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VIA Rail

Admiral Beez said:
In February I'm taking the HSR from Taipei to Kaohsiung City, my first trip in Asia on an intercity train. I'm also taking a shorter train from Guangzhou to Hong Kong, and local rail in Seoul. I'll try to get some pics.

I imagine the comparison to my recent VIA trip from Toronto to Montreal will be noteworthy.
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Fun tip on all modern mainland Chinese trains and stations, they have free boiling water dispensers, so bring noodle cups or tea, if that's your thing (not sure about Taiwanese trains though).
 
brainfreezed said:
Fun tip on all modern mainland Chinese trains and stations, they have free boiling water dispensers, so bring noodle cups or tea, if that's your thing (not sure about Taiwanese trains though).
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i can confirm from my trip there this summer that no they dont have boiling water dispensers. the train though is quite fast, 300km/h and are export versions of the N700 from japan
 
steveintoronto said:
There's been a series of North Am accidents down to 'operator error' in the last decade or so. Many remarkably similar. I've just accessed the Transportation Safety Board reports and others, it's a bit too macabre to post them now.

Suffice to say this CBC headline at the time is not only accurate, it's prophetic, and the debate will be very heated here in Canada, as the US, although lagging, is far ahead of us on implementation of safety systems, most notably PTC:

Via derailment report says crew misperceived warning signal
'This will happen again,' unless there are changes after deadly 2012 derailment, TSB warns
By Dave Seglins and John Nicol , CBC News Posted: Jun 11, 2013 5:03 AM ET Last Updated: Jun 11, 2013 11:01 PM ET

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/via-derailment-report-says-crew-misperceived-warning-signal-1.1381387

Amidst the horror, I have to repeat my observation on "draw bars" tying the carriages together by necessity due to the shared single pair wheelsets (not bogies).

There's been many comments by a wide array of observers, some of them from within the industry, as to how (gist) "It's a miracle that more weren't killed".

It's too soon to state this unequivocally, but the wheelset arrangements and fixed draw-bars (only unlinkable during pit servicing) might have been a good part of the 'miracle'. I must repeat though, that's a subjective observation. In other aspects, the lack of a 'break point' might have compounded the coaches 'accordianing' . These are all things that will be closely examined. This will be the first time in modern history for US investigators to study the safety in situ of this type of 'trainset' accident.

Addendum: I know I'm going to be challenged on my supposition, these forums especially are rife with 'sensitivities' when Cdn practice is compared to other examples, so I'm going to quote more from the CBC article linked:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/via-derailment-report-says-crew-misperceived-warning-signal-1.1381387

Cue the endless excuses...
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My impression is that human error is a leading cause of rail accidents. Perhaps it's time to remove the human factor?
 
brainfreezed said:
Fun tip on all modern mainland Chinese trains and stations, they have free boiling water dispensers, so bring noodle cups or tea, if that's your thing (not sure about Taiwanese trains though).
Click to expand...
I'll look for that.

My trip to South Korea should be interesting, as it's a week or so before the winter Olympics, so presumably signs will include English and other languages. I have to take trains in Korea, but only local ones I think.
 
Admiral Beez said:
I'll look for that.

My trip to South Korea should be interesting, as it's a week or so before the winter Olympics, so presumably signs will include English and other languages. I have to take trains in Korea, but only local ones I think.
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I was in China, Korea, and Taiwan a few years ago, in the big cities, and trains in between, and all the signs on the transit systems and trains were also in English, most announcements too. I was very envious of their transit and heavy rail systems there, decades ahead of North America.

To try to somewhat get not too off topic here, PTC can't come soon enough. Probably be costly, but I wish we would nationalize our rail infrastructure. The countries with the best rail networks tend to be government-owned, and sell usage to operators. Basically the same way that we own and maintain the highways for the public good.

Would also be a lot easier to get reliable VIA service on long-distance routes, RER on the non-Metrolinx lines, and make freight more efficient by not having parallel CN and CP lines.
 
HFR news from Quebec:
http://www.journaldequebec.com/2017/12/20/le-projet-de-train-a-grande-frequence-sur-la-bonne-voie

There was a meeting yesterday between people from Via Rail, the Quebec transport minister and the Trois-Rivières MNA, and there seems to be a lot of optimism.

There price tag is now 5.2 billion and it could be up in running in 4 years. Somehow, the travel time between Trois-Rivières and Montreal would be only 50 minutes.

The Quebec government will support the project if the federal government goes ahead.
 
nephersir7 said:
HFR news from Quebec:
http://www.journaldequebec.com/2017/12/20/le-projet-de-train-a-grande-frequence-sur-la-bonne-voie

There was a meeting yesterday between people from Via Rail, the Quebec transport minister and the Trois-Rivières MNA, and there seems to be a lot of optimism.

There price tag is now 5.2 billion and it could be up in running in 4 years. Somehow, the travel time between Trois-Rivières and Montreal would be only 50 minutes.

The Quebec government will support the project if the federal government goes ahead.
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Excellent heads up. Here's the English translation:
The High Frequency Train (TGF) project with stops in Trois-Rivières seems closer and closer to being realized. A meeting was held on Tuesday between the people of Via Rail, the Minister of Transport of Quebec, André Fortin, and the member for Trois-Rivières.

"The government will endorse the project if the federal government goes ahead," said Jean-Denis Girard, MLA for Trois-Rivières.

The passenger train could see the light of day in four years.

"We are talking about a train that will be approaching a speed of 100 miles per hour (160 km / h) with a dedicated rail only to the passenger train, but we must split the way," said the MP.

The project requires an investment of $ 5.2 billion. All that is missing is federal funding to move forward.

"It must absolutely be announced in 2018," believes Robert Aubin, MP for the NDP.

At the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, we are following with interest the evolution of the TGF project.

"It's good for the economy of Trois-Rivières. It is believed that people might want to come here, "said Amélie St-Pierre, president of the Trois-Rivières Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

The high-frequency train would make the trip between downtown Trois-Rivières and Montreal in just 50 minutes.
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innsertnamehere said:
50 minutes to make 145km? That is an *average* speed of 175km/h, yet alone a top speed of 160km/h.
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Hmmm. 177kph is the planned HFR top speed.

It would need to accelerate and stop on a dime like an Enterprise NCC-1701 on rails.

Is there a 200-220kph trojan horse hiding under the Xmas tree?
 
innsertnamehere said:
50 minutes to make 145km? That is an *average* speed of 175km/h, yet alone a top speed of 160km/h.
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When VIA used to operate that route previously they had it as 147 km from Central station. 141 km from Mount Royal station.

It's not really clear where they are going to operate this service from. If there's a terminus near Montpelier station on the Deux-Montagnes line, then it would only be 139 km.

But it could be shorter. Perhaps they'll operate it from Parc station (or even Park Avenue station) instead, which CP used to use for this service. Or they could even run out of de la Concorde station on the Orange line. Or heck, use the CN track through Repentigny and then join the old CP alignment to Trois-Rivieres at L'Épiphanie - why my gut tells me would be shorter, but it's a long time since I took the Trois-Rivieres train.

If the speed seems faster than possible, then likely the route is shorter than you think.
 
As the bird flies the route is about 120km. To do that in 50 minutes will require an extremely high average speed if your max speed is 160km/h.
 
nfitz said:
It's not really clear where they are going to operate this service from. If there's a terminus near Montpelier station on the Deux-Montagnes line, then it would only be 139 km.
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Tbe article says from downtown to downtown.

That 50 min time in the article should absolutely be taken with a grain of salt. The number most likely doesn't even come from VIA.

It's probably not a coincidence that 50 min is exactly "distance * max speed".

Looks like someone (the author of the article?) just made a simplistic extrapolation.
 
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nephersir7 said:
Tbe article says from downtown to downtown.
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LOL. It will take them nearly 50 minutes to get from Lucien L'Allier to Park.


nephersir7 said:
It's probably not a coincidence that 50 min is exactly "distance * max speed".

Looks like someone (the author of the article?) just made a simplistic extrapolation.
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Quite possibly.
 
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