Or two...

About RSIA 2008:

A.If I were a freight railroad, looking at the hours of service requirements, which clearly were formulated in response to, shall we say politely--er, certain difficulties after some big mergers of Class 1s-- but let's not bring up the past-- So if I were a Class 1 looking at these HOS requirements, I tell you I would seriously look at adjusting my hauls so that every crew could:

1. swap enroute with another train crew operating in the opposite direction so that everyone is at back at their home terminal in 10 hours.

2. reach an away from home terminal, drop their train, cut their power, couple on to a train ready to go back to their home terminal.

I know I'm a dinosaur, but this sounds a lot to me like the current rage for optimum asset utilization.

If I were a commuter railroad where everybody does get back to their home terminal, I would:

1. do everything possible to consolidate sign up points, starting locations, and  extra lists.

2. work with my resident labor organizations to hammer out some operating agreements before the unpredictability of the RSAC process takes hold.

B.  Looking at the PTC, risk analysis, and technology review and incorporation requirements of RSIA 2008, I would--

1. unload this myth that says PTC is going to improve operating capacity and throughput.  Signal systems did not originate with demand for increased throughput.  They originated and are organized around safe separation of trains; with that safe separation governed by the distance to ZERO velocity.   From that point of initiation, origination on, comes the century long struggle between maintaining safe separation and facilitating throughput, but there is no necessary connection.

Of course you could argue that safe separation and throughput are joined at the hip because, after all, nothing screws up throughput more than a collision; nothing messes with optimal asset utilization like a wrecked locomotive-- but in so arguing then you have to accept, and believe me I do, that capacity constraints are not solely, nor simply, the responsibility or the signal design, nor are they amenable solely through changes in signal design.

2. I might, if I were a freight railroad, begin by separating out the requirements of PTC--  stop signal, speed, work area prohibition enforcements. Then if I were a freight railroad I might calculate the impact of laying those requirements over my present signal design, increasing the distance for stopping by usual 8 seconds of free-run time.  Then I might see how that impacts my throughput.

I might look at using wireless systems, linked to GPS,  to identify, report, monitor actual train speeds, and enforce the temporary speed, civil speed, and work area restrictions of my railroad without out ripping out and relocating all my insulated joints, utilizing the GPS to give an 8 second preview to absorb and account for the free run time. 

I might do that.  I actually might do the same thing if I were a commuter railroad.  It is, after all, the same physics for freight and passenger, the same 4' 8.5" gage.  And the wireless/GPS system could be configured to distinguish between passenger, and its braking distance, and freight and its braking distance; might take some changes to the waysides in order to bring the fixed signal into accordance with the PTC authorization but.... better yet, let's do away with the fixed wayside signals, except at interlockings.

And I might read closely the paper by Ron Lindsey, available on the FRA website, "An Analysis of the Opportunities for Wireless Technologies in Passenger and Freight Rail Operations."

2. I might, if I were a freight railroad, keep my powder dry when it comes to CBTC and moving block technologies.  I don't want to rain on anybody's parade [sure I do], but maritime container traffic has plunged, with Maersk operating its newest, largest ships at  half capacity, routing transport from Asia to Europe via the Cape of Good Hope, adding some 5500 miles to the trip but saving $600,000 in Suez Canal tolls.

Traffic was what? down 12% in February?  And sure it will recover, like a dead cat bounces when you drop it out a window, but the future is not so bright that we all better put on the SPF 30 sunblock and our Ray-bans. 

3. I might, if I were a freight, or a commuter railroad, subject CBTC to some close, close scrutiny if the impulse behind its installation on my/your railroad is throughput and capacity because... because CBTC will do little, if anything to resolve the problem of overtakes, of high speed traffic following lower speed traffic; because the governing principle of all signal design is, will remain, and must be, safe train separation, the distance to zero velocity. 

So... unless all my commuter trains do pretty much the same thing, make the same stops, then my CBTC boost is effectively compromised once the first train makes a stop, and dwells, and dwells, and dwells... you get the picture?  Yes, we see, sang the Shangri-Las. (He's good-bad, but he's not evil).

If I were a commuter railroad,  I would look at the improvement to performance I might get from additional cab signal aspects [provided I had cab signals/speed control.  If I didn't have cab signal/speed control, well let's just say I wouldn't spend a penny on anything else, not locomotives, not control centers, not station platforms, until I did] as compared to the cost/benefit of CBTC.

I mean, go figure, I'm running trains at 2 minute headways at 75 mph.  Train 1 stops at Yankee Stadium in the PM rush on a night in August.

The opponent is that hated, vicious, venal, demented, arrogant team from Boston called-ugh-the Red Sox.  One thousand Yankee fans and 100 Boston fans who have taken the New Haven line to Grand Central get off the train.  One of the Boston fans, drunk of course, are there any other kind?, says something unrepeatable about Derek Jeter's mother, following it up with a reference to A-Rod's conversion to Judaism after his engagement to Madonna.  A dispute erupts, compounded by the fact that the Boston fan is trying to dodge the tariff and hasn't purchased a ticket, which is only collected after the train arrives at the station.

Gee, thank God  that CBTC allows us to follow on right up this train's tuchas.

Just some thoughts.  Copyrighted by the way.  Don't use them without my permission.

Of course you can steal them.  Claim they're yours when reviewing PTC, HOS, CBTC proposals.  But we'll know,  won't we?

David Schanoes
April 13, 2009
Always a pleasure, never a chore