scholarly journals Making Tracks

2016 ◽  
Vol 138 (02) ◽  
pp. 36-41
Author(s):  
Bridget Mintz Testa
Keyword(s):  
Rural Areas ◽  
High Speed ◽  
Passenger Cars ◽  
High Speed Rail ◽  
Bullet Train ◽  
Rail Line ◽  
The Right ◽  
Car Travel ◽  
Made In ◽  
The Way

This review discusses various challenges and solutions to tackle them on the route that the Texas Central is developing between Houston and Dallas. A privately funded high-speed rail line promises to whisk passengers from Houston to Dallas at 200 mph; however, building the project may divide rural areas even as it unites cities. Inter-regional passenger car travel and three- to five-hour air flights are increasingly plagued by delays, hassles, and bureaucratic security theater. Researchers believe high-speed rail can compete in that market, potentially transforming the way business is conducted and national geography is conceived. That is, of course, if the companies building high-speed rail lines can find the right alignments between cities without alienating residents, businesses, and farmers along the way. Texas Central Railway has chosen the Japanese Shinkansen bullet train technology for its trainsets and rail. The current plan is for all the power and passenger cars to be made in Japan.

scholarly journals A Fuzzy Optimization Model for High-Speed Railway Timetable Rescheduling

2012 ◽  
Vol 2012 ◽  
pp. 1-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Li Wang ◽  
Yong Qin ◽  
Jie Xu ◽  
Limin Jia
Keyword(s):  
Optimization Model ◽  
High Speed ◽  
Fuzzy Optimization ◽  
Soft Constraints ◽  
Accurate Approximation ◽  
Total Delay ◽  
High Speed Rail ◽  
High Speed Railway ◽  
Tolerance Approach ◽  
Rail Line

A fuzzy optimization model based on improved symmetric tolerance approach is introduced, which allows for rescheduling high-speed railway timetable under unexpected interferences. The model nests different parameters of the soft constraints with uncertainty margin to describe their importance to the optimization purpose and treats the objective in the same manner. Thus a new optimal instrument is expected to achieve a new timetable subject to little slack of constraints. The section between Nanjing and Shanghai, which is the busiest, of Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail line in China is used as the simulated measurement. The fuzzy optimization model provides an accurate approximation on train running time and headway time, and hence the results suggest that the number of seriously impacted trains and total delay time can be reduced significantly subject to little cost and risk.

Critical Logistics Support Enables Fast Track Construction for High Speed Rail

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
James R. Blaze ◽  
Jay Gowan ◽  
Stephen Byers
Keyword(s):  
Construction Management ◽  
Construction Projects ◽  
High Speed ◽  
Fast Track ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
Economic Advantage ◽  
High Speed Rail ◽  
Operational Costs ◽  
Construction Zones ◽  
Made In

Paper and PowerPoint presentation format will describe process for much faster logistics and construction management of new high speed track construction and improvement of existing FRA track from FRA Class 4 to Class 5 and Class 6 standards on existing freight railway lines. This process involves an integration of the long materials supply chain together with rapid process state of the art construction machines. These machines have been used in both European and Chinese high speed construction projects. Huge gains in new track kilometers and miles per day have been made in the last decade on the machinery side of the equation. The authors will show several case studies. The critical key to these production rates has been in the integration of materials ordering and prepositioning. The economic advantage is that track time construction windows that delay other passing trains can be reduced at tremendous savings in service and operational costs to the operators already providing service in these new high speed corridors and construction zones. Examples and calculations are shown.

Who Rides These Things?

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jack E. Heiss
Keyword(s):  
High Speed ◽  
Market Demand ◽  
Market Information ◽  
High Speed Rail ◽  
Development Patterns ◽  
Trip Purpose ◽  
Passenger Rail ◽  
Rail Line ◽  
Market Capture ◽  
Investment Grade

While planners and politicians alike go about kicking the tires of various trains, and traveling abroad on fact-finding missions about HSR, the question remains whether Americans will patronize high-speed rail in sufficient number to justify the investment. A common practice is to identify an existing or abandoned rail line as the candidate route that connects population centers, identify the former stations for rehabilitation, select a technology, and then perform an investment-grade ridership study to determine whether sufficient revenues will be generated. This approach may prove sufficient in the upgrading of an existing conventional service, or re-establishing a previous service in those areas of the country with a long history of passenger rail. When approaching newer developed areas such as the Sunbelt cities, the inter-relationship of development patterns and fixed-guideway passenger services is not established. Those development patterns were influenced by the automobile, not by guideway-based transportation. A different approach is needed when history is not a guide. While the selection of the population centers to be served at the outset is appropriate and makes for a basic identification of the market to be served, it does not reveal the actual destinations that are interest to the travelers. The next step is to more thoroughly investigate travel between those points. That investigation should include surveys to determine trip purpose, identify the main attractors in the markets, the demographics of the travelers and how time is valued by the travelers. Finally, estimates must be made of the absolute numbers of those traveling. Additionally, examination of the current travel patterns through the patronage of existing services can provide clues to the market demand. The acquisition of this market information then allows the planners to design a transportation product that will appeal to the potential customers and make a determination of potential revenue. Even when certain parameters of a system are set because of geography or availability of infrastructure, market information can guide improvements to maximize market capture. This paper will examine those data that are important to a high-speed rail plan and how some system decisions directly affect the ability of the transportation product offered to satisfy the needs of the traveling public. “Build it and they will come” cannot be trusted to repay the massive investment required by high-speed rail.

Investigation on the Aerodynamic Efficiency of Braking Spoiler for High Speed Train Applications

2020 ◽  
pp. 2150009
Author(s):  
M. Vikraman ◽  
J. Bruce Ralphin Rose ◽  
S. Ganesh Natarajan
Keyword(s):  
High Speed ◽  
Cfd Simulation ◽  
Aerodynamic Drag ◽  
High Speed Train ◽  
Passenger Cars ◽  
High Speed Rail ◽  
Braking Performance ◽  
Simulation Tools ◽  
Drag Forces ◽  
Differential Drag

The demand for high speed rail networks is rapidly increasing in developing countries like India. One of the major constraints in the design and implementation of high speed train is the braking efficiency with minimum friction losses. Recently, the aerodynamic braking concept has received good attention and it has been incorporated for high speed bullet trains as a testing phase. The braking performance is extremely important to ensure the passenger safety specifically for the trains moving at more than 120[Formula: see text]km/h. In this paper, an Indian train configuration WAP7 (wide gauge AC electric passenger, Class 7) has been assumed with the locomotive and one passenger car. Aerodynamic braking system design is done by opening a spoiler over the train to amplify the aerodynamic drag at high speeds. The magnitude of braking force depends on the position and orientation of the braking spoiler. It creates differential drag forces at various deflection angles to decelerate the trains instantaneously in proportion to the running speeds. Drag created by the braking spoiler is observed numerically with the help of CFD simulation tools for further validation through wind tunnel experiments. Striking aerodynamic results are obtained with and without braking spoilers on the passenger cars and the spoiler at 40[Formula: see text]–50[Formula: see text] orientation makes greater drag coefficient as compared to the other angles.

On the Usefulness of a Combined Mode Choice-Schedule Choice Model: Case of the Paris–Bordeaux Rail Line (France)

2019 ◽  
Vol 2673 (4) ◽  
pp. 697-707
Author(s):  
Minghui Chen ◽  
Stéphanie Souche Le Corvec
Keyword(s):  
High Speed ◽  
Choice Model ◽  
Mode Choice ◽  
Discrete Choice Models ◽  
Transport Infrastructure ◽  
Model Case ◽  
High Speed Rail ◽  
Schedule Delay ◽  
Early Arrival ◽  
Rail Line

The high-speed rail line (HSR) Ligne à Grande Vitesse Sud Europe Atlantique (LGV SEA) was inaugurated and put into operation on July 2, 2017. Since then, a decrease has been observed in air traffic and in air service frequency on the Paris–Bordeaux route. This paper examines the competition between HSR and air transportation services and the influence of this new transport infrastructure on passenger behavior. Using discrete choice models along with data from traveler surveys, an econometric analysis of traveler demand is conducted, dealing jointly with mode choice and schedule choice between Paris and Bordeaux. Results demonstrate that the variables specifically constructed to represent the schedule delay cost are significant, with late arrival generating relatively greater costs compared with early arrival. This model also makes it possible to evaluate the quality of transport timetable proposed by the transportation operators with the help of market share prediction.

Intermodal Connection of High-Speed Rail with Interregional Bus Services in Japan

2020 ◽  
Vol 2674 (11) ◽  
pp. 674-684
Author(s):  
Ryosuke Yashiro ◽  
Hironori Kato
Keyword(s):  
Rural Areas ◽  
High Speed ◽  
Travel Demand ◽  
Choice Model ◽  
Market Potential ◽  
Intermodal Transportation ◽  
High Speed Rail ◽  
Transportation Service ◽  
Bus Service ◽  
Bus Services

An intermodal transportation service consisting of high-speed rail (HSR) and an interregional bus service is one policy option for rural areas where interregional travel demand is too low to justify the construction of HSR. This study reviews current interregional bus services connecting with interregional rail, particularly HSR, in Japan, and analyzes the market potential for improving intermodal transportation by integrating HSR with an interregional bus service. It reviews the current interregional transportation network and related travel demand, including for air, rail, and bus. It also analyzes the connectivity of rail+bus intermodal transportation. The analysis showed poor connectivity of HSR and interregional bus services in Japan. Next, an interregional travel mode choice model is estimated with a nested-logit model using data from the Interregional Travel Survey 2010. Then, origin–destination pairs constituting the potential travel demand of the rail+bus option are identified using simple market analysis. This revealed that origin–destination pairs connecting prefectural cities along the Tohoku Shinkansen (HSR) with Kofu City could gain modal shift from other travel modes to rail+bus through improvement in the connection or introduction of a new interregional bus service connected with HSR. Expected changes in modal shares for rail+bus are estimated through a case study where a connection at the HSR station is hypothetically improved by a newly introduced interregional bus service. This suggests that improvements in connectivity at the HSR station could encourage the intermodal transportation service of rail+bus, even for areas not connected with the HSR network.

Blended Approach

2016 ◽  
pp. 155-172
Author(s):  
Richard Harnish ◽  
F.K. Plous
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Building Block ◽  
High Speed ◽  
The United States ◽  
Network System ◽  
High Speed Rail ◽  
Interesting Topic ◽  
The Future ◽  
The Right ◽  
Block Approach

High Speed Rail development is an increasingly significant, interesting topic in the present and expected to continue to grow even more in the future. Implementation of high-speed rail would require the right type of track network system that would need to be maintained and/or built, as necessary. In this chapter, the author recommends that the United States will need to use the Blended or Building Block Approach to develop high-speed rail. He presents several examples of blended infrastructure worldwide for high-speed rail, which would offer a range of tools here in the United States for high-speed rail development.

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