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

Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

yle.fi

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 465 posts

Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

#11

Post by hapidjus »

thih9 wrote: post #3

> will cost billions of euros, affect more than 9,200 km of track, and take decades How is a change like this going to be implemented? E.g. are they going to mainly update some tracks everywhere (and have two systems running in parallel), or all tracks in selected areas (and have passengers change), or something else? Was there a comparable large scale rail infrastructure change in some other country?

I think you can ”upgrade” the tracks to use three rails so you can handle both track widths. Also there are trains with adjustabe axle widths.

Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

#12

Post by helsinkiandrew »

worldsayshi wrote: post #4

I wonder if there will be measures for backwards compatibility in the transition period. Like having dual track widths.

There's only 89mm difference between the two widths - I'd guess that isn't enough room to have both on the same track.

Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

#14

Post by vesinisa »

Here's a much better article from the Finnish public broadcaster giving more context: https://yle.fi/a/74-20161606

My comments:

The important thing to note that at this point it's just a political posturing and an announcement of intent. They haven't shown any concrete technical plan how this would actually be executed.

> "Of course, we are very pragmatic and realistic, we cannot do this in five years. Planning will continue until the end of the decade, and maybe in 2032 we can start construction."

Once they have the cost estimates and effects on existing rail traffic studied, I bet construction will never start.

Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

#15

Post by Sloowms »

anticodon wrote: post #9
thih9 wrote: post #3

> will cost billions of euros, affect more than 9,200 km of track, and take decades How is a change like this going to be implemented? E.g. are they going to mainly update some tracks everywhere (and have two systems running in parallel), or all tracks in selected areas (and have passengers change), or something else? Was there a comparable large scale rail infrastructure change in some other country?

> Was there a comparable large scale rail infrastructure change in some other country? Baltic states attempted this (project Rail Baltica). Lots of EU money were spent with no visible result. I guess, several people in Baltic states became super rich, but in terms of rail infrastructure nothing was done.

No visible result is the goal. The change is minimal but makes the system compatible with other EU carriages. Did the Baltics attempt this or succeed?

Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

#17

Post by [deleted] »

gspr wrote: post #7
thih9 wrote: post #3

> will cost billions of euros, affect more than 9,200 km of track, and take decades How is a change like this going to be implemented? E.g. are they going to mainly update some tracks everywhere (and have two systems running in parallel), or all tracks in selected areas (and have passengers change), or something else? Was there a comparable large scale rail infrastructure change in some other country?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_gauge

[deleted]

Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

#18

Post by yevgeby »

thih9 wrote: post #3

> will cost billions of euros, affect more than 9,200 km of track, and take decades How is a change like this going to be implemented? E.g. are they going to mainly update some tracks everywhere (and have two systems running in parallel), or all tracks in selected areas (and have passengers change), or something else? Was there a comparable large scale rail infrastructure change in some other country?

There are several options nowadays. For instance, the Spanish train maker Talgo holds many patents for variable-gauge railroad wheel systems. Such systems can be used at scale for large projects. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variable_gauge

Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

#19

Post by andriamanitra »

thih9 wrote: post #3

> will cost billions of euros, affect more than 9,200 km of track, and take decades How is a change like this going to be implemented? E.g. are they going to mainly update some tracks everywhere (and have two systems running in parallel), or all tracks in selected areas (and have passengers change), or something else? Was there a comparable large scale rail infrastructure change in some other country?

Currently the leading plan is to build another narrower track alongside the existing ones (so the old trains can keep operating), but it is still in the planning phase. [1] I am not convinced this project is ever going to pay for itself. I feel like you could move cargo from one train to another somewhere near the border for quite a long time with the money it is going to take to convert the entire rail network. Finland is only connected to Sweden and Norway by land in the North so it's not really going to connect the Finnish rail network to Europe either (unless the Helsinki-Tallinn tunnel [2] gets built, but it does not seem likely at this time).

[1] https://yle.fi/a/74-20161793

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helsinki%E2%80%93Tallinn_Tunne...

Post reply on HN