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Urban Sky said:
No, you are paying for the largest investment program any metropolitan passenger rail network North America has ever seen and that is also what you are getting. No reason to whine around just because the most ambitious project to ever receive the green light was not ambitious enough…
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So we paid for the tesla roadster then.... perpetually delayed until we're all dead...
We were promised RER by 2025, but once we had a change of govt their agenda has continually delayed and watered it down from the original intent. If they were serious about it they wouldn't have let go DB. Not to mention, zero communication or transparency on the reason for this severance nor what they intend to do
 
cplchanb said:
So we paid for the tesla roadster then.... perpetually delayed until we're all dead...
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I really don’t understand what your problem is: you are paying more than anyone else has ever paid for a metropolitan rail network transformation in North America and you are getting more upgrades than anyone else in NA has ever received. It costs what it costs and prices naturally explode if a country like Canada suddenly makes more metropolitan rail infrastructure investments in a single decade than it did in the preceeding century. Just ask my colleague in Germany who works for the infrastructure owner of a short commuter line (the one which tested the Hydrogen trains with very underwhelming success) and tells me that the unit costs for rail electrification have effectively tripled in the last 5 years…

Edit to add: here the translation of the header and summary of an article by the German institute for Economic Research:

Are more government funding for the railway primarily a price driver?

Parts of the special infrastructure fund could be allocated to Deutsche Bahn. Is this the tidal change? Or could price increases occur? How? The articles refer to the volumes and prices of the documents over the past few years. The result is devastating: Construction volumes have not increased, but rather prices have exploded. This raises the question of whether and how government stimulus programs are driving up prices in specialized sectors such as railway construction.

 
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Urban Sky said:
I really don’t understand what your problem is: you are paying more than anyone else has ever paid for a metropolitan rail network transformation in North America and you are getting more upgrades than anyone else in NA has ever received. It costs what it costs and prices naturally explode if a country like Canada suddenly makes more metropolitan rail infrastructure investments in a single decade than it did in the preceeding century. Just ask my colleague in Germany who works for the infrastructure owner of a short commuter line (the one which tested the Hydrogen trains with very underwhelming success) and tells me that the unit costs for rail electrification have effectively tripled in the last 5 years…

Edit to add: here the translation of the header and summary of an article by the German institute for Economic Research:

Are more government funding for the railway primarily a price driver?

Parts of the special infrastructure fund could be transferred to Deutsche Bahn. Is there a trend you can follow? Or could price increases occur? How? The articles refer to the volumes and prices of the documents over the past few years. The result is devastating: Construction volumes have not increased, but rather prices have exploded. This raises the question of whether and how government stimulus programs are driving up prices in specialized sectors such as
railway construction.

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stop speaking like a metrolinx, apologist. We've invested billions into it yet So far we are nowhere near finishing even a single line in entirety. What have they shown that is remotely close to finishing for the last 10 years? Seems like they're always promising We are upgrading, we are upgrading. But when it comes to actual substance, it gets continuously pushed back. It shouldn't take more than 10 years to make double tracking for a single line. Case in point, look at the stouville line where you see bits and pieces of double tracking sitting, unfinished and unused for years.

The cost increases are all self-inflicted. they stretch things out so far that inflation and cost creep inevitably drove the price up. Yeah, things are game going and things are moving. But at the pace they're going right now, we are not going to see this project finish within twenty years and costs will skyrocket at least three times over.
 
cplchanb said:
stop speaking like a metrolinx, apologist. We've invested billions into it yet So far we are nowhere near finishing even a single line in entirety. What have they shown that is remotely close to finishing for the last 10 years? Seems like they're always promising We are upgrading, we are upgrading. But when it comes to actual substance, it gets continuously pushed back. It shouldn't take more than 10 years to make double tracking for a single line. Case in point, look at the stouville line where you see bits and pieces of double tracking sitting, unfinished and unused for years.

The cost increases are all self-inflicted. they stretch things out so far that inflation and cost creep inevitably drove the price up. Yeah, things are game going and things are moving. But at the pace they're going right now, we are not going to see this project finish within twenty years and costs will skyrocket at least three times over.
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I‘m really not sure what you are trying so compulsively to prove at this point beyond your irrational hatred against Metrolinx and your embarrassing ignorance of the fundamental trends and challenges the global construction industry and especially the rail construction industry is facing worldwide. I would strongly suggest that you either read up or shut up…
 
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A cautionary tale for those who feel battery trains are ready for prime time. Still a ways to go.

- Paul

1755717002123.png
 
Great Western Rail released a white paper "Fast-charge battery technology: A viable option for regional rail?" discussing their experience running this class 230 unit and research by Arthur Little. They suggest that partial overhead electrification of tracks with fast-charging of large amp-hr train batteries (at stations) would be a cost effective alternative to full electrification, for the 158 miles (255 km) UK western mainline from Bristol to Penzance. For reference, the rail-distance between Bramalea and Kitchener is ~75km.
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I wonder how the weight of the former D Stock trainset compares to anything comparable you could put in North American mixed traffic (esp without PTC)
 
dowlingm said:
I wonder how the weight of the former D Stock trainset compares to anything comparable you could put in North American mixed traffic (esp without PTC)
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According to Wikipedia a 3-car D train is about 27.5 tons. Not sure if the battery adds weight to that.

Weight is one consideration, HVAC load may be another.

Certainly battery power is coming, but on the mainline it would mostly suit low-utilization peak trains that layover for much of the day and overnight. Not gonna see an Oshawa-West Harbour 2WAD train running on battery.....yet. But maybe not too far off.

- Paul
 
urbancog said:
Great Western Rail released a white paper "Fast-charge battery technology: A viable option for regional rail?" discussing their experience running this class 230 unit and research by Arthur Little. They suggest that partial overhead electrification of tracks with fast-charging of large amp-hr train batteries (at stations) would be a cost effective alternative to full electrification, for the 158 miles (255 km) UK western mainline from Bristol to Penzance. For reference, the rail-distance between Bramalea and Kitchener is ~75km.
View attachment 675603
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Great read, some other highlights and a few of my thoughts below:
IMG_4210.jpeg

It looks incredibly cheaper in the upfront infra costs, although this study was done by retrofitting trains with electric motors already fitted. GO trains would need to fit batteries and electric motors, or entirely new cars.

IMG_4209.jpeg

IMG_4211.jpeg

(Note: this was tested on a 2-car train, hence 84x3x2=~500)

Obviously a lot of factors at play for power consumption but for fun if we assumed similar conditions (7km/minute charge), you could yield something like the following:

Bramalea -> Brampton: ~6km (charge 1min)
-> Mt Pleasant: ~5km (charge 1min)
-> Georgetown: ~8km (charge 1min)
-> Acton: ~10km (charge 1min)
-> Guelph: ~21km (charge 1min)
-> Breslau: ~15km (charge 1min)
-> Kitchener : ~8km (charge 4.5min)

10.5 mins charging to recover ~73km of travel.

As described in the white paper, there’s also opportunities for integrating “short stretches of overhead lines for on-the-move charging.”
 
Urban Sky said:
I‘m really not sure what you are trying so compulsively to prove at this point beyond your irrational hatred against Metrolinx and your embarrassing ignorance of the fundamental trends and challenges the global construction industry and especially the rail construction industry is facing worldwide. I would strongly suggest that you either read up or shut up…
Click to expand...

Honestly, the problem is not delivering iterative results that are perceptible to the average person, and a stunning failure of communication and setting expectations. Instead of selling a grand vision, they need to focus on 1 or 2 things, and drive them to completion, then focus on the next. There's too much planning, consulting, re-planning, more consulting which just changes scope, and drives schedules and budgets way off the charts. It doesn't matter how perfect the final vision is if it gets delivered after we're all dead and can't ride it, or someone gets elected that cancels it after it's deemed a waste.
 
Did AMT/Exo’s EMUs get scrapped? These might have been a candidate for such a retrofit depending on remaining fatigue life. Otherwise you’re probably looking at something new like Dublin’s Alstom BEMUs currently in pre-service testing (video below)

The thing is that underfloor gear is easier to stow in high floor vehicles, and that’s something Montreal, Britain and Ireland have that the GTA/GGH doesn’t have (UPX excluded)

 
If I were some ambitious ML PR exec wanting to look like they are leading the charge, I would just build a couple 'B' units that can be coupled behind the diesel engine in a L-B-6/10/12 configuration. Install a couple overhead chargers at layover yards. Let the battery units run to discharge with the diesel kicking in when there is no battery power left. Lots of opportunity to recharge during layover (or heck, trickle charge off the HEP). Paint it bright green so everybody notices it.

The point being, there is really very value gained at this stage from a "demonstration" of this sort. Great for PR to woo the uninformed public, but really it's a waiting game until the vendors have a scaled and debugged product that can be implemented as a fleet solution. That technology is coming, but breaking trail is time and effort wasted and not delivering value. Let someone else cope with the bugs in the 1.0 product and wait to buy when 2.0 is ready.

- Paul
 
PS - The irony is, once the politicians come to believe that mainline battery is viable, they will never provide the money to do any mainline electrification. We may all be better off if we can prolong the urban legend that battery is only viable on low capacity branches - just long enough to get wires in place on the major routes. Otherwise, it might never happen in the GTA.

- Paul
 
crs1026 said:
If I were some ambitious ML PR exec wanting to look like they are leading the charge, I would just build a couple 'B' units that can be coupled behind the diesel engine in a L-B-6/10/12 configuration. Install a couple overhead chargers at layover yards. Let the battery units run to discharge with the diesel kicking in when there is no battery power left. Lots of opportunity to recharge during layover (or heck, trickle charge off the HEP). Paint it bright green so everybody notices it.
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One might say it’s the sort of use the F59s acquired from California could be put to. But could it be done without triggering TTCI testing, NRC testing and some other sort of holdup?
 
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