Rail Mass Transit

[LivingInThePast 364]

One of the most confusing things in world travel is what to call rail-based mass transit.

Well, we have freight trains, but they don't carry people. There's subway, HSR, PRT, trams, trolleys, light rail, commuter rail, regional rail...there's enough to make your head spin!

Anyway, I think I figured out the different types.

Subways primarily travels underground. There are numerous cars, they are powered by an electrified third rail, go relatively long distances between stations, and never had at-grade crossings. These are seen primarily at New York City, Washington DC, and a few others.

Elevated rails are basically the same things but are elevated. These include Chicago (famously) and Miami-Dade County (less famously)

Officially, trams, trolleys, and streetcars are all the same thing. They refer to a small vehicle powered by overhead electric lines and on their own track. In the United States, these were mostly dismantled in the early 20th century and went around downtown at-grade with traffic. The only system in America that really remains this way is San Francisco and maybe New Orleans. They are primarily known as "trolleys" in the U.S. and trams elsewhere.

Heritage streetcars is basically a streetcar/trolley that is built post-20th century and is built to resemble the trams/trolleys/streetcars of old. Example is Galveston (but they haven't run for the last three years due to Hurricane Ike)

Light rail has higher capacity than trams or trolleys. Typically, these things travel throughout an inner city (but more than downtown, even out to the suburbs), powered by overhead wires (but in an organized fashion), and are faster than trolleys. Found in LOTS of American cities and some European ones. Most were put up in the 1990s or 2000s. Examples include Pittsburgh, San Diego, Houston, Dallas, and much more.

Commuter rail travels at the normal freight tracks (many have their own ROW). Generally, these go from downtown out to the suburbs without much stopping in between. Sometimes they go throughout the city. Examples of the former include Los Angeles. The latter includes Austin and the now-gone Syracuse.

Tram-train are commuter rail trains that resemble trams/streetcars but with their own power and that travel on the same freight track. Examples include Austin.

Regional rail travels from city to city. This is what Amtrak holds exclusively in America.

I hope this didn't confuse anyone.

[Duke87 1,070]

You're contradicting yourself on the subway definition. You say they have relatively long distances between stations, and then use New York as an example... the subway in New York is actually quite unusual in that the stations remain very closely spaced, even at the extremities of the system.

I don't think elevated rail is really a different type of transit than a subway, it's just the same thing put above the street rather than below it. And indeed, if you look at the cities with "els" (New York and Chicago), the very same trains make different parts of their runs elevated above the street and tunneled below it.

Realistically, I would define the following categories:

Streetcars: an old-fashioned system almost exclusively replaced with buses once they were invented, and indeed today may be described as "buses on rails". Every major city and many minor cities in North America used to have these, but Toronto and San Francisco are the only cities where they remain.

Light Rail: an urban or suburban system that uses short trains, often articulated rather than separate cars. Part of the system is in or along streets on the surface with grade crossings. Platforms are usually low-level. Unheard of 25 years ago but increasingly common nowadays due to relative inexpensiveness and ease of construction. LRT vehicles are, as rail vehicles go, capable of handling some very sharp turning radii and some very steep grades. Fare functions on a proof of payment system or by paying fare when boarding.

Heavy urban rail: a.k.a. "subway", "metro", or, archaically, "rapid transit". Uses longer trains and is completely grade-separated. Higher capacity but more expensive to build than light rail. Primarily purposed for travel within a city. Platforms are usually high-level. Cars have seats but leave large spaces for people to stand. Functions either on a proof of payment system or by having gated fare control.

Heavy suburban rail: a.k.a. "commuter rail". Uses longer trains, may in some cases have grade crossings. Primarily purposed for travel into and out of a city. Platforms may be high or low level. Car interiors are dominated by seating and are not designed to carry large numbers of standees. Fare functions by having conductors check tickets onboard.

Intercity rail: like heavy suburban rail, but with longer distances in mind. Primarily purposed for travel between cities. Trains may include additional amenities such as dining cars and first class seating. Fare functions by having conductors check tickets onboard.

High speed rail: intercity rail on steroids, designed to cover longer distances in shorter times. Requires dedicated trackage with special stricter design constraints.

[LivingInThePast 364]

Yeah, those are better definitions. I like those.

Some cities use them for different purposes. Houston uses light rail for inner city, while commuter rail utilizes existing trackage for out of town toward the suburbs, at least they would, provided they could make a deal with the busy freight lines, and if they hadn't abandoned two lines that would've been handy.

Dallas uses light rail exclusively.

Austin uses heavy commuter rail, but uses it for in-city traffic. It even looks like a light rail.

[Madri 3]

Streetcars: an old-fashioned system almost exclusively replaced with buses once they were invented, and indeed today may be described as "buses on rails". Every major city and many minor cities in North America used to have these, but Toronto and San Francisco are the only cities where they remain.

Do people just overlook New Orleans?! The City has 3 major trolley lines most famously St. Charles Line. They stretch out from 1 end of the crescent to the other. Some running North, because Downtown is riverside you can only parallel the river or go north.

[Duke87 1,070]

New Orleans has streetcars still hanging around? News to me.

I suppose Philadelphia also sort of still has streetcars but they make their run into downtown underground so not 100% so.

[astronelson 339]

Heavy urban, heavy suburban, and intercity rail can blend into each other. To give an example, the Gold Coast Line in Queensland is urban rail inside Brisbane, then becomes intercity rail between Brisbane and the Gold Coast, then suburban rail through the stations it has down there. It connects to Brisbane Airport to the north and there are plans to extend it south to Coolangatta Airport, passing under the runway threshold (next to to the Tugun Bypass) as it does so, and to add more stations and a transfer to a light rail network being built in the Gold Coast. As if it wasn't busy enough already... one hopes they put on some more services.

Also, Melbourne still has trams, as do many other cities not in North America (Vienna and Helsinki come to mind as ones I have ridden on).

[LivingInThePast 364]

Intercity and heavy suburban often (at least in the U.S., certainly) use standard freight rail tracks and often have at-grade railroad crossings.

[SteveMSim 275]

Officially, trams, trolleys, and streetcars are all the same thing. They refer to a small vehicle powered by overhead electric lines and on their own track. In the United States, these were mostly dismantled in the early 20th century and went around downtown at-grade with traffic. The only system in America that really remains this way is San Francisco and maybe New Orleans. They are primarily known as "trolleys" in the U.S. and trams elsewhere.

Heritage streetcars is basically a streetcar/trolley that is built post-20th century and is built to resemble the trams/trolleys/streetcars of old. Example is Galveston (but they haven't run for the last three years due to Hurricane Ike)

 

 

 

Streetcars: an old-fashioned system almost exclusively replaced with buses once they were invented, and indeed today may be described as "buses on rails". Every major city and many minor cities in North America used to have these, but Toronto and San Francisco are the only cities where they remain.

 

 

I'm bumping this thread to clarify the streetcar definition.  Streetcars, trolleys, or trams today could be split into three categories.  What Duke87 is referring to is legacy streetcars, which Toronto, New Orleans, and San Francisco have.  LivingInThePast is right about heritage streetcars, which can be found in other cities such as Little Rock, Memphis, Dallas, and Tampa, and are being planned or built in a few other cities.  All of these heritage streetcar systems have been built in the last 20 or so years, and they often use recovered track from former systems.  Now there are new, modern streetcar systems that have already appeared in Portland (a pioneer light rail city) and Seattle, and are either under construction or planned in a few other cities.  The modern streetcars are different than light rail in that they are lighter, have limited distances within cities, usually going between downtowns and adjoining neighborhoods, and run mostly in the streets sharing traffic with motor vehicles.  Modern (and often legacy) streetcars are different than heritage streetcars in that they are modern vehicles and they serve primarily local commuters rather than tourists.  The streetcar idea, modern and heritage, has been catching on in the U.S. but I am not sure about the rest of the world.  I know that European cities have legacy streetcar (tram) systems with modern vehicles along with a few other places such as Melbourne, Australia.

[Turjan 1,048]

I know that European cities have legacy streetcar (tram) systems with modern vehicles...

 

Streetcars, light rails, subways and heavy rail blend into each other. Here in Vienna, you have the legacy streetcar system that is used by a mix of old streetcars and modern articulated low-floor vehicles. At times, they go below ground in tunnels with "subway" stations or as elevated rail. You also have "normal" subway lines with a (third) power rail, but also "subway" that runs mostly on one of the former suburban rail tracks, in tunnels and elevated, with the vehicles looking more like light rail (I guess they must have been cheaper) and catenary. Then you also still have suburban rail. Some run on their own tracks, others on mixed tracks with intercity or other trains. You also have intercity light rail that runs as streetcar at both ends and on main railway tracks in between.

 

tl;dr: It's all a big, colorful mix.

[Odainsaker 2,137]

The distinction also has political and legal importance:
 
In 2000, San Antonio voters turned down a $1.5 billion comprehensive light rail proposal financed by a raise in the local sales tax, which to voters at the time seemed like a hefty price tag for a still struggling city.  City funding was redirected and dithered away into other projects, and it was largely believed at the time that the committing away of available flexibility in maximum capped local sales tax rates to other projects would starve any future rail initiatives.  However, over a decade later, the VIA put together its own plan to install a much smaller downtown streetcar system, which many downtown businesses saw as the seed to an eventual broader light-rail system.  Anti-rail activists, however, have reinterpreted the 2000 vote against a particular light rail plan as a proscription on any rail-based mass transit, and had filed numerous lawsuits and launched targeted political campaigns arguing that streetcars and light rail are actually identical.  Because voters rejected light rail in 2000, and if streetcars and light rail are the same, then streetcars must also have been rejected and are banned.  Indeed, they argue that streetcars are light rail in disguise, and that the light rail plan defeated in 2000 was itself just another streetcar.
 
Of course, that line of reasoning is absurd, but it is often the nature of local politics to become theaters of the absurd.  Indeed, anti-rail activists pushed further, demanding a petition to rewrite the City's charter in to order to prevent the City from ever installing rails into any city streets without a city-wide vote, a barring threshold not held against any other transportation option or development project.  Partly, this was reaction to the City's plan to allow the VIA-financed project to move forward without a city-wide referendum, which was not legally required as the City was not creating a new tax, which had already reached their maximum State-allowed cap.  However, a rewrite of the basic founding charter in order to specifically and permanently block a particular rail plan stuck many as foolishly extremist.  Regardless, activists believe they have enough signatures for their petition to add the issue to the upcoming November ballot, and as those mid-term elections are expected to bring out raving hordes of anti-Obama voters, it is possible that this narrowly-conceived charter-changing petition designed to forever lock-out rail transit may get swept up in the Republican tidal wave and pass.
 
Amusingly, the City Council has gotten cold feet over the issue, and our new interim mayor, Ivy Taylor, with an eye to her own election in May, has asked the council to drop the project.  County, State, and Federal funding sources also worried, and overnight, hundred's of millions of dollars of committed public investment in the downtown area evaporated as politicians sought cover through November.  Billions more are now in uncertain limbo, and the longer they remain in limbo, the more likely they too will just evaporate or be dithered away.  Anti-rail activists rejoiced at stopping what they saw as an giant expense benefitting only downtown, and then promptly demanded that VIA's mass transit funding that was to be used for the streetcar system instead now be raided to pay for highway expansions in the wealthy northern suburban fringes to forestall those expected expansions from becoming State-planned toll roads.  Yes, using our downtown mass transit monies to preempt suburban toll roads...theater of the absurd!
 
Former mayor Julián Castro, under whose leadership the streetcar plan was devised, had been selected by President Obama to head the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in a Cabinet shuffle to replace HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who was disgraced by the rocky Obamacare rollout, and many see Castro as a rising star for the national Democratic Party.  The streetcar project collapsed under his interim replacement immediately after he resigned the mayoral post to head to Washington, and many are rejoicing in taking down a potential legacy project of a potential vice presidential pick.  Indeed, the same activists are now targeting other, larger signature projects initiated during Castro's tenure, with the stated aim of sticking it to Obama, and in 2016 also Hillary Clinton, by first preemptively taking down Castro.  How absurd is it to deliberately sabotage and burn down your own local city in order spite hated national leaders in Washington?  Why should Obamacare have anything to do with San Antonio's streetcars?

[Turjan 1,048]

The distinction also has political and legal importance.

 

Well, sure. Although I find the distinction between "streetcar" and "light rail" superfluous. The main legal distinction between rail systems is of an operational kind. Streetcars need indicators to operate in the flow of vehicles in the streets and have simplified signaling requirements. Operation is mostly on sight. Heavy rail needs an elaborate signaling system, for example automated block signaling.  Often enough, you can find both operating modes within the same line. This is important regarding maximal speed and train frequency.

 

Here's an overview about the systems in this city.

 

1. Historical

 

The two main systems that form the base of rail mass transit in this city, other than standard heavy rail, can be seen on this photograph from 1910:

 

 

Streetcars are obvious, and the steam train there was mostly built for military purposes to connect the rail terminals. It was called "city rail", and two thirds of it were dumped on the city after WW I, because the federal rail company didn't have any use for it. Many of the beautiful elevated rail stations are still in use nowadays.

 

The city then electrified the "city rail" and used tram-like vehicles.

 

 

From streetcars and "city rail", the subway system was formed. Which brings us to the current setup.

 

2. Subway

 

The city uses two subway systems. Many of the old elevated "city rail" tracks were not suited for a third rail for electricity, so you have this situation of two electrical delivery systems for the subway:

 

 

A more modern train:

 

 

One of the old stations:

 

 

100 years younger:

 

 

3. Tram

 

The streetcar network is still about 172 km long. I guess you would call this light rail?

 

 

About half of the trams still look like this:

 

 

But you also have underground parts with automated block signaling:

 

 

4. S-Bahn

 

The federal railway runs its own city transport system, called "S-Bahn". Part is on mixed-use tracks with all kinds of other traffic:

 

 

Parts are on separate tracks, like on the old "city rail":

 

 

5. Lokalbahn

 

The "local rail" is only one line and completely mixed in its setup. It sometimes runs as streetcar (at both ends of the line):

 

 

Sometimes like a subway:

 

 

Sometimes like a real railway (in the center of the line):

 

 

Even with freight transport:

 

 

6. Other

 

Of course, you also have "normal" trains, like here the City Airport Train.

 

 

And normal suburban rail:

 

 

A colorful mix, as I said.

[TekindusT 3,809]

@Turjan: All these pictures are from the city of Wien? This is what I call a confusing system!

[Turjan 1,048]

@Turjan: All these pictures are from the city of Wien? This is what I call a confusing system!

 

Yes, everything is from Wien and, with the exception of the "historical" part, all current. There's nothing confusing about it though, as it's all on the same ticket, except the airport train (but you can take the S-Bahn there). Including buses, of course. You buy a ticket and enter whatever comes your way. A one-year ticket is €365.

 

I would say the system tops Berlin with ease. Which is quite a task, given how good the Berlin system is. The only thing that needs fixing is the speed on the mainline S-Bahn, which is pretty slow on the mixed-use tracks, probably due to age and high traffic frequency.

 

I like that it's not that boring. You have sunken stretches:

 

 

Funny bridges:

 

 

You have a double-decker end loop for lots of tram lines at an underground station:

 

The above image shows the lower loop in the gallery below this loop:

 

And here the tram even changes to "left-hand drive" on an elevated section in order to be able to use a center platform:

 

[__A 792]

Here in Melbourne our railway system is a mixture of both suburban rail and metro. Our rail lines all start at the CBD through the City Loop (which is an elevated and underground loop) and sprawl out towards the suburbs. Generally speaking anything with 3 or more tracks is usually grade separated, 6 car trains are used except for shuttles (3 car trains) and they provide turn-up and go services when they join up with other lines.

 

A train at Parliament Station part of the underground section of the City Loop.

 

A train at a suburban station.

 

This method provides high frequencies for the inner city areas where it is much denser than the suburbs. Sydney's system is partially the same as it mostly joins together closer into the city before going underground through the City Circle. No Australian city has a full metro system but cities like Sydney and Melbourne plan to have metro style services with their existing rail system.

 

Then we have Melbourne's tram system, the largest in the world. The majority of our system uses existing roads and therefor shares with car traffic but some routes have dedicated lanes where the cars cannot drive on the tram tracks and then we have routes where they run on light rail sections (former rail lines).

 

A tram using the road.

 

A tram using the Port Melbourne light rail section.

[SteveMSim 275]

The distinction also has political and legal importance:

 

In 2000, San Antonio voters turned down a $1.5 billion comprehensive light rail proposal financed by a raise in the local sales tax, which to voters at the time seemed like a hefty price tag for a still struggling city.  City funding was redirected and dithered away into other projects, and it was largely believed at the time that the committing away of available flexibility in maximum capped local sales tax rates to other projects would starve any future rail initiatives.  However, over a decade later, the VIA put together its own plan to install a much smaller downtown streetcar system, which many downtown businesses saw as the seed to an eventual broader light-rail system.  Anti-rail activists, however, have reinterpreted the 2000 vote against a particular light rail plan as a proscription on any rail-based mass transit, and had filed numerous lawsuits and launched targeted political campaigns arguing that streetcars and light rail are actually identical.  Because voters rejected light rail in 2000, and if streetcars and light rail are the same, then streetcars must also have been rejected and are banned.  Indeed, they argue that streetcars are light rail in disguise, and that the light rail plan defeated in 2000 was itself just another streetcar.

 

Of course, that line of reasoning is absurd, but it is often the nature of local politics to become theaters of the absurd.  Indeed, anti-rail activists pushed further, demanding a petition to rewrite the City's charter in to order to prevent the City from ever installing rails into any city streets without a city-wide vote, a barring threshold not held against any other transportation option or development project.  Partly, this was reaction to the City's plan to allow the VIA-financed project to move forward without a city-wide referendum, which was not legally required as the City was not creating a new tax, which had already reached their maximum State-allowed cap.  However, a rewrite of the basic founding charter in order to specifically and permanently block a particular rail plan stuck many as foolishly extremist.  Regardless, activists believe they have enough signatures for their petition to add the issue to the upcoming November ballot, and as those mid-term elections are expected to bring out raving hordes of anti-Obama voters, it is possible that this narrowly-conceived charter-changing petition designed to forever lock-out rail transit may get swept up in the Republican tidal wave and pass.

 

Amusingly, the City Council has gotten cold feet over the issue, and our new interim mayor, Ivy Taylor, with an eye to her own election in May, has asked the council to drop the project.  County, State, and Federal funding sources also worried, and overnight, hundred's of millions of dollars of committed public investment in the downtown area evaporated as politicians sought cover through November.  Billions more are now in uncertain limbo, and the longer they remain in limbo, the more likely they too will just evaporate or be dithered away.  Anti-rail activists rejoiced at stopping what they saw as an giant expense benefitting only downtown, and then promptly demanded that VIA's mass transit funding that was to be used for the streetcar system instead now be raided to pay for highway expansions in the wealthy northern suburban fringes to forestall those expected expansions from becoming State-planned toll roads.  Yes, using our downtown mass transit monies to preempt suburban toll roads...theater of the absurd!

 

Former mayor Julián Castro, under whose leadership the streetcar plan was devised, had been selected by President Obama to head the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in a Cabinet shuffle to replace HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who was disgraced by the rocky Obamacare rollout, and many see Castro as a rising star for the national Democratic Party.  The streetcar project collapsed under his interim replacement immediately after he resigned the mayoral post to head to Washington, and many are rejoicing in taking down a potential legacy project of a potential vice presidential pick.  Indeed, the same activists are now targeting other, larger signature projects initiated during Castro's tenure, with the stated aim of sticking it to Obama, and in 2016 also Hillary Clinton, by first preemptively taking down Castro.  How absurd is it to deliberately sabotage and burn down your own local city in order spite hated national leaders in Washington?  Why should Obamacare have anything to do with San Antonio's streetcars?

 

I guess that the anti-rail activists live and either work or have businesses in the wealthy suburbs and have never been downtown nor have any desire to go downtown since they still have a '70s notion of downtowns being dirty, rundown, and crime-ridden.  They do not want one cent of tax money to pay for any projects that would benefit downtown or the inner city, which they look down on.  Plus, these people are likely heavily involved in the tea-party, which is strong in Texas and oppose spending any money on public works projects.  For those who have businesses in the suburbs, any project that benefits downtown would mean that they would lose customers and clients to businesses downtown. 

 

San Antonio is not alone in this.  Across the country, efforts to improve downtowns and inner city neighborhoods of some cities have met stiff opposition from suburban business interests.

 

 

Here's an overview about the systems in this city.

 

1. Historical

 

The two main systems that form the base of rail mass transit in this city, other than standard heavy rail, can be seen on this photograph from 1910:

 

 

Streetcars are obvious, and the steam train there was mostly built for military purposes to connect the rail terminals. It was called "city rail", and two thirds of it were dumped on the city after WW I, because the federal rail company didn't have any use for it. Many of the beautiful elevated rail stations are still in use nowadays.

 

The city then electrified the "city rail" and used tram-like vehicles.

 

From streetcars and "city rail", the subway system was formed. Which brings us to the current setup.

 

2. Subway

 

The city uses two subway systems. Many of the old elevated "city rail" tracks were not suited for a third rail for electricity, so you have this situation of two electrical delivery systems for the subway:

 

3. Tram

 

The streetcar network is still about 172 km long. I guess you would call this light rail?

 

About half of the trams still look like this:

 

But you also have underground parts with automated block signaling:

 

 

 

Philadelphia and San Francisco have heavy rail subways and light rail streetcar systems that run through subways downtown and on surface legacy streetcar lines in the streets in the outlying neighborhoods.  Boston has a metro system that consists of several heavy rail lines that run through subways, on the surface and elevated but always grade separated from the streets and the Green Line, which is light rail and runs through a subway downtown and on the surface elsewhere, usually in avenues within its own right-of-way but cross streets at grade.

[Turjan 1,048]

Philadelphia and San Francisco have heavy rail subways and light rail streetcar systems that run through subways downtown and on surface legacy streetcar lines in the streets in the outlying neighborhoods...

 

Yup, setups like heavy rail in tunnels and mixed subway/streetcar systems are very common. I didn't want to imply that Vienna was special in this regard (it is still special regarding the density of its line network and service frequency), but just provide examples from a city I know, in order to illustrate that distinctions are not that clear as has been sometimes implied up there in the thread.

 

I guess the strict distinction in SC4 has more to do with game limitations, like the abstraction of the subway system in the game or to prevent freight trains from running on elevated rail tracks.

[mrsmartman 200]

An underground rail yard in the city center.
 

[mrsmartman 200]

The Penn Central Certificate Vignette

 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wOcnq3wBPcE
 
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9904E0D91F3EE733A2575AC0A96F9C946797D6CF


 

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/18229/18229-h/18229-h.htm

The bridges and tunnels make the entry into the Big Apple an unique experience.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGeJIa8_r9I

[mrsmartman 200]

NYC: Park Avenue Tunnel + Grand Central Terminal
PRR: Bergen Hill Tunnels + North River Tunnels + Pennsylvania Station + East River Tunnels