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Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

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Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#141

Post by penteract »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #103
okanat wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look at how much Switzerland spends per capita vs Germany. €477 vs €115. And Swiss kept their infrastructure well unlike Germans. source: https://www.allianz-pro-schiene.de/themen/infrastruktur/inve...

> Look at how much Switzerland spends per capita vs Germany. €477 vs €115 Your chart shows close to €200 spent by Deutschland per capita in 2024, before the abovementioned spending splurge (about €30/person/year). (The numbers 477 and 115 never appear in your source.) €230 in Berlin purchases about as much as €371 of CHF in Zürich [1]. So no, I’m not seeing evidence Germany needs to further 3x capital expenditure to…

The number €115 is in the second chart as the per capita German expenditure on rail infrastructure in 2023. I don't see €477, but it's pretty close to the €480 figure for Switzerland in 2024. My guess is they saw an old version of the page when the first chart had numbers for 2023 and have kept using it without noticing the update.

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#142

Post by cyberax »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #80
eqvinox wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For context, in case people are less familiar with German politics: DB is in a misbegotten state of privatization, started in the 90ies. The government spun it out into a private company but still owns 100% of it. They were trying to pump it up so they could sell it for good money. They did that by skimping on everything including maintenance, to try and make the numbers look good. Except they never got to whatever m…

> Not sure if this is better or worse than the UK's Network Rail story “About 72 per cent of Deutsche Bahn’s intercity trains arrived within 10 minutes of their scheduled arrival time in the year to January 2025, compared with 78 per cent of British long-distance trains, according to the FT analysis. Any interaction with the German rail network is also one of the biggest factors affecting the punctuality of long-dist…

Heh. Ukraine is doing better than that _during_ _the_ _war_: https://en.cfts.org.ua/news/ukrzaliznytsia_boasts_97_train_d...

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#143

Post by eska »

iknowstuff wrote: post #139
eqvinox wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For context, in case people are less familiar with German politics: DB is in a misbegotten state of privatization, started in the 90ies. The government spun it out into a private company but still owns 100% of it. They were trying to pump it up so they could sell it for good money. They did that by skimping on everything including maintenance, to try and make the numbers look good. Except they never got to whatever m…

What is the incentive for politicians to sell a publicly owned company for a lot of money? How would they personally benefit from a high price? I can only think of incentives to sell it for as little as possible to a most favored investor/buddy.

Exit strategy for after their political career. Compare with Gerhard Schröder

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#144

Post by cyberax »

wrs wrote: post #136
NamTaf wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It did fail safe though? Interference led to the network stopping, not trains just racing towards each other due to bogus line authorities. That is, by definition, fail-safe

That seems like a fail-safe interpretation of communication: if there is no communication, stop the train. But that's a special case. GSM-R is much more than line authorities. >GSM-R is a secure platform for voice and data communication between railway operational staff, including drivers, dispatchers, shunting team members, train engineers, and station controllers. Designing the communication network itself in such…

"Fail-safe" by definition means that the system fails into a safe state. Stopping the trains on comms failure _is_ safe.

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#145

Post by robocat »

ahartmetz wrote: post #98
eqvinox wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For context, in case people are less familiar with German politics: DB is in a misbegotten state of privatization, started in the 90ies. The government spun it out into a private company but still owns 100% of it. They were trying to pump it up so they could sell it for good money. They did that by skimping on everything including maintenance, to try and make the numbers look good. Except they never got to whatever m…

The one good thing is that they failed to take it private. Imagine how bad it would be with the current maintenance backlog and no public funding.

The New Zealand government sold their rail system, then Toll didn't make a success of it, so the government bought it back at a massive loss.

Now rail is just a nightmare moneypit. But older voters love rail "it's efficient" so the government panders to them and wastes more expenditure on it.

Edit: Currently for every $1.50 tax income from road user taxes and petroleum taxes: $1 is spent on roads, and 50 cents is spent on "rail". Crap. Rail is paid for by cars but is mostly waste.

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#146

Post by bluGill »

dcel wrote: post #137
phatfish wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything about UK rail is custom (apart from the gauge). Apparently it's one of the (many) reasons HS2 is such a mess. They were trying to run trains faster than typical continental high speed lines, which meant custom design work that needs loads of additional testing and certification. Rather than just use the Spanish or French high speed designs.

Max line speed of HS2 is 360km/h, with provision for 400 in some sections in future. This is entirely in line with many other modern HS lines. China’s been running regular 360km/h services for years. This is a project with a 200+ year shelf life. Designing to 300 or less would have been short sighted, and many of the changes to accommodate such high speeds actually reduce costs in the long term (slab track, headroom…

China has run at 360kmh before, but last I checked they mostly run slower.

Air resistance is a killer as you go faster. So for trains 300 is usually about the best compromise between energy use and speed. If you want to go faster a jet at altitude is going to be much faster at a better fuel efficiency. High speeds make sense for long distances.

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#147

Post by vachina »

dgellow wrote: post #99
mcbetz wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Erfurt since 2,5 hours. Out of office train driver keeps us updated from chats with fellow drivers (their sources say it is due to software update), radio is fixed now and trains processed one after another (starting with super fast ones - Munich > Berlin, e.g. - so the tracks get emptied quickly). Other interesting observations: when our train stopped, all hotels were already fully booked, as were coach tickets (…

Yeah, I experienced that a few times in airports with massive disturbance. You could see all the hotels getting fully booked almost live, then when you eventually arrive somewhere with a booking you still have to wait an hour due to how long the queue at the hotel reception is. Always a crazy experience

Society is really living on a thin ice of equilibrium.

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#148

Post by wil421 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #73
fnordian_slip wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what happens when you ignore critical infrastructure for three decades. Of course, if the government were to correct the mistakes of the past, it would get worse for another decade. The necessary repairs would cause a lot more delays, and voters would then say "Were giving them so much extra money, and it gets worse? Unacceptable!". So I fear we'll continue to have these problems forever.

> when you ignore critical infrastructure for three decades To be fair, Deutsche Bahn is currently spending “€107bn between 2025 and 2029” on infrastructure upgrades [1]. [1] https://www.ft.com/content/db75e347-b13b-4753-8130-6301bb55c...

NYC is spending around $68 billion to modernize their subway. Not sure what that’s says about Deutsche Bahn vs NYC/MTA but I’m sure both are not upgrading that much.

Not sure what I was expecting quality wise in Germany when I rode the DB rail between states and the Munich subway but it wasn’t much different than the US, except it much more expansive. Nothing fancy and it was late but I’d rather not pay for fancy here or there. Just make it work.

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#149

Post by LearnYouALisp »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #80
eqvinox wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For context, in case people are less familiar with German politics: DB is in a misbegotten state of privatization, started in the 90ies. The government spun it out into a private company but still owns 100% of it. They were trying to pump it up so they could sell it for good money. They did that by skimping on everything including maintenance, to try and make the numbers look good. Except they never got to whatever m…

> Not sure if this is better or worse than the UK's Network Rail story “About 72 per cent of Deutsche Bahn’s intercity trains arrived within 10 minutes of their scheduled arrival time in the year to January 2025, compared with 78 per cent of British long-distance trains, according to the FT analysis. Any interaction with the German rail network is also one of the biggest factors affecting the punctuality of long-dist…

The secret, as told in some other threads (elsewhere), is that "If the service is canceled, it can't have been late!" So trains that are over ~30 minutes late can be canceled.

Re: Trains halted across Germany because of communication system problem

#150

Post by [deleted] »

cyberax wrote: post #144
wrs wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems like a fail-safe interpretation of communication: if there is no communication, stop the train. But that's a special case. GSM-R is much more than line authorities. >GSM-R is a secure platform for voice and data communication between railway operational staff, including drivers, dispatchers, shunting team members, train engineers, and station controllers. Designing the communication network itself in such…

"Fail-safe" by definition means that the system fails into a safe state. Stopping the trains on comms failure _is_ safe.

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