We hear and read a lot about vitality.  Everyone involved with the design, installation, validation, and operation of PTC systems, and that is just about everyone, knows some things are vital things, and some things are non-vital things.  Some processes are vital and other processes are non-vital.  Some logic is vital, and other logic is non-vital.

But what makes some logic vital and other non-vital in railroad operations?

Vital logic is the process by which overlapping authorities for train movements are prevented.  More than prevented, such overlapping authorities, allowing more than one train to be in the same place at the same time, are eliminated and excluded from the operating environment.                                            

Back in the day before "back in the day" was a phrase used by those too young to actually recall back in the day, the vital logic of the railroad was embedded in that quaint, prosaic pamphlet called the book of operating rules.  

Vital logic is still embedded in those books, those rules.  Those too young to recall back in the day may think that vital logic is the god called algorithm that we've placed into machines to make everything fail-safe. But it is not.  The algorithm represents the vital logic, is derived from the vital logic that was used to write the rules; from the vital logic that would deliver us all from the evil of the dreaded "lap order."

It's a simple logic with a simple format.  If railroading were only for geniuses, I wouldn't be this good at it.  And I am very, very good.

Most complicated things start with a simple logic.  The complications arise when we have to reconcile all the competing demands and needs of the operation with the vital logic.

The format of the logic is the basic logic of conditions: "If....., then...." This logic governs everything from 26c air brake valves to cab signal systems.

If X.....[train 1, HRC 2, MOW Foreman Smith] has authority, then Y [all trains not 1, HRCs not 2, all MOW Foremen not Smith] cannot have authority that overlaps with the already established authority.

Simple.  If....then.  

The rules in our operating rule books are structured with this logic of conditions, from the general rules of conduct-- [If] governed by these rules, [then] employees must have a current copy they can refer to while on duty-- which establish the railroad's authority over the conduct of its employees, to those rules governing exceptions to the normal operation of equipment--[If] a signal is improperly displayed or absent from the place from which it is normally shown, [then] the signal must be regarded as displaying its most restrictive indication-- to those rules governing the issuance of written authority for the movement of trains--[If] issuing a Form...., [then] the form must be legible without erasure of alteration.

While the book of operating rules reads as a system of requirements-- what must be done, what is necessary-- in essence the rules are a system of negations, determining through exclusion and elimination what can be done, and the "if" becomes to mean before and after.

[If X movement is authorized] Before X movement is authorized, it is required that no other conflicting movement has been authorized.

[If] After X movement is authorized, no other conflicting movement may be authorized.

It all comes down to if....then.   If 1, then 0.  It all becomes the condition of 1s and 0s.  Our prosaic analog vital logic is more than just compatible with its digital representation, it is, in its very essence a counting process.

Being what we are, peculiar creatures, with railroad operating officers more peculiar than most, no sooner do we recognize the core to our vital logic, the counting of 1s and 0s, than we want to go beyond 1s and 0s. If 1, then 0 is a vital logic, but what about those other vital processes of the railroad, providing service, and  making money in so doing?  If 1, why not more than 1, why not n trains?  If n trains, then n+1 trains. 

How can we do this without degrading the logic vital to safe train operations?  We confine the logic.  We segment it.  We assign it to discrete packages of time and space. We sectionalize.  We block.

We sectionalize the railroad into lines east, lines west, regions, divisions, districts, lines, branches, and we divide the tracks into defined sections called blocks.  We define block as a section of track the use of which is controlled by block signals, either automatic or manual, either fixed wayside or cab displayed or both.

Then we install signal systems controlling the entrance, operation, and exit of trains in those sections we call blocks.  

And then? Then we have mastered time and space as best we know how, by measuring them. With the ability to measure, we can meter, we can regulate the flow of trains in compliance with the vital logic.  That regulation of movement is nothing other than the schedule for train operations.

We break the operation and systems into tasks, components, items, procedures in order to provide a schedule for each, so that each and the sum of all can obtain an authority for execution not in conflict with any other authorities.

For scheduling of n or n+1 trains which are to operate safely, regulated by the vital logic of the railroad, all tasks that precede, support, and facilitate those trains must also be scheduled.  So we break down, dis-integrate the various tasks, so that we might reintegrate the results of those tasks in the safe operation of n+1 trains.

This reintegration requires oversight, a super-vision, a vision that moves beyond the individual tasks with their individual authorities; a vision that moves beyond the n+1 trains to grasp the real product of the railroad, service delivery.

The apparent contradiction between the requirements of the vital logic of the railroad, and increased, improved service is just that.. only apparent.  With the understanding of the vital logic, comes the ability to schedule, analyze, regulate-- to optimize the actual operation of the railroad. 

[If] we are railroading, [then] we engage in a calculus, a series of successive, self-aware approximations, each using the result of previous approximations to enhance the operating capacity of the railroad under the protection afforded by the vital logic.  In this calculus, technology does not substitute for supervision, but provides the platform, the elevation necessary for the super-vision. In this calculus, there is not conflict between safety and efficiency.  An unsafe railroad cannot be an efficient railroad as resources are not being properly scheduled.  An efficient railroad cannot be an unsafe railroad as efficiency requires the optimum use of assets.  In this calculus, the vital logic of the railroad is the business of railroading.

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