to 50 mph.
Service type terminology and speed definitions discussion
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Absolutely right about high-speed LD trains. In addition to the Lakeshore Limited, both the Silvers, the Palmetto, the Crescent, and the Cardinal all operate at speeds of up to 110 mph (180 km/her) on large swaths of the Northeast Corridor. In fact, the NEC trains, both the Regionals and the Acelas run at speeds of 200 km/hr (120 mph) or more for large parts of their runs, perhaps a far greater percentage of the total run than the Brightline trains are going to be running at 180 km/her, and the NEC trains have been doing this for decades.
As far as Brightline's "superior service," I'm sure it's nice, but let's see how it plays out after they actually open the Orlando segment and have a really useful transportation service, and after they've been running the service day in and day out for many years. Of special interest will be to see how well they can keep the service running in the face of pandemics and other natural disasters. They were certainly fast to shut down completely in the face of COVID, something that Amtrak, despite their draconian cutbacks, didn't do. I still think that the minute ridership sags or there's some spike in costs, their "superior service" will start to resemble that of the Penn Central, and either the Feds or the State of Florida is going to have to come to the rescue.
they could be running at 125mph if they had all viewliner II equipment or they rebuild the vielinwer I to 125mph
yep I forgot that one
west point
Engineer
Fact of the matter is that the second pair of tunnels across the Hudson are primarily needed to fulfill the needs of Commuter Rail (NJTransit). As far as Amtrak by itself goes they do not really need any more tunnels under the Hudson. So in that sense the new tunnels are really a Commuter Rail project. I know this blows the mind of many in the rail advocacy community who are very Amtrak-centric on many occasions.
There is no way one tunnel bore beinging taken out for a major overhaul would the other tunnel bore could remain in service for thaaaaaat long shutdown.
There is no way one tunnel bore beinging taken out for a major overhaul would the other tunnel bore could remain in service for thaaaaaat long shutdown.
west point
Engineer
There is no way one tunnel bore being taken out for a major overhaul would work. Amtrak now needs to shut down either bore for servicing on weekends. Those shutdowns occurr as not planned but what tunnel bore needs immediate work the most. No way the other tunnel bore could remain in service for work for thaaaaaat long shutdown time of maybe 1 - 1/2 year?.
If there was no NJT traffic then a single tunnel would be just fine to carry Amtrak’s at most 4-5tph in each direction indefinitely. That is what I. Said. Apparently you responded without reading what I said.
In the UK you have some lines that further defy classification. For example the London Overground which is made up of mostly former commuter rail lines rebranded into a more rapid transit like system and run by the same agency (TfL) that runs the rapid transit Underground. Also there is the new Elizabeth Line which runs over tracks used by commuter as well as intercity rail but with a subway like operation through central London.
Not to mention London's Underground Metropolitan Line which shares some tracks and stations with commuter rail trains operated by Chiltern Railways into Marylebone Station. There used to be a lot more of this sharing between the sub-surface Underground and main line railways, e.g. the LT&S Line to Southend and the Underground District Line, but much of this has been segregated in more recent times.
Hey, don't forget the Norristown High Speed Line (aka "P&W") outside of Philly. Single cars and pay the driver on boarding, like a light rail, high platforms, turnstiles at 69th St. and grade separation like heavy rail transit. And they can go 70 mph. (or at least they used to before they started the recent track work.) What do you call that?
Until 1951 it also had Interurban cars of the LVT from Allentown running over it to 69th Street Terminal.
Tokyo has several lines like that, where a suburban line enters into the subway system.
Elizabeth Line is in some ways similar to Paris' RER lines. The overly and pointlessly restrictive regulations and over bureaucratization of the regulatory framework into silos makes such things difficult to do in the US.
It walks like a light rail and quacks like a light rail
if one must categorize it using the Feds scheme I would think. But one could push it into heavy rail too.And don't forget in the mid 1960s, they ran an articulated former interurban trainset (surplus from the Chicago North Shore" called the "Liberty Liner."
You neglected to mention 3rd-rail power.
When I rode it last month, it was a 2-car train, but it appeared that the 2nd car was closed. Do they put a conductor in it for fare collection when they open it?
I don't ride it often enough to have any experience. When I was a kid, and they were still running the Brill Bullets, they would sometimes have 2 car trains, but I don't remember how they did the fare collection.
cirdan
Engineer
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The initial section of London's Metropoiltan Railway was intended to permit main line trains from Paddington to get closer to central London and also provide exchange with some of the other terminii being served. Later the Metropolitan and Great Western fell out and the Metropolitan responded by running its line as a standalone system, which over time developed into what is today the London Underground system.
The Elizabeth line is thus in a way a recreation of what already once was but is too crowded today to be able to accommodate its original purpose.
As mentioned by others on this thread, the Paris RER system is another good example of extending suburban rail lines into (and across) the city center. Although the RER was officially launched as such in the 1970s, the germinal section was the line from Gare d'Austerlitz to Gare d'Orsay which effectively already satisfied this function and was built to serve the Paris world exhibition of 1900.
In Barcelona the central interchange of Placa Catalunya began to take shape in the 1920s, when the interurban lines from Sarria that had previously accessed central Barcelona by sharing streetcar tracks, were placed into a tunnel, and an underground terminus built at Placa Catalunya. This line is today the backbone of the standard gauge part of the FGC system. At about the same time a broad gauge line was built to this location from the Arc de Triompf, initially intended for suburban trains but soon after integrated into the Barcelona metro (to this day line 1 is the only line of the Barcelona metro to be broad gauge, the other lines are all standard gauge). In the 1970s a new cross-city link serving this interchange was built for broad gauge suburban trains. Often overlooked is that this is not actually the first cross-city broad-gauge line as a couple of blocks away there is another line, serving Paseig de Gracia. This was initially surface running and opened in about 1901, but was moved into a tunnel in the 1950s to alleviate the nuisance to street traffic. This tunnel was for many years shared between suburban and long distance trains. With the recent opening of the high speed line (using a new tunnel a few blocks away) it now only sees suburban trains. For those interested in historical trivia, there was once a further cross-city line, running on the surface close to the sea front, serving mostly industries and the docks. The last remnants of this were dismantled to make way for facilities of the 1992 Olympics, but it had ceased to be relevant long before that.
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One could make a case that the Washington Metro combines some of the function of commuter rail, as some of its lines run pretty far into the Maryland and Virginia suburban sprawl. I'm thinking especially of the Red Line to Shady Grove and the Silver Line, which now runs out past Dulles Airport into Loudon County. Of course, no Metro line interchanges with the commuter rail system.
When I think of the term "commuter rail" here in the US I mainly connect it with those train systems that are pretty much exclusively made for commuters as this is pretty much their main purpose. They do not work for most other travel patterns due to the extremely restricted timetable (only on weekdays, have a few trains go towards the city center in the mornings and then leave again in the afternoon), like VRE or some of the MARC lines in the DC area. If you want to travel for other purposes (meaning: at different times) or even the opposite direction you pretty much can forget it.
Similar systems like this in Europe, or those that have a more regular service pattern (like NJ Transit), I would think of as regional trains or suburban trains. But that's just my understanding of the terms.
Similar systems like this in Europe, or those that have a more regular service pattern (like NJ Transit), I would think of as regional trains or suburban trains. But that's just my understanding of the terms.
I think that is logical. Somehow the word "Suburban" seems to be completely absent from the vocabulary of American transport planners! Maybe that is why they keep designing "commuter" services which are unusable for anything other than traveling to and from 9 to 5 jobs, and then wonder why they fail.
It is like pulling teeth to get the likes of SunRail to transition from a "commuter" service to a true daily and hourly for most of the day "suburban" service.
The funniest part of this is that for commuter systems like Boston, many of the “commuters” fall into a tax bracket that allows them to drive their BMW’s to work, rendering those trains useless.
Certainly not universal, but much of the time, the people who can afford far flung suburbs usually don’t take the train.
Boston is an interesting system when it comes to commuter vs. regional vs. intercity. In some sense, it could be all three! Many of the ends of each line qualify as intercity travel, given that it can be close to 50+ miles away and over an hour of travel.
The Fitchburg, Providence and Worcester Lines are all basically intercity trains if measuring from end to end. If the lines could be electrified, and the tracks upgraded, it could make it a really useful system! To the MBTA’s credit, they’ve finally switched lines over to an ever hour system instead of a commuter system.
Well I was thinking of something that is of relevance in the last 50 or so years in transportation planning
One of the problems in the US is the tendency to hark back to golden times that have absolutely no relevance to today.
That may be true for the inner suburbs like Newton and Wellesley on the Worcester Line but as you move out from Boston you get to much less affluent areas - Worcester, Framingham, Fitchburg, Leominster etc. The same is probably true for other Boston commuter lines.
Originally there was Broad St Station for intercity trains and Broad St. Suburban Station for commuters. Then when Broad St. station was torn down the Penn Center development replaced it. For a while SEPTA tried to call the station Penn Center Station but the name never took, everyone insisted on calling it Suburban Station so they eventually gave up and went back to that name.
Agreed in part. Much of the workforce of those town however, stay local, as jobs in downtown Boston, with a few exceptions, tend to be increasingly white collar.
Taking a 1 1/2 hour train to Boston from Worcester really takes a toll on what’s available to any working person.
Nearly everyone in our society, whether they can afford new BMWs or not, can afford to drive. Apparently 90% of households in the US have a motor vehicle available. While this might be lower in large cities with good transit, like Boston, I would suspect that in the suburbs, car ownership among all class is the same as it is in the rest of the country. Nearly all the commuters from the suburbs can afford to drive. Many of them prefer to take the train, enough to keep the trains full, because they prefer not to drive. I think this is mainly because of the hassle of big city traffic and costs of parking. I know something of this, because I speak from personal experience, though it involves Washington, D.C., not Boston.
JontyMort
Lead Service Attendant
The Metropolitan’s main line northwards out of Baker Street would definitely be classified as commuter rather than rapid transit. It got rich on stimulating housing development near its line in what was then - early last century - green fields. Even cut back to Amersham it’s a fair way - but a fun route with some long stretches of four-track main.
Chiltern’s predecessor the Great Central depended on running powers over the Metropolitan for its original access to London from the north via Aylesbury.
