Quote:
Originally Posted by electricron
I don't. Why do people from New Zealand quote people from Japan about a transit system in San Francisco Bay area that they have never seen or ridden? From what I can reason, the guy from Japan recommends skipping stations because they had less than 10,000 daily riders, to provide express services. That's being exclusively a bean counter, there's no consideration at all about the politics why those stations were included into the system at all. It's entirely possible everyone getting on at those smaller ridership stations are heading for San Francisco, and everyone getting on at the higher ridership stations aren't, although I'll admit that probability is very small. But I strongly suggest some sort of ridership study should be finished discovering what the ridership history and patterns are for every station before committing to bypassing it for express services - something better than some bean point based on daily ridership boardings and a lightings.
In other words, how about studying the commuting patterns of the Bay Area before making recommendations on how to improve the service? Something that can't be found from afar after solely reading daily ridership data. The grand idea, providing express services, might be a grand idea, but try to provide some data supporting it first. Local administrators and politicians would certainly look at such recommendations more seriously if the proposals were more seriously based on facts.
Additionally, every change the administrators might suggest have to go through a public process, and I guarantee every rider and politician associated with any bypass station would certainly voice their disapproval; on the streets, in the media, and in their ballot boxes. Blood might flow in the streets over such radical changes - you better have the facts well documented to justify these proposed changes.
Skipping three stations is only going to save 90 seconds (30 seconds per station) over a train ride an hour long. Even 5 minutes savings, 10 stations skipped, isn't worth the political upheaval to establish express services.
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The time saved is actually higher, because if one were to employ platform edge gates and/or walls, trains do not have to slow down to go through the station to be bypassed.
I suspect that from normal speed to stop to back to normal speeds takes between 90 and 100 seconds per station (20 second doors open). 3 stations at 100 seconds (upper end) is 5 minutes. 10 stations (upper end) is 16 minutes.
Put in 3 passing station out of those 10 run through stations, prevents bunching. At a 10 minute headway, a given train would pass 2 trains going in the same direction. At a 5 minute headway, a given train would pass 3.
Per scheduled time, a Richmond to Fremont express would shave the trip from 1:00 hours to 0:46 hours.
This even gets better: let's say the train skipped the Fruitvale, and Lake Merritt stations. Per the same schedule, the interval between Colliseum and 12 St Oakland City Center is 8 minutes. From Coliseum/Oakland > Fruitvale takes 3 minutes; from Fruitvale > Lake Merrit takes 4 minutes; from Lake Merrit to 12th St, Oakland City Center, takes three minutes. Using the 100 seconds figure, that's 200 seconds or almost 3.5 minutes shaved off via express running. But that's not quite accurate, as the maximum speeds between these stations are lower, possibly 5 or so mph slower than would be for an express. This might save another 15 to 20 seconds.
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http://www.bart.gov/schedules/bylineresults?route=3&date=03/04/2014)
Short station to station times abound on this route, where out of 18 stations on the route 7 stations are separated by 4 minutes, 3 by 3 minutes, 4 by 2 minutes and 2 by 5 minutes, and 1 by six minutes. Let's assume that instead of 100 seconds per stop including acceleration and deceleration, that as the stops are closer together that we consider 70 seconds for 2 minute intervals, 90 for 3 minutes, and, 100 for 4 or more minutes. Here the maximum speed increases as the stations are skipped so we gain at least 20 seconds between each station in addition to the stop and go times. Per rough calculation you save about 17.5 to 20 minutes per run, making the Richmond to Freemont run in 43.5 to 40 minutes instead of 1 hour.
To put this in perspective, the time required to travel end to end would be equal to what it now takes to travel from Freemont to a bit past the 19th Street Station.
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It's the principle. And, this would truly stimulate East Bayside traffic. Of course, this also could be done on the SF side. From the Embarcadero to Daly City takes 25 minutes. No stop is separated by more than 4 minutes, with most between 2 and 3 minutes. Here again the 90 or 100 second per stop rule applies and the maximum speed increase rule too. I would think that 8 or more minutes, perhaps as many as 10 could be shaved off here.
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Oh yes, you can increase train schedule density by both better equipment utilization and frequency tweaking. There is a semi-express system where every train skips every other station, where during rush hour for example, every station gets an express train every 30 minutes on a straight 15 minute scheduling. There is a whole gamut of different schedule types.
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who "serve" them.
. When coupling, at least two and preferably 3 people are needed- if A is coupling B, then A would have to have an engineer, 1 witness would be need to watch the process and possibly an engineer in train B. Detaching, I would think would not need an outside witness, just the two engineers.
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