[HN Gopher] The fragmented nature of modern-day railways
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The fragmented nature of modern-day railways
Author : prostoalex
Score : 106 points
Date : 2022-06-24 02:29 UTC (1 days ago)
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| londons_explore wrote:
| An automated system could be made for this.
|
| Imagine two tracks side by side. Now have a mechanism above that
| lifts goods off one train and into another. The mechanism could
| work on moving trains such that a 30 mph train could unload all
| its cargo and have it all loaded into a neighbouring train also
| moving at 30 mph.
|
| Such a mechanism would be expensive, but only needs to exist at
| cargo borders, and the cost would be dwarfed by the value of the
| trade it enables.
| sschueller wrote:
| That seems like an over complication when you have automatic
| gauge adjustment system [1] (already in use) that can change
| the cage while the train travels through it at 15 km/h. At the
| same time you can easily build locomotives to run on
| electricity of any voltage and also diesel at the same time.
| Also changing locomotives at boarders is quite common in Europe
| so even if you can't get the locomotive to work you can switch
| them easily.
|
| We have a light rail here in Zurich Switzerland that is a Tram
| while in the city and a Train when it is outside. It switches
| from 600V to 1200V and back halfway through the journey and it
| does this all day long without any issues. [2]
|
| [1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spurweite_(Bahn)
|
| [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forch_railway
| avianlyric wrote:
| Those systems have some pretty tight weight limits on them,
| which makes them unsuitable for freight usage. I believe this
| approach, and why doesn't work, is covered in the article.
| sschueller wrote:
| According to [1] (German) DB and PKP have Gage changing
| system for loaded cargo trains which work similar to
| regular ones but require a much longer and slower process
| in order to deal with the extra weight.
|
| [1]
| https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umspurung_(Eisenbahnfahrzeug)
| ajuc wrote:
| Poland has its own system like that
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SUW_2000
|
| But different standards aren't the main problem. The main
| problem is lack of trains to move that much grain.
| notatoad wrote:
| article: with Ukraine using 1,520 mm gauge, all cargo has to be
| transferred to different trains at the Ukraine-EU border
|
| HN: why don't they just build a system to transfer the cargo to
| a different train? That would solve it
| ajuc wrote:
| There are many solutions, including a much simpler ones like
| cars that can move on both standard and wide gauges
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SUW_2000
|
| Or automatic unloading of this kind:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzG-pizgqUQ
|
| Imagine this but with grain instead of sand and over a Vistula
| river where ships going to Gdansk are waiting.
|
| But the main problem is too few trains. Sea transport is so
| efficient compared to rail, that combined Polish and Ukrainian
| cargo trains are far too few in number to move all that grain
| in time. You'd have to buy order of magnitude more trains.
| Tabular-Iceberg wrote:
| What's the benefit of moving during the operation? It seems
| like it would add a lot of cost and complexity for no clear
| benefit.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| There isn't any benefit, it only eats up capacity of two
| tracks that could be used by other, faster trains.
|
| If you need to move cargo from one train to another, just do
| it somewhere away from the main tracks.
| andbberger wrote:
| an automated system already exists
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZiH4kt14yGw
| wongarsu wrote:
| Something like a container crane? I'd argue even that is too
| complicated.
|
| Bulk cargo like grain is often unloaded like this [1]: doors on
| the bottom of the wagon that allow dumping the cargo next to
| the rail, or in some configurations below it. Loading happens
| by dumping stuff in from the top.
|
| Now it doesn't take much to make a structure to have one train
| drive below and lightly to the side of another, enabling one
| train to dump their cargo into the other.
|
| The problem with all those solutions is that they have to be
| built, and before the war Ukraine had little reason to invest.
| Shipping bulk goods by ship was cheaper, thus train
| infrastructure for them was neglected. It's the same story as
| Europe underinvesting in port infrastructure for unloading oil
| and lpg because in peace time pipelines were cheaper.
|
| 1: https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/b/unloading-crushed-stone-
| rail...
| AlbertCory wrote:
| If you are not a train buff, this comment is not for you. (I
| wouldn't claim I'm one myself, but let's say I'm a
| "sympathizer.")
|
| I just heard about this rather _large_ model railroad [1], up
| near Skyline on private land (this is in the Bay Area). When I
| say "rather large" I mean "you can ride on it." It's members-
| only. I'm not a member. (If you were only 60 years old, you'd be
| the youngest.)
|
| They have giant workshops where you build things to maintain the
| railroad.
|
| [1] https://www.pvarr.org/
| Stevvo wrote:
| You would love the UK. Many cities have steam railroads of
| similar gauge in public parks. They are also run by clubs of
| old men, but offer rides to kids all day on the weekend instead
| of hiding out in the hills!
| AlbertCory wrote:
| I hasten to add I'm not a train spotter (that's what you call
| them over there, right?) I don't have a model train of _any_
| gauge.
| kzrdude wrote:
| There is a lot more wheat to ship than could ever fit on rail
| cars.
|
| https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61583492
|
| "Ukrainian farmers have 20 million tonnes of grain they cannot
| get to international markets"
|
| Let's say you could ship 10 ton (10,000 kg) per train car; that's
| still 2 million rail cars. The longest possible freight train
| would be 100 cars or so - so now we're down to 20,000 grain train
| runs needed for the export.
|
| It's not possible, not enough rail capacity, not enough rail cars
| and engines or days in a year to do it.
| maxerickson wrote:
| Apparently hopper cars can hold ~100 tons.
|
| Still some tough arithmetic.
| kzrdude wrote:
| Now I learned thought that "In 2020, U.S. Class I railroads
| moved nearly 1.5 million carloads of grain."
|
| Apparently it's almost possible in that sense.
| coredog64 wrote:
| It's almost as if the US actually does have a good rail
| system, except it's been optimized for freight. /sarc.
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Let's say you could ship 10 ton (10,000 kg) per train car;
|
| What if we _don 't_ underestimate by a full order of magnitude?
| [0]
|
| > The longest possible freight train would be 100 cars or so
|
| Why? Freight trains over 100 cars are fairly routine.
|
| [0] https://www.freightwaves.com/news/commentary-moving-grain-
| is... : "Rail's economic advantage comes in large part from
| each railroad car's capacity of up to 100 tons"
| avianlyric wrote:
| Reading around it seems the bulk goods wagons in the EU can
| move about 56tons each max, are about 13m long[1], and
| freight trains have a max length of 750m[2] but normally need
| to be shorter.
|
| In total that means the maximum an EU freight train could
| theoretically move is only 3,100 tons[3]. So to move 20mil
| tons of wheat in 3 months (I don't know the shelf life of
| wheat) would require about 70 full trains a day. Which I
| suspect might be beyond what's possible.
|
| [1] https://railrent.com/en/wagon-overview/bulk-freight-
| wagon/
|
| [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Europe
|
| [3] 750/13 = 57.6 wagons per train. Subtract one for an
| engine (but I suspect you need more than one engine) give you
| 56 wagons. 56 wagons at 56 tons each gives you a total of
| 3,135tons are cargo.
| kzrdude wrote:
| I don't know.
|
| There's apparently some rail export already running, but the
| scale is really much smaller.
|
| https://www.railfreight.com/railfreight/2022/05/09/first-
| exp...
|
| "Each train consists of 25 bulk goods wagons, and each
| transports 1,400 tons of grain. "
| [deleted]
| bobthepanda wrote:
| The European network is not generally set up to handle these
| long freight trains, because passenger trains are prioritized
| and the long freights screw that up (see: Amtrak)
| cenriqueortiz wrote:
| One clear benefit of ensuring disparity of rail systems across
| adjacent countries is protection from an impromptu invasion. IIRC
| for some countries during the WWs, that was a main reason for the
| differences and was in fact effective. I wonder if the rail
| systems difference helped avoid Russia using the rail system for
| the invasion of Ukraine.
| ajuc wrote:
| Poland actually has some wide-gauge railways connecting Ukraine
| to Silesia region in Poland (originally for moving coal, steel
| and sulphur between Ukraine and industrial part of Poland, now
| used for various things including moving refuges out of Ukraine).
| See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linia_Hutnicza_Szerokotorowa
|
| So it's not true that all the reloading has to happen on EU
| border.
|
| We also have trains that can move from standard to wide gauge and
| back with minimal delays. For example
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SUW_2000 but there are also more
| modern versions.
|
| The main problem is simply too small capacity of railway
| transport compared to sea transport. We'd have to increase the
| number of cargo trains Poland and Ukraine owns by orders of
| magnitude to move all that grain in a reasonable time.
| bell-cot wrote:
| Zzz. At scale, railroads (at least in the US) mostly move grain
| in covered hopper cars - https://www.up.com/customers/track-
| record/tr071321-what-is-a...
|
| If you've got enough single-gauge RR infrastructure and
| equipment, but a problem with a gauge change along the route,
| then building a one-way grain transfer facility is d*mn easy.
| Full hopper cars, gauge "U", get pushed onto an elevated railroad
| track. Empty hopper cars, gauge "P", sit ready on another track,
| below the full cars. In between are a bunch of crude welded-
| sheet-metal chutes. You open the loading hatches on the lower
| rail cars, then open the dump gates on the upper rail cars, and
| gravity moves the grain.
|
| (Yes, this requires _some_ equipment and intelligence to do, and
| _some_ time to build. It 's late-1800's technology.)
| [deleted]
| california2077 wrote:
| This would be a perfect place to try Hyperloop-like solution at
| scale.
| warning26 wrote:
| Regauging the railways too expensive? Not a problem, we'll just
| build a series of _vacuum sealed maglev railways_ instead. Much
| cheaper.
|
| Wait a minute...
| photochemsyn wrote:
| It's a bit surprising to see an article on modern-day rail that
| doesn't at least mention China's remarkable advances in rail. You
| can love or hate their state-sponsored, approach, but it seems
| undeniable that Chinese rail is the most advanced in the world at
| present.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_China
| mlindner wrote:
| Because the conversation is about rail transport between Europe
| and post-soviet Europe. It would in fact be surprising to see
| China being mentioned at all, given it's complete irrelevance
| to the conversation at hand.
|
| And no I'd pretty easily say that Chinese rail is not the most
| advanced in the world. That award would go to Japan. (China
| buys (or steals) their technology from Japan and also Europe.)
| Animats wrote:
| China's Belt and Road initiative is forcing more railways in Asia
| to support "standard gauge" (1435 mm) width, which China and
| Europe, while the Soviet-era countries use 1520mm. The goal is to
| be able to run freight from China to Europe.[1] Some track is
| dual-gauge. There's enough difference between 1435mm and 1520mm
| to use a 3-rail system. Plain track isn't too hard, but switches
| are complicated.
|
| [1] https://asiatimes.com/2021/11/chinas-belt-and-road-
| chugging-...
| divbzero wrote:
| This map [2] shows a proposed railway running through
| Kyrgyzstan to Uzbekistan. Presumably it would continue through
| Turkmenistan and Iran to Turkey?
|
| [2]: https://www.silkroadbriefing.com/news/2020/12/10/awaiting-
| on...
| Gare wrote:
| > There's enough difference between 1435mm and 1520mm to use a
| 3-rail system.
|
| Can you provide an example? I've only seen 4-rail dual-gauge
| systems for those gauges.
| floehopper wrote:
| Jon Worth's [1] CrossBorderRail project [2] aims to highlight
| missing cross-border rail links in Europe. He's recently embarked
| on a huge rail and bike journey that crosses every internal
| border inside the European Union (and EFTA countries) that you
| can cross by train. En route he's stopping off to organise a
| meeting in the political capital of each country to discuss the
| missing rail links with local activists.
|
| [1]: https://twitter.com/jonworth [2]:
| https://crossborderrail.trainsforeurope.eu/
| kkfx wrote:
| The real *ways (not just rails, also roads) issue is one:
| evolution.
|
| We start a project a day, with a certain set of needs and
| desires. The project takes time to be complete, let's say
| 10-15-20 years, at the end some parts of the network are still
| useful and valuable many others are not. Change them is hard,
| demand again more time, once done (IF done) we end up in the
| similar departure scenario.
|
| Society does not change that fast in general, but still do. In
| the past we have followed nature and people have started to
| follow transport networks, now with climate change, transport
| tech changes etc we experience issues.
|
| The sole solution is IMO:
|
| - do their best to create free networks, like privileging air and
| water transports who demand infra but only at their endpoints
| letting paths evolve much faster and simpler;
|
| - do their best to avoid LARGE infra, preferring capillar ones
| were surely there would be useless parts but being a small local
| size and much connected network any segment cost far less so both
| profitable ones and unprofitable ones can be operated.
|
| In the past we have seen something like this, for rails for
| instance: http://carfree.fr/img/2015/06/sncf.jpg overall the old
| network worked LESS well and cost A BIT more, but the old one
| allow many paths from A to B so allow flexibility, the new one is
| far more efficient AS LONG AS transportation needs do not change.
|
| We have seen the very same issue in modern just-in-time
| manufacturing and we see that solutions found so far are the
| same: less efficiency traded for more flexibility.
| dieortin wrote:
| Why would we privilege air and water transports when they're
| the hardest ones to electrify by far? We're in a climate
| emergency, and should be doing the opposite.
| Linda703 wrote:
| gambler wrote:
| Hm, after reading the title I monetarily thought the article
| would talk about the implosion of Union Pacific and complications
| of switching to a different provider. FYI:
|
| https://www.manufacturing.net/labor/news/13118134/union-paci...
|
| https://www.wsj.com/articles/union-pacific-to-cut-nearly-3-0...
|
| https://www.thepacker.com/news/transportation/union-pacific-...
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/sd9kqw/union_paci...
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/CatastrophicFailure/comments/s6c04a...
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jan/14/los-angeles-...
|
| https://www.cfindustries.com/newsroom/2022/union-pacific-shi...
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDxp8lUXDz0
|
| Meanwhile at the top:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qF_5jng3RYM
|
| TLDR version. UP switched to some fancy "efficient" system
| several years ago, laid off thousands of employees. At the time
| many people predicted collapse of the company in a couple of
| years. Three years later it is plagued by rampant theft and trash
| on the tracks. This year it refused to ship fertilizer during
| planting season. It also refused to ship additives to diesel fuel
| earlier this year (amidst general truck shipping issues and
| skyrocketing fuel costs). Meanwhile the CEO is smiling like a
| Cheshire Cat and giving out Bloomberg interviews about efficient
| management.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| So my grandpa was an engineer and I love railways...
|
| "different signaling systems, different voltages for electrical
| trains" isn't that much of a problem nowadays. There are almost
| always enough multi-system engines available that can cross
| borders and cope with those changes. We have a jumble of voltages
| in Czechia and yet another voltage on our German/Austrian
| borders, and trains go through without a hitch, not even slowing
| down, full speed.
|
| A break of gauge is a different beast: a real tough problem. Even
| the railcars are wider on wide-gauge railways, which means that
| they cannot pass through some European tunnels etc.
|
| Frankly, the only solution is to re-gauge the entire Ukraine to
| 1435 mm and introduce a new fleet of railway vehicles there. As
| an added bonus, that would complicate further Russian invasions
| in the future, as the Russian army still heavily relies on rail
| for its logistics.
|
| This will be expensive, but the EU could pay for that, plus a lot
| of that work could be done by European contractors.
| kposehn wrote:
| 1. Agreed for the most part, though I think a startup could
| overcome the break-of-gauge limitations pretty fast with
| moderate investment (and less red tape).
|
| 2. There are multiple different ways of handling BofG; the
| holdup is just deploying it effectively.
|
| 3. For loading gauge, using EU grain hauling stock with
| variable gauge (or swapped) bogies would be ideal - this avoids
| issues with larger cars and heavier axle loads.
|
| (Edit)
|
| 4. The unit nature of grain trains makes the problem easier to
| solve since outside of gauge changes you deal with large cuts
| of cars. No need to swap couplers on every car as you only hook
| on the ends (Europe uses hook & buffer, while the former USSR
| uses SA3)
|
| 5. Brazil has the largest network of dual gauge track in the
| world and has optimized it quite well; 1600mm gauge engines
| frequently handle 1000mm with the help of idler cars that allow
| them to couple up. Some lessons to be learned here.
| labster wrote:
| Just make a startup to fix it is classic HN. _Six
| generations_ of hackers have been working on the problem of
| track gauge, but it's obviously going to be solved with a few
| million in VC funding.
|
| On the last point, some gauges are too close to run dual
| gauge tracks well. It's great when you can just add a third
| rail, but European and Soviet standards are too close and
| need four rails to run on the same track.
| kergonath wrote:
| > I think a startup could overcome the break-of-gauge
| limitations pretty fast with moderate investment (and less
| red tape)
|
| I am not sure what the angle is, here. Variable-gauge trains
| are things we can build, and as a matter of fact there are a
| bunch of them crossing the French-Spanish border every day.
| It's not some magical disruptive technology that boring old
| engineering firms could not crack.
|
| It would not solve the issues already mentioned, which is
| that infrastructure is built for a set gauge, and wide-gauge
| carriages cannot physically fit in some places in a narrow-
| gauge network.
|
| And the red tape is not at this level anyway, it has to do
| with certification, with which the startup-ness of the
| designer won't help.
|
| Not everything is best solved by just setting up a startup.
| larusso wrote:
| > It would not solve the issues already mentioned, which is
| that infrastructure is built for a set gauge, and wide-
| gauge carriages cannot physically fit in some places in a
| narrow-gauge network.
|
| My solution to this problem: Build it the other way. Use
| dual carriages from the EU side and add the gauge
| changeover at the border. I really don't see the reason why
| the wide-gauge trains have to travel over the border. Yes
| they can carry more load but that is simply something we
| have to live with. But they will try to unblock the ports
| before they even attempt to solve this issue.
| kposehn wrote:
| Exactly. Allowing European unit trains to run into
| Ukraine for grain would be a significant improvement at
| vastly lower cost.
| midasuni wrote:
| Track Gauge can be solved, various methods with various
| pros and cons, from adjusting bogies to just relaying the
| tracks (like GWR did in ye olden days)
|
| Loading gauge though is another matter - you can't fit a
| square peg in a round hole.
| kposehn wrote:
| The angle is that systems to overcome this limitation have
| lacked for (a) economic reasons and (b) political will.
| Both clearly now are less of an issue due to the shortage
| of grain on the global market due to the war.
| avianlyric wrote:
| But what do either of those factors have to do with
| startups?
|
| If economics and politics are the primary blockers, what
| exactly are startups bringing to the table?
| kposehn wrote:
| Someone has to start it. Incumbents so far have not.
| ThePowerOfFuet wrote:
| > Variable-gauge trains are things we can build, and as a
| matter of fact there are a bunch of them crossing the
| French-Spanish border every day.
|
| The high speed lines are all standard gauge in both
| countries.
|
| At the crossing between Puigcerda and La Tour de Carol the
| Catalan regional train goes one stop into France on an
| Iberian gauge line which ends there (English Wikipedia
| needs to be updated to reflect this). At the crossing
| between Cerbere and Portbou it's the opposite, with a
| French train going one stop into Catalonia on a standard
| gauge line which ends there.
| kposehn wrote:
| Renfe also operates some variable gauge trains on the
| high speed network that radiate out into the Iberian
| gauge lines to serve smaller cities. That said I don't
| believe any cross the border to France.
| Tabular-Iceberg wrote:
| My suggestion is that we build a dedicated freight network of
| Soviet gauge and SA3 couplers and leave the existing network for
| passengers.
|
| We're only going to need more capacity for climate-friendly
| transportation of both passengers and freight, and stronger
| tracks and couplers for heavier trains is going to help with
| efficiency of the latter.
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