Actually, they don't. There is a Speed Chart issued to crews ( I have a copy but for certain reasons better if I don't post it) that indicates the top speed to be applied, assuming acceleration at Run 8 from the last station and clear track without turnouts or TSO's. Once they hit the target speed, they are supposed to hold it and not accelerate further, in the interest of fuel conservation. For LSW the highest top speed is only 65 mph wb (Clarkson to Oakville) and 67 mph eb (Clarkson to Port Credit) . For LSE it's max 64 mph wb Whitby to Ajax and 70 mph eb Guildwood to Rouge Hill and Ajax to Whitby. Some are quite low (Guildwood to Eglinton wb 44 mph). Obviously individual crews may go faster on a given day if circumstances require, but in theory the current schedule can be maintained with these low speeds.
- Paul
They quietly dropped those a while ago, unless they brought them back again recently, though I haven’t heard anything about it.
Personally, I never once followed those cockamamie speed procedures. For one, I wasn’t about to let some desk jockey over at MX, who’s likely never even been on an engine, tell me how to operate a train - something I’ve spent tens of thousands of hours doing, and a good portion of the workforce felt the same way.
But more importantly, I
strongly believed the procedure was wholly unsafe. Expecting us to memorize an entire second set of speed restrictions, this time between nearly all 71 stations stops times two - the speeds were different in opposing directions, was just asking for trouble. This, on top of already having to memorize zone speeds, PSO speeds, temporary slow orders, equipment speed limitations(and also knowing mileages, signal locations, and other restrictions) leads to cognitive overload. And I say that as someone who once memorized the names and mileages of every single level crossing in the entire network. I used to think knowing that kind of information would be helpful, but it’s not, it’s entirely superfluous. Eventually, the
deluge of information becomes overwhelming to keep track of and it is in fact one of the biggest reasons why dangerous incidents happen in the first place.
Some might say, well you don't necessarily have to memorize all 130-odd additional speeds, you can have that speed chart posted somewhere in the work space to reference. One, there barely is any space as is in the control stand area just to place the DOB, the daily changing list of restrictions we have to abide by, and having to reference and continually worry about the fuel conservation chart would still serve as an additional distraction from the things that matter the most; like track speeds, signals, foremen, and radio communications. So I absolutely refused to follow that procedure on the grounds of safety(since it wasn’t a safety-related procedure, a CROR rule, or a CN or CP GOI instruction, it was not enforceable as such).
Beside that, the entire concept of the procedure didn’t make much sense to me begin with for two reasons.
First, the procedure itself was flawed. Think about it, wouldn’t the most fuel-efficient method be to
gradually increase your speed rather than mashing the accelerator(throttle) and racing up to the required speed? Does it make any sense to floor the accelerator in your car just to hit highway speed if your goal is fuel efficiency? I always throttled up gradually, sometimes all the way to throttle 8, but for most stops I’d only go up to throttle 5 or 6 and just hold it there until it was time to brake for the next station.
Secondly, isn’t the whole idea of running an efficient commuter service to get people to their destination as reliably
and quickly as possible? There should never be such a thing as fuel conservation in a commuter network, its a fundamentally flawed idea that goes against the very concept of the service. The fact that there even was a fuel conservation proceedure just goes to show how much fluff the schedules contain. Sure, in some cases current or upcoming construction work might justify a bit of schedule padding in between stations, but time padding exists between nearly all stations, including ones with no active or planned work that would slow things down. What is the point of that?? I'll tell you what - they exist to boost MX’s on-time performance metrics. The 15-minute service guarantee also doesn’t help the cause there. On the surface it creates the impression of a accountability, but in reality it just slowed everything down because they extended the schedule times so much that there's little worry of them having to pay commuters out for delays, not to mention the plethora of exceptions to payouts, limiting payouts to "MX caused delays" All in all, to those on the ground level it certainly gives the impression that the upper managers care more about meeting metrics than about actual efficiency. But that's par for the course for MX, nothing but bureaucracy at it's finest.
