High Speed Rail: London - Kitchener-Waterloo - Pearson Airport - Toronto

[mdrejhon]

Exactly. Hopefully, the provincial authorities have learned something from the Scarborough RT debacle about trying to showcase technologies in corridors instead of just building the necessary.

HSR isn't RT.

High(er) speed rail is successfully used in several countries in the world, at varying speeds from 200 through 350kph.

But yes, Gadgetbahn ist Nuisancebahn, so we should NOT build a custom clean-slate HSR train for it.

Just use good track engineering principles, good old fashioned electrification of standard voltage, catenary builds with modern engineering principles of avoiding resonant energy issues of faster trains (read: 1955 high speed train trial), bring some offshelf RER consists onto it, and when you've bog-standard grade separated all the way to Kitchener or Kingston or Ottawa or wherever eventually, and removed a bunch of TSOs/PSOs, eventually buy faster offshelf "special express" VIA and/or RER 240kph trainsets and call it high speed rail and be done for the day even if it only sprints briefly like Acela initially. Users thrilled at the faster-than-car timetables anyway. America calls their rarely-240kph "high speed rail", and both our TOM/TKL corridors are a far easier incremental upgrade than some of that Northeast Corridor mess was for Amtrak.

Amtrak's Acela Express is more of a HPR train (to Japan/Europe standards) yet they still call it high speed. The engineering differences of speed range 177kph-240kph is a far easier incremental than 177kph versus 300kph. Many of those 177kph-capable sprint lines are already straight enough for a 240kph track lay if it weren't for those farm and level crossings and all (no new greenfield for these particular sprints). 5 years, 10 years, 50 years. Slowly nurse (even 10 year after HFR success after startup) the better 177kph ROWs to 240kph rating, through routine trackbed/tie replacements and grade separations, well-established track precision adjustments and when needing routine reballast, switch to high-speed-compatible ballast (ballast granularity and bed thickness) swap the wooden ties for concrete ties when the old ties rot away.

If you include HSR upgrades in routine major track refurbishment cycles the HSR progression becomes far less painful. Given properly-made concrete ties can last longer, and a thicker railbed of HSR-compatible ballast stays packed longer. So you take a lot longer to deploy HSR, the cost of HSR now instead get mostly embedded in traditional rail refurbishment cycle (plus a little extra) over a couple or three decades, rather than one gigaproject surge. Still....we can do it a smidgen faster than Amtrak has been able to incrementally do with Acela Express, given our rail ROWs (on average) have fewer legacy complications outside GTHA. Plan the speedup progress in an open-ended way that doesn't deadend like UPX or RT with "special trains" or "special stations", etc.

 

[kEiThZ]

HSR isn't RT.

I'm thinking of nonsense like those pushing Hyperloop in Canada.....

 

[dunkalunk]

I'm thinking of nonsense like those pushing Hyperloop in Canada.....

But pneumatic tube transport has been around since the 19th Century!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pneumatic_tube#/media/File:Pneumatic_Dispatch_-_Figure_7.png
/sarc

 

[mdrejhon]

<delorean year="1964">

I just saw the Sputnik launch a few years ago, and we need to copy that spiffy gadgety "bullet train" thingy that Japan just finished building last year, the Shink-something or whatever it was. Bullet trains for Canada! Let's put a jet engine inside a train and call it a Turbo.

</delorean>

 

[mdrejhon]

<delorean year="2064">

After a brutally long daily commute on the London-to-Kingston high speed VIAGOFAST™ train, way too long at 1.5 hours. Why can't we have the Hyperloop already? Two dozen countries have it after the successful trials of the roaring 2020s in Nevada, California and China. All bog standard nowadays, reliable and proven, with great surround VR scenery! Some of them even built by our own re-resurrected Bombardier2 Inc! But no Hyperloops installed in Canada! I would just love to be home for lunch.

</delorean>

 

[ssiguy2]

Exactly. Hopefully, the provincial authorities have learned something from the Scarborough RT debacle about trying to showcase technologies in corridors instead of just building the necessary.

Could you PLEASE stop referring to the SRT as a failed technology. The failure of the SRT is 110% the fault of the TTC itself and has absolutely nothing to do with the technology. Vancouver's SkyTrain is faster, more frequent, cheaper to run, and more comfortable that the Toronto subway. You can hate the line but don't confuse the SRT to SkyTrain.

 

[ssiguy2]

As far as "just wanting to get home for lunch"...........that's a pretty low bar to cross. I just don't think that spending billions on a rail line so it can travel as it did 75 years ago is much of an accomplishment and certainly not worth the money.

I can appreciate there are some lunatic ideas out there. Hell, next thing you know someone is going to say you can power an entire country by splitting atoms or you can take a picture with your camera. I even heard of this moron who is actually advocating to run trains under the ground in big cities..............some people are delusional!

 

[steveintoronto]

Could you PLEASE stop referring to the SRT as a failed technology. The failure of the SRT is 110% the fault of the TTC itself and has absolutely nothing to do with the technology. Vancouver's SkyTrain is faster, more frequent, cheaper to run, and more comfortable that the Toronto subway. You can hate the line but don't confuse the SRT to SkyTrain.

I think the argument revolves around Linear Induction Motors, and indeed, it's far from "failed". In fact, it's having a resonance...errr...renaissance.

http://skytrainforsurrey.org/blog/2012/02/07/skytrain-in-japan/

[“Notwithstanding criticisms and misinformation over the years, the Scarborough RT has been the single most-reliable service operated by the TTC.”
The words jump off the page of the January 2013 staff report to the Toronto Transit Commission. “The service has been very successful at attracting ridership and has been operating over capacity for a decade,” the report continues.][...]
http://www.thestar.com/news/city_ha...lect-of-scarborough-rt-is-shameful-james.html

Should the SRT line have remained for how it was originally intended and designed, Tram-Trains with CLRVs? Most likely, but the CLRVs would have proven problematic too in that capacity. For one thing, they weigh far too much by a factor of two. They're hell on trackbeds and rails, but the SRT, if it has failings, is more in the political sphere, not the technologic, which is alive and well as Bombardier's Innovia. (and many competitor's equivalents)

Staying on-topic for High-Speed London-K/W-Pearson-Toronto:
[TWINDEXX is a double-deck train that is specially designed by Bombardier Transportation for Swiss Federal Railways (SBB). The rolling stock was designed in response to SBB's proposals to launch an intercity high-speed express train. The trains proved to be the feasible choice for long-distance intercity transport on SBB's existing routes with short platforms.
[...]
TWINDEXX is successfully operated in countries such as Switzerland, Denmark, Poland, Germany, Luxembourg and Israel. Its operational speed is 160kmph to 189kmph, with a maximum speed is 230kmph.]
[...]
The TWINDEXX Vario comes with both low and high floor entrances, which enhances the accessibility of the passengers....Deutsche Bahn was the first customer for TWINDEXX Vario. The variant can travel with speeds ranging from 160kmph to 189kmph. It can be used as an EMU and Diesel Unit. [...]
http://www.railway-technology.com/projects/bombardier-twindexx-double-deck-trains/

 

[kEiThZ]

Could you PLEASE stop referring to the SRT as a failed technology. The failure of the SRT is 110% the fault of the TTC itself and has absolutely nothing to do with the technology. Vancouver's SkyTrain is faster, more frequent, cheaper to run, and more comfortable that the Toronto subway. You can hate the line but don't confuse the SRT to SkyTrain.

The tech is fine. But as far as a sellable operational concept? Not so much. How many sales did UTDC and now Bombardier make? They couldn't even convince the TTC to extend the SRT and buy more rolling stock in all those years.

I'd much prefer if we stick to simply buying off the shelf, rather than using transport corridors as demonstrations. In this particularl case, I'm not even sure we actually need "high speed" trains. Simply need to run GO's rolling stock at max speed. Maybe some coaches that are more comfortable for longer distances.

 

[kEiThZ]

http://www.metrolinx.com/en/regionalplanning/rer/rer_kitchener.aspx

The more I look at that, the more I wonder how this could be anything else but an express GO service. If GO sticks to its plans, there will be substantially fewer customers for the high speed service. Might as well cut half-hourly rush and hourly off-peak to Acton. And then do HSR to Guelph and beyond.

And in this scenario, I really don't see how you can skip Guelph at all. That's a ton of money to spend upgrading rails all the way to Guelph to support RER, and then spending more to build a bypass. That seems wasteful. And the only way that makes sense was if the HSR was planned without considering the impact of the RER and/or customer cross-over between the two.

It also strikes me that the real benefit of the "HS"R is that it effectively makes Kitchener as close as Acton by rail. And London as close as Kichener is today.

 

[Urban Sky]

Before I reply to some of those "intermediate stops defeat the purpose of HSR" discussions, I'm posing the following calculations:

First, I've simulated the travel times for a "stop everywhere", "stop at all current VIA stops" and "stop in Malton and Kitchener only" service and three different design speeds (150 km/h as GO's current maximum speed, 177 km/h as the maximum speed for conventional rail and 200 km/h as the maximum speed for a higher-speed service) on the current Toronto-Kitchener-London alignment:

Second, the same simulation, but this time for a HSR alignment combining the 2 HSR segments proposed by the FCP "study" (i.e. the Guelph bypass and the Kitchener-London cutoff) for various design speeds (200 km/h as the maximum speed for higher-rail services, 240 km/h as maximum speed of the Acela Express and 320 km/h as the highest maximum speed for revenue services):

Third, a table with an overview of the various travel speeds (simulated above) and the achievable time savings by choosing a stopping pattern with less intermediary stops:

Forth, a table quantifying the time penalty for adding an additional stop at any intermediary stop for any design speed and alignment mentioned above:

With these tables in mind, I reply to the posts, as follows:

Indeed, all the 'non-stop expresses' being discussed in the literature I read presume stopping at Pearson as a given. They talk of the 'time to Pearson' in the same breath as 'time to Toronto'. There are two stops London to Toronto being discussed in the major SW Ontario press: K/W, Pearson. Any others would slow them down too much to the point of defeating the purpose.

As you can see in the second Table, a HSR service with a design speed of 320 km/h (achieved only on the Guelph Bypass) and one stop in Malton (as the assumed Pearson stop) could achieve a travel time of 39 minutes between Toronto and Kitchener. Even after adding stops in Brampton and Guelph South (with their respective time penalties of 3'19" and 2'08"), the travel time would narrowly meet the declared 48 minute target promoted by the Ontarian government with 46'55". Note that the same stopping pattern but with the current alignment and a design speed of 200 km/h (Malton-Brampton-Guelph) would be 53'23", thus less than 6 minutes (or 13.8%) more.

Exactly.

Add too many stops and you will take the High Speed equation out of HSR.

What takes the "High Speed equation out of HSR" is the choice of a city-pair where only 40 km of the 100 km distance can be upgraded to speeds beyond 200 km/h and the maximum time saving of choosing a HSR alignment over a Higher-Speed service on the existing alignment is only 9'22" (35'22" vs . 44'44" for a non-stop Toronto-Kitchener service).

[...] With GO electrification, the Kitchener to Toronto stretch of HSR already won't be much faster than a GO express. HSR is suppose to be for travel between major cities and not a glorified commuter rail line. [...]

Which is the reason why the whole HSR discussion is pointless between Kitchener and Toronto, as exemplified by the fact that the target travel time of 48 minutes between the two cities seems to be feasible with a design speed of 200 km/h on the existing alignment and one stop at Malton for Pearson Airport (see first Table).

[...] Why would a Londoner {or points westward} get excited about a HSR rail line that is no faster than the London/Toronto Express that use to operate in the 80s?

As the result of a lucky coincidence, I have just about every VIA Rail timetable ever published sitting on my desk and the fastest travel time I found so far between Toronto and London was 2:00 hours (e.g. train 85 in timetable effective 1985/06/01 or train 81 in timetable effective 1979/6/17). If you refer to the third table, you will see that simply running VIA's existing services at a design speed of only 150 km/h, but with modern EMUs and the line upgraded to permit such a speed wherever feasible, would beet that travel time by 5 minutes. Increase travel speed to 200 km/h and you could serve every single existing stop (VIA and GO) in 2:02 hours.

There's no really meaningful stops between Kitchener and London, this is where the speed is made up. [...]

Yes, but even here, the maximum travel time savings of building a HSR segment as suggested by the FCP "study" is only 16 minutes (compare first two tables):
200 km/h design speed on current alignment:
Departure Kitchener: 0:48:59
Arrival London: 1:31:21
Travel Time Kitchener-London (non-stop): 0:42:22
320 km/h design speed on HSR alignment:
Departure Kitchener: 0:39:44
Arrival London: 1:06:03
Travel Time Kitchener-London (non-stop): 0:26:19
Travel time saving: 0:42:22-0:26:19=0:16:03

To compare: upgrading the existing line to accommodate VIA's existing services in modern EMUs at design speeds of 150, 177 or 200 km/h would cut 23, 26 or 28 minutes off the current travel time (see first table).

[...] The Kitchener-Toronto corridor is definitely capable of supporting various levels of express (Kitchener-Toronto direct), intercity (VIA-type spacing) , and regional (GO-type spacing) service at once.

Agreed, but building two HSR segments with respective lengths of 42 km and 62 km could be seen as highly questionable if they yield only 10.6 and 15.4 seconds of travel time savings per km greenfield HSR alignment, compared to upgrading the existing alignment to 200 km/h.

Could you PLEASE stop referring to the SRT as a failed technology. The failure of the SRT is 110% the fault of the TTC itself and has absolutely nothing to do with the technology. Vancouver's SkyTrain is faster, more frequent, cheaper to run, and more comfortable that the Toronto subway. You can hate the line but don't confuse the SRT to SkyTrain.

I don't think anyone denies that RT (as exemplified by Vancouver's superb Skytrain) is a superior system compared to TTC's Subway with its absurd Toronto Gauge. However, given that the system choice has already been made and created a path dependency, it was a huge mistake to create a different, incompatible system rather than simply extending the Subway on the same overground alignment around Scarborough. For the same reason, establishing a separate incompatible passenger rail intercity system would be counter-productive (as acknowledged by China in the wake of the Transrapid white elephant) and this is exactly what kEiThZ was referring to in this clarification you apparently missed:

I'm thinking of nonsense like those pushing Hyperloop in Canada.....

[...] Staying on-topic for High-Speed London-K/W-Pearson-Toronto:
[TWINDEXX is a double-deck train that is specially designed by Bombardier Transportation for Swiss Federal Railways (SBB). The rolling stock was designed in response to SBB's proposals to launch an intercity high-speed express train. The trains proved to be the feasible choice for long-distance intercity transport on SBB's existing routes with short platforms.
[...]
TWINDEXX is successfully operated in countries such as Switzerland, Denmark, Poland, Germany, Luxembourg and Israel. Its operational speed is 160kmph to 189kmph, with a maximum speed is 230kmph.]
[...]
The TWINDEXX Vario comes with both low and high floor entrances, which enhances the accessibility of the passengers....Deutsche Bahn was the first customer for TWINDEXX Vario. The variant can travel with speeds ranging from 160kmph to 189kmph. It can be used as an EMU and Diesel Unit. [...]
http://www.railway-technology.com/projects/bombardier-twindexx-double-deck-trains/

Nothing of this matters as long as Transport Canada imposes the FRA standards of crash-worthiness (as helplessly outdated and counter-productive they might be). Doing the trick of concessioning it as a light rail like the O-Train in Ottawa will almost certainly not work for an intercity passenger rail service.

 

[crs1026]

Which is the reason why the whole HSR discussion is pointless between Kitchener and Toronto, as exemplified by the fact that the target travel time of 48 minutes between the two cities seems to be feasible with a design speed of 200 km/h on the existing alignment and one stop at Malton for Pearson Airport (see first Table).

Wow - really excellent detailed analysis.

The question we should be asking is, how low can we push the speed limit ? Would 160 km/h do instead of 200 km/h? I'd like to see us get to 200 km/h, and we should rough in for this.....but if we can attract plenty of riders at the lower speed limit, which may be much cheaper and faster to implement, we get past the political hump that is the true obstacle to doing more.

- Paul

 

[mdrejhon]

Nothing of this matters as long as Transport Canada imposes the FRA standards of crash-worthiness (as helplessly outdated and counter-productive they might be). Doing the trick of concessioning it as a light rail like the O-Train in Ottawa will almost certainly not work for an intercity passenger rail service.

Good analysis, with ONE minor disagreement.

That may not be necessary, since GO RER is possibly ending up using lighter-weight EMU trains on some routes, and Kitchener would just be an extension of GO RER running at higher speeds.

Let's not forget the earlier quotes I've made in the GO Train Positive Train Control section:

_____________________________________

Using advanced Google-Fu search syntax, I was finally able to dig up evidence of Transport Canada flexibility on non-FRA trainsets:

Transport Canada has recently indicated that they may be more flexible with the FRA structural strength requirements, which might open opportunities for GO to study a broader range of European and Asian EMUs and DMUs. Specifically, they stated their intent to require new GO vehicles to either:
 Meet FRA structure strength and crash worthiness for passenger cars, or
 Maintain temporal separation from freight and heavy rail passenger traffic, or
 Operate under some form of Positive Train Control (PTC) signalling system

_____________________________________

What's a ballpark cost estimate for PTC on the full GO network? $500 million? $5 billion?

We now know:

$200 million for PTC
$800 million for CBTC
And it's already part of the GO RER budget...

http://www.metrolinx.com/en/regiona...fitscases/GO_RER_Initial_Business_Case_EN.pdf
Price quotes of PTC/CBTC come from section 5.6, Page 145 labelled, Page 161 PDF viewer.

An enhanced train control technology is already part of the GO electrification budget, from what I am reading.

Also, further selected quotes:

TRAIN CONTROL: Enhanced Train Control (ETC) is a prudent and necessary investment given the level of services now being operated. This may be of a type of train control, such as Positive Train Control (PTC) and Communication-Based Train Control (CBTC).

In all scenarios, allowance is made for installation of ETC (and associated costs) to varying extents within the five scenarios.

It is noted that PTC is not yet a legal requirement in Canada but it is mandated in the U.S., and many RER systems in other countries have a train control system with similar functionality. PTC’s effect on capacity is not yet known; it should be noted that CBTC is the working assumption for the Scenario 5 (10-Year Plan Optimized) RER program.

Installing new train control systems to enable higher frequency services.

(and more, cementing an ETC system as being germane to RER).

The Scenario 5 is the GO electrification (EMU scenario).
If GO is receiving EMUs at all, then we're getting a form of ETC too, needed anyway to milk the EMU advantages (short headways) -- meaning we'd get CBTC to go with them.

FRA structural strength requirements are also possibly being relaxed (Table 30):

Technical Standards: GO currently voluntarily complies with US FRA and American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of-Way Association (AREMA) standards which are optimized for mixed operation with freight.

It is assumed for the purpose of this IBC that GO: 1) adopts international (UIC and EN) technical standards;2) this approach is accepted by Transport Canada under the Alternate Practice policy; and 3) by CN and CPR where they interact with RER services. Operating rule changes would need to be discussed and confirmed with Transport Canada and other bodies. This discussion with Transport Canada is particularly important with respect to rolling stock, train control and electrification costs.

The word "important" and "costs" being applied to the discussion to Transport Canada...

Billions from 3 levels of government (... the SmartTrack pitch in to the GO RER budget...) results in many tapping feet and twiddling thumbs at Transport Canada, breathing fire down at them to make a decision on rules & safety requirements -- and given the apparent intent of $800M spend for GO-wide CBTC.

...we might overhear Pearson ATC reporting flying pigs on their radar.

 

[mdrejhon]

Also, Metrolinx and VIA are probably talking now (needed for GO RER and VIA HFR electrification specifications and compatibility), given both GO and VIA wants to electrify in the 2020s, and HFR provisions for eventual HSR someday.

Both TOM and TKL HSR are now mentioned in Metrolinx's 273-page Appendix A of the 180-page RER Business Plan released last month:

As Transport Canada regulates both Metrolinx and VIA corridors, it is in both their interests to get a lighter European structural strength standard applied to their passenger-only network. (The infrequent daytime freight transits on Metrolinx-owned corridors will be even less frequent by 2025-2030)

Assuming the whole corridor becomes owned for passenger use, rather than freight companies, and the combined Corridor electrification budget is almost exactly ~1000 times bigger than O-Train. We're talking an $18M O-Train versus $13.5bn(RER)+$4bn(HFR)=$17.5B. Three extra zeros, an M turned into a B! It's not even remotely in the same ballpark.

There are still freight customers on Lakeshore West, so the same document talk about freight solutions, requiring daytime freight to be CBTC-equipped to enter Metrolinx corridors. CBTC can also be used to create bigger headways between a (non-FRA) passenger train and a freight train, much like adding bigger distance behind an Airbus A380 for a Cessna on landing approach.

Though some of it will be diverted to nighttime, to simplify things:

With less daytime freight that would now also require CBTC (already funded as part of $13.5bn RER plan) to operate in Metrolinx corridors...

For the Kitchener All bets are probably now off on definitely only using FRA structural-strength trains in a future filled with passenger-only non-freight-owned corridors by, say, 2025 or 2030.

 

[steveintoronto]

As you can see in the second Table, a HSR service with a design speed of 320 km/h (achieved only on the Guelph Bypass) and one stop in Malton (as the assumed Pearson stop) could achieve a travel time of 39 minutes between Toronto and Kitchener.

Beautifully detailed post! I'll pore over that later tonight at home, glossed over the rest for now, having trouble accepting your stated time-loss for Guelph and Malton, but have to say the "39 minutes" is an incredibly good time. Even if you stated "45 minutes" for unforeseen complications, that alone would be a real selling point. Are you including loss of time to decelerate and accelerate as well as dwell time at the stops? (Edit: I see the note that "dwell time is 60 seconds" so it leaves approx a minute for deceleration and acceleration each) I still get the feeling that K/W, at almost ten times the size of Guelph, and far more in common with K/W tech-types renders a stop at Guelph almost inconsequential for traffic, and what traffic there is could be served by a local express much more effectively, but will study the charts later. They're exceptional.