Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Caltrain's new electric trains

fastcompany.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 140 posts

Re: Caltrain's new electric trains

#31

Post by JumpCrisscross »

kderbe wrote: post #23

Anyone interested in Caltrain operation should check out the Caltrain HSR blog, https://caltrain-hsr.blogspot.com/ . It's not just about high-speed rail. For example, last week the blog pointed out that the new trains take an extra 8-10 seconds after stopping at a station to begin opening the doors. Which chews up 12% of the trip time savings achieved by the move from diesel to electrified trains!

> the new trains take an extra 8-10 seconds after stopping at a station to begin opening the doors

Why?

Re: Caltrain's new electric trains

#32

Post by divbzero »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #27

> new express route between San Jose and San Francisco will stop at 11 stations instead of seven, and take 59 minutes instead of an hour and five minutes If you ignore wait times. Why couldn’t they have just sped up the train?

The increase in riders might be worthwhile and part of why Caltrain can now have off-peak trains “run every 30 minutes, rather than every hour”.

Re: Caltrain's new electric trains

#33

Post by Jalad »

kderbe wrote: post #23

Anyone interested in Caltrain operation should check out the Caltrain HSR blog, https://caltrain-hsr.blogspot.com/ . It's not just about high-speed rail. For example, last week the blog pointed out that the new trains take an extra 8-10 seconds after stopping at a station to begin opening the doors. Which chews up 12% of the trip time savings achieved by the move from diesel to electrified trains!

> For example, last week the blog pointed out that the new trains take an extra 8-10 seconds after stopping at a station to begin opening the doors

Anecdotally, this is also true of the San Francisco Municipal subway. The subway cars take a long time to open and close doors because there is a mechanical bridge that closes the gap between the train and the platform. This is also a pretty big time sink for the subway system

Re: Caltrain's new electric trains

#34

Post by grvbck »

jwr wrote: post #13

As a European, this article is outright bizarre, and makes me appreciate what we have much more. I will complain less about trains from now on.

Same! Glad to see it wasn't just me. Trains here have been electric since 1920… EMU units have been a staple since 1990, though some routes still have locomotives of course.

There is no lack of stupidity, however, at the system level. The state owns the rails and procures service from private actors who then manage the traffic more or less successfully. The booking systems are chaotic, the prices are high. It is sometimes cheaper to fly domestically, even though the door-to-door time is longer.

Imagine if the U.S. could get their rail network together... Like really invest in proper, normal, modern trains. Not the tech bro vacuum tube nonsense.

Re: Caltrain's new electric trains

#35

Post by solardev »

jeffbee wrote: post #12
chiph wrote: post #3

Someone tell the Town of Atherton that electric trains don't pollute. I think they're now up to 3 lawsuits against California high speed rail, at least two of which are on environmental reasons.

Can we just tell the town of Atherton to not exist? Atherton is a "general law" city of California and the legislature can dissolve it with a simple majority vote. The purpose of a city in California is to advance and further state policy, so I never understood why the state stands around acting powerless while reactionaries thwart broadly supported state initiatives.

While we're at it, if we just built more train-trailer-homes and moved all the Californians into them, we could solve the entire state's housing problems AND get everybody to take transit every day AND improve air pollution. Census counts would become a lot easier too.

Homeowners don't want to move? No problem, just eminent domain them or invent some new CEQA provision by a simple majority vote. It's about time the state learned to use its powers!

Re: Caltrain's new electric trains

#36

Post by noiobeforebed »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #27

> new express route between San Jose and San Francisco will stop at 11 stations instead of seven, and take 59 minutes instead of an hour and five minutes If you ignore wait times. Why couldn’t they have just sped up the train?

The track still has a hard speed limit of 79mph from the rails themselves, so much of the savings is in acceleration and braking.

Since adding stations costs less time now, I guess they decided these extra two were worth it.

edit: rules around level crossings may also have something to do with the speed limit.

Re: Caltrain's new electric trains

#37

Post by Animats »

jeffbee wrote: post #12
chiph wrote: post #3

Someone tell the Town of Atherton that electric trains don't pollute. I think they're now up to 3 lawsuits against California high speed rail, at least two of which are on environmental reasons.

Can we just tell the town of Atherton to not exist? Atherton is a "general law" city of California and the legislature can dissolve it with a simple majority vote. The purpose of a city in California is to advance and further state policy, so I never understood why the state stands around acting powerless while reactionaries thwart broadly supported state initiatives.

But Atherton has the best polo field of the three in Silicon Valley!

Re: Caltrain's new electric trains

#40

Post by pikma »

Jalad wrote: post #33
kderbe wrote: post #23

Anyone interested in Caltrain operation should check out the Caltrain HSR blog, https://caltrain-hsr.blogspot.com/ . It's not just about high-speed rail. For example, last week the blog pointed out that the new trains take an extra 8-10 seconds after stopping at a station to begin opening the doors. Which chews up 12% of the trip time savings achieved by the move from diesel to electrified trains!

> For example, last week the blog pointed out that the new trains take an extra 8-10 seconds after stopping at a station to begin opening the doors Anecdotally, this is also true of the San Francisco Municipal subway. The subway cars take a long time to open and close doors because there is a mechanical bridge that closes the gap between the train and the platform. This is also a pretty big time sink for the subway s…

In contrast, in the metro in Paris, the doors open a few seconds before the train stops, so that the doors are fully open by the time the train is stopped - and passengers in a hurry can jump out while the train is still moving.
Post reply on HN