An Introduction to Rail Transport Planning

By Donovan Muddle

This textbook attempts to details in depth the various concepts needed for the planning of rail transport. This textbook represents perhaps the first attempt anywhere to dfescribe in detail the processes involved in transport planning. The book is a combination of discussion on engineering systems, network analysis, economics, and detailed

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dolans Publishing
• Release date: Jun 14, 2016
• ISBN: 9780994434029

Book preview

Part 1 – Introducing Rail Transport and the Rail Industry

Chapter 1 - Introduction

Chapter 2 - Overview of the Rail Industry

Chapter 1

Introduction

Rail transport planning is not for the feint of heart! This difficult area is full of complex jargon, and sophisticated technology. Rail systems are very infrastructure intensive, and there are many different types of engineering systems that can be installed to support rail systems. Rail transport planning requires a reasonable understanding of many of these asset items, how they work, advantages and disadvantages, and when they can be successfully applied. Moreover, rail systems can be conceptually difficult to understand, and many mathematical, economic, business and engineering concepts and ideas can be applied to rail systems. This includes economics for project appraisals, operations research for timetabling optimisation, and signalling and civil engineering for designing track. Rail systems can be very complex, and many areas of expertise are brought together to create a rail system.

Rail transport has been a very important part of the lives of many people around the world for almost 200 years. Rail systems are very common and installed in large numbers in every continent in the world other than Antarctica. Rail systems come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, and can be very large systems running over tens of thousands of kilometres, or alternatively only a few kilometres long. They may be above ground, or under, or pass over rivers, or under mountains. The variety of different rail systems is truly huge, which makes planning them rather difficult.

The first railway was constructed between Liverpool and Manchester in England, and started operation in 1830. Railways were built throughout England quickly after the success of this line, and rail lines expanded quickly. There is some dispute about the construction of the first rail line in the US, but it seems to have occurred at almost the same time as the Liverpool to Manchester rail line in England. Again, once completed, there was a boom in building railways throughout the US, and after 30 years there were tens of thousands of kilometres of rail track across the US.

The first railway line within one city built to service passengers within that city was the London Underground, where the first line was opened in 1863. The Underground continued to expand and by the first World War included several lines. Concurrently a number of large cities had built railways that solely moved people within the city, and these included New York, Paris, Berlin, Buenos Aires, Athens, and Chicago, and a small number of others. Between the first and second world wars, more cities constructed metro style systems, including Barcelona and Moscow. Construction of large numbers of metros systems began in earnest in the 1980’s and now there are over 100 metro systems all over the world. The metro has become a very standard rail system, and its popularity has greatly assisted with the development of rail as a transport system.

So we can observe that rail systems are very much in fashion at the moment. Rail systems are being installed all over the world, and there is almost a mad scramble to install more. China is installing high speed networks across the country, and almost every city that has a metro has some sort of plan to expand it, or is actively doing so. People love their rail systems, and are prepared to invest huge sums to get the system working efficiently.

Whilst rail systems in many parts of the world are growing, the history of rail is not one of uninterrupted expansion. Many of the large cities in the Western World had very extensive tram systems and most of these have been removed. London and Sydney both had very extensive trams systems, and first line of London’s tram system opened in 1860 (these were horse drawn trams, rather than powered ones on rails). Melbourne in Australia opened its first tram line in 1884. Tram systems were once extremely common, but in the 1940’s and 50’s were removed from London and many other cities. Very few systems remain from this time, actually almost none, and their removal and the speed with which it was done is surprising. One of the largest remaining systems is in Melbourne in Australia, and has over 250 kms of track and is currently being expanded.

Trams were reborn in the 1970’s as light rail. Light rail as a system attempts to avoid many of the problems associated with trams, such as the congested city streets caused by slow moving trams, and operating at higher speeds than trams. Light rail is another of the systems that has led the resurgence of the rail industry. Light rail is a very interesting and popular system, and there are numerous books and papers published on this type of transportation system. Light rail is a hybrid system, often operating on city streets, with vehicles larger than trams, but and faster than trams, but not as fast as heavier commuter and regional trams.

High Speed Rail (HSR) is another of the types of rail systems that has become very popular. They are considered to be the premium intercity transportation system, and their installation in any country brings it great prestige. HSR systems, despite their obvious appeal, are installed in only a small number of countries, but that number is increasing. This type of rail system is sexy and popular with passengers and the public alike.

So there is plenty of interest in rail as a transport mode, but how would anyone go about planning a rail system? What is actually meant by rail transport planning? What steps are involved? Is it even something that needs to be planned? We really need a definition of what rail planning is before we can proceed. Perhaps one way of thinking of rail transport planning is as the process of identification, costing and approval of the installation, change or removal of any rail system. Another would be the setting of the general direction for future rail projects and strategy in a country or region. Perhaps both of these are part of rail transport planning. These are pretty broad definitions, and include many different activities. Construction would normally not be thought of as part of rail planning, it’s more about doing than planning!

So should rail transport planning be seen simply as one branch of urban planning? Urban planning concerns land use and infrastructure for the design of urban environments. Rail transport planning will often be included under this rubric, and so we should consider rail transport planning as one part of that overall field. Not all rail transport planning is part of urban planning, freight rail systems can operate entirely outside of urban environments, and tourist railways operate wherever the tourist attraction is located. However, in many cases rail systems are designed to be within, or at least start and end in an urban environment, so the relationship between urban planning and rail planning is a close one.

Transport planning can be separated into three broad categories, based on the timescale of the planning, and the scale of the plans:

•The master plan, specifying transport planning for the next 20 or 30 years in a specific area, city, or country

•Large projects that will substantially change the character of one part of the area as defined in the master plan

•Smaller projects that are completed to support a larger project or master plan. These are numerous and lower in cost than a large project.

A common misconception is to view transport planning as just building a new rail line, without any of the other activities that might go either before or after the new line is constructed. It is much larger than that, and encompasses both broad strategic planning, and detailed planning associated with much smaller projects and plans. Rail transport planning may not even need to be project specific, and can provide guidance on transport planning for an area.

One key first question to ask in any rail transport planning is; why rail? Rail as a system is technically very complicated, presents lots of technical challenges, and takes a long time for those working in the industry to learn. Its planning is very difficult, and requires lots of specialised people to manage and run. Rail systems are flashy and attractive to use, but when should countries and companies build one? What rules should we apply in deciding what system to have? How could any country choose to have a rail system, and why? Rail systems are very expensive, and rarely return much by way of revenue. Any country that installs one almost always need to subsidise it for many years to come.

So, given the cost of rail as a system, it must have some serious benefits compared to other transport modes. Some of these include:

•It’s very energy efficient. Trains consume very little power in moving people and freight, and so the power consumption is low. As the power consumption is low, global warming gases and poisonous emissions are also low.

•It’s comfortable. Many different types of trains are very comfortable to ride in, more so than buses and planes (but not always the case). For long distance journeys, trains can be spacious and well-laid out, and the ride quality is very smooth. Buses have a lot of rapid acceleration and deceleration, and planes are often crowded and cramped.

•Rail systems can move large numbers of people. A metro style can move huge numbers of people over short distances very efficiently, which makes them ideal for mass transit systems (but comfort is sacrificed).

•Trains can travel faster than buses and cars. Modern high speed trains can travel at over 300 kms/hr, and sustain this speed.

•It’s permanent, making it easy to find and easy to use. The large amount of physical infrastructure makes the system obvious and easy to find to those living and moving around it, and tourists. Tourists often use trains for transport, as the presence of the permanence of the infrastructure makes useful tourist information long-lived. Also, maps for tourists commonly contain rail maps, because there are usually only 5 or 6 rail lines in any large city, and they don’t move nor change. Contrast this with bus routes, which are almost always invisible, move frequently, and are very numerous.

•Train systems are visually appealing. People like the look and feel of them, especially rollingstock, and are excited to use the system.

•Large numbers of people or goods can be shipped with only one train driver, which can be very economical when large quantities or numbers of people are being moved.

There are also some disadvantages of rail systems, and these include:

•Rail systems are expensive to install and operate. The physical infrastructure of rail systems is large in size and number, and requires specialised resources to install and manage.

•It’s not flexible, a rail system cannot be easily adjusted to go to a new growth area, and even small changes to a rail system can be extremely expensive.

•The time to construct a rail system can be up to 10 years, a very long time. Bus routes can be created by adding buses and having roads, and plane trips can be created effortlessly as long as there are airports at each destination.

•Train systems are really mass-transit systems, and need large numbers of people to use them to be economical or make sense to install. In countries with low population densities, constructing a rail system often doesn’t make sense, and so there are few of no rail systems. This can be very frustrating for the local residents.

•The technical complexity of rail systems is very high, and so it’s hard for non-rail people to fully understand, or even partly understand, the operation of a rail system. Buses are very easy to manage, and so too are planes really, as air transportation systems can be fairly easily explained to the lay person.

•Rail systems often operate at a loss, and need to be financially supported by governments. This often makes investment capital difficult to attract, particularly problematic given the high fixed cost in establishing a rail system.

One of the themes of this book is the technical complexity of rail systems, which for even simple rail systems can be very high. This makes planning for rail systems difficult, as rail planners need a high level of base knowledge to successfully plan new rail lines. The aim of this book is to contribute and support the understanding of the reader for rail systems and to assist the reader in understanding the different issues in planning rail systems.

The vast majority of rail systems operate at a loss. Countries need to provide a constant supply of funds to keep rail systems operational, and this can be a real burden for many countries. Very wealthy countries often have more sophisticated rail systems, and can spend freely, but almost all countries need to be very careful in choosing what rail systems to install and where. There are a small number of rail systems that operate at a profit, and these are mostly metros in crowded cities with very large populations. Some freight systems are also highly profitable. Tourist railways can also operate profitably, as the price for a ticket can be high enough to sustain the operation of the rail system.

So again, why rail? Listing the benefits of rail systems still doesn’t entirely help us to understand why to install rail systems. Fundamentally, the answer to this question is that the benefit of operating a rail system is economic, and the benefits outweigh the costs. There can be large economic benefits for operating a rail system, regardless of whether the railway needs to be subsidized or not. A country or city should operate a railway when there is a clear and overriding benefit, and otherwise not. Operating a rail system that produces few benefits, and costs large sums to operate and maintain, makes no sense at all, and really, this shouldn’t happen. Governments should not allow themselves to be swayed into constructing expensive systems that provide little benefit, but in public debates for rail projects many are mooted that are clearly not viable

In many cases one type of rail system may be more viable and beneficial than others. Even where there is agreement with a nation or government to build a rail line, it’s not always obvious which transport mode to use, and if rail is chosen, which rail system to use. This is particularly so with light rail, where there are many competing options. The way to assess the usefulness of a rail system is to examine what a city or region gets from its system, ie, what are the benefits and how to maximise them?

Broadly, the benefits to society of operating a rail system usually include one or more of the following:

•Rail transport systems get cars off the roads, and allow road traffic to move faster

•Well designed rail systems offer cheap and affordable transport for those who may not be able to afford road vehicles

•Rail transport is generally better for people with disabilities than buses, and much cheaper than taxis

•Where large numbers of goods or people are moved, there is an economic and financial advantage in the use of rail for both individuals and a country as a whole

•Pollution emitted from electric trains is minimal where the train is located and operating

•The general amenity of living in a place is improved where rail transport is available, even more so if it is fast and affordable.

•Rail systems allow the construction of densely populated cities, which can be economically very powerful places, as people can live in high rise buildings and move quickly and efficiently around the city

•Rail systems bring in tourism and tourist dollars

•Rail systems offer an alternative form of transport, when one mode of transportation may not be able to cope with moving all people all goods

•A rail system can reduce the emission of greenhouse gases

•For rail freight, rail offers a transport mode that is very energy efficient, which is important for freight operators moving bulk materials

So there are often substantial benefits and reasons to construct a rail system. Once again it should be emphasised that the benefits should be very clear and obvious, as the construction of a rail system is a long, complicated and expensive process.

So can we divide rail systems in broad categories? Yes we can, and is helpful to do so. The big categories of rail transport are, in the order that the author thinks reflects their importance:

•Mass transit systems within cities, especially metros. Moving people quickly and efficiently around big cities is important, and many large cities require rail systems that can move truly vast numbers of people. Metros can do this

•Freight trains and services, which move goods from one place to another. Freight trains usually move container traffic, or bulk materials. The experience has in Australia has been that moving bulk materials by rail is more economical than by road, and there has been substantial growth in this freight market. Rail container traffic often struggles to compete with road traffic, as containers usually need to be shipped by road to their final destination anyway.

•High speed rail, between major centres. High speed rail is often defined as be rail travel in excess of 200 kms/hr. Rail connections between very large cities, with trains moving at high speed, can be very successful

•Light rail and tram systems, which is a system with small trains moving down the centre of roads, and crossing roads at grade, ie, at the same level as cars and other road traffic.

•Regional rail/commuter rail, moving people from the centre of a city or town to the outer suburbs, or smaller satellite towns, often on a daily basis.

•Special express services, such as a rail connection to an airport, or to a convention centre, or even an amusement park (such as Disneyland in Hong Kong). Express services are often built as part of the construction of the facility that requires them, such as a convention centre.

•Tourist railways, and there are many of these in Australia. As people only use the system once, the price per trip can be very high.

•Railways involved in the production of goods and materials, such as the sugarcane railways in Queensland in Australia and Fiji. These rail systems can be very large, and quite exotic. Gauges on this type of railway is often very small, in Queensland 610 mm is used.

In many parts of the world people are packed into small urban areas. Europe is a very densely populated continent, and moving people around the continent is very challenging. If most mature adults owned a car, as is common in Australia or the US, then road congestion would be very high and moving around quickly would be an impossibility. Rail systems are an effective solution to this problem, and for large urban areas the only effective solution. The ability of rail systems to move large numbers of people quickly is one of the key advantages to the installation of rail systems.

One of the major competitors to rail systems is buses. A standard bus can move 70 – 80 people, more if it is articulated or a double decker bus. Buses offer an efficient and sometimes comfortable way to travel around a large urban, and are very common throughout the world. Even in cities with excellent rail systems, such as Hong Kong, buses are an extremely common and efficient form of transportation. Their major advantage is their cheapness, and bus routes can be changed easily. Learning to drive a bus is quick in comparison to driver training for rail, and buses can operate on existing roads.

Buses are cheap to purchase, and don’t require complex infrastructure to operate. Buses run down existing roads, and are very flexible, and routes can be changed almost on a whim. Buses can overtake one another, and when given a long stretch or road with no traffic lights, can move at high speed. Buses should always be considered first before a rail system, as the cost of installation of a bus lane or service is less than $500,000 per kilometre per year (in 2012 US dollars).

The table below provides some guidance on the number of people that can be moved on different transport modes. As with many of the tables presented in this book, the numbers are indicative only, and should not be considered hard and fast rules. With any rail system there are always some exceptions to any rule. Nonetheless, the numbers below are a good guide.

The different systems are ranked on the basis of the number of people moved per hour. This unit is commonly used to compare different transport modes. It is often the case with transport planning that many systems need to be excluded from consideration because their capacity to move people is not high enough.

We can see immediately from the table above that only metro systems have the capacity to move large numbers of people. This makes them indispensible for transport needs within major cities, and large ones can have over a dozen metro lines running through it. Much of the recent upsurge in rail construction has been the installation of metro systems, which aside from the number of people that can be moved, are very economical as well, and people can be transported for a low cost.

A lot has been written about Bus Rapid Transit, or BRT for short. First installed in Curitiba in Brazil, a number of countries, including Indonesia and Columbia have installed them, and Australia also has a small number of BRT type systems. Relatively cheap to install, BRT systems have become increasing popular around the world. BRT systems have been seen to move up to 30,000 people per hour (pph) or possibly even more people in one direction per hour, a high figure. BRT is the most serious competitor with rail systems in cities.

To achieve the benefits of a full BRT system, buses and bus routes need a separate right of way. A right of way is a legal right to use land for a specific purpose, and this term of often used in relation to rail systems. The creation of a separate right of way can be very effective in improving the efficiency of a rail system, or a BRT system, and having a separate one is often the key to the success of a rail or BRT system. Separate right of ways are often difficult to provide, especially in built up areas. In some cases the creation of the BRT may require the resumption of land in densely populated areas, something which is not always easy. In many cases it is very tempting for planners to cut back on the quality of separation of the right of way, and there is a corresponding drop in BRT effectiveness. For a BRT system to work effectively, the system must be separated from other road traffic, and even a small amount of mixing will dramatically reduce its performance.

Light rail is often seen as the closest competitor to BRT systems, and the two are often seen as rivals. Whilst it’s true that the cost of installation is lower than for light rail than for heavy rail, the cost is still very high compared to BRT or using buses. Light rail is certainly more glamorous than BRT systems, which in some instances can be seen as the poor cousin of light rail. In some parts of the world, such as Canada, a common view amongst rail planners is that once a BRT system has proven itself and become popular, it becomes a candidate for replacement with a light rail system.

Another advantage of trains over buses is their top speed. Long distance travel is common with both buses and trains, but trains can achieve speeds of over 200 kms/hr, which is far in excess of what a bus would be permitted to do in almost all countries. Buses for long distance travel are referred to as coaches, and have seating that is more appropriate for long journeys, but are still much slower than a well designed rail system. A well designed rail line is almost always substantially quicker than coach travel.

Frequently discussed in this book is the metro rail system. The word metro comes from the French Metropolitan de fer, which means city railway. Metro rail systems have become very standard, and are located in large cities, have single deck trains with limited seating, frequent stops, and large numbers of people. They have become standard enough that they are now constructed almost as a standard engineering package bought off the shelf by cities and countries.

This book is divided into three large sections, the first is the introduction were basic rail concepts are introduced and explained. The second consists of many of the calculations that are needed to really explore how rail systems operate, and to define their performance. The third concerns the economics of rail transport, and the project planning process. All of these areas are quite important, and each needs to be understood to plan rail projects effectively.

Rail transport planners will find themselves doing a wide variety of different tasks, and broadly can be described as follows:

•Identification of the changes to a rail system

•Costing of those changes

•Identification of benefits of the change

•Writing of the specifications for the changes

•Economic appraisal

•Seeking approval for the changes

•Public consultation

This book focuses almost entirely on the first five points above, but particularly the first point. The public relations exercise, and the process for seeking approval, will not be discussed in detail in this book, as there are other books that better address this topic.

The first three activities in the rail planning process are the most difficult. Identifying the best possible changes to a rail system is not easy, and requires a lot of base information. As much as possible, this book attempts to provide information on how to get the end of step 5 successfully, and make the best possible decisions.

REFERENCES

1. Taipei Rapid Transit Corporation 2013 Annual Report, http://english.metro.taipei/ct.asp?xItem=1056448&ctNode=70219&mp=122036

2. CFL, Rapport Annuel, 2011 (In French)

3. Calgary Transit Transit Planning A Review of Bus Rapid Transit, March 2002

4. Railway Gazette Commissioning the world’s heaviest automated metro, Metro Report 2003

Chapter 2

An overview of the rail industry

The rail industry worldwide is very large, and employs large numbers of people. There are 130,000 people directly employed by rail infrastructure companies in continental Western Europe alone, not including all the people indirectly employed and rail operators. The rail industry is very large and generally speaking, fairly well funded.

Railways are common on all continents of the world except Antarctica. Large railway companies exist on every continent, and worldwide there are millions of kilometres of track in place. At any one time there are hundreds of construction projects progressing, and billions of dollars being spent on new rail lines. This frenzy of activity is not expected to really end any time soon, the rail industry will provide a home and continued employment for many years to come.

The rail industry can be divided into a number of key industry participants, companies and government departments. These include:

•Rail operators, who run trains and passenger services. This also includes freight operators. Rail operators are often split from the company that maintains the fixed infrastructure, and so are free for focus on maintaining and operating trains. This type of organisation often contains people with many years of operational rail experience.

•Infrastructure maintainers, who maintain the infrastructure needed to move trains around. These companies can be very large, and almost always rely heavily on government support for money. Mostly these organisations have many engineers, and tend to hire a lot of electrical and civil engineers. A common profession within this company is the fettler, who maintains track. Since 1996 the EU has required infrastructure companies to be separate from operating companies

•A combined company that manages all rail operations and maintenance of equipment. This company may also run other transport services in the area, such as buses. This type of company is common for metros, which are operationally simpler than commuter or regional railways. The rail company in Singapore is called SMRT, and operates buses, trains and taxis.

•Manufacturers of railway equipment, companies that can be very large. Bombardier, one of the largest companies, reputedly has almost 35,000 people worldwide, and manufacturers almost all the components needed for a railway. Other companies are Alstom, Siemans, Kawaski, and Ansaldo, but there are many others. Smaller companies may specialise on particular engineering items. Overall the competence of these companies seems high.

•Government departments supervising rail companies, and there is obviously at least one of these in each country. A government department will usually monitor, and report on the performance of each rail company, for both infrastructure companies and operators. There may be more than one department involved, or one may predominantly manage the rail industry whilst the others have a smaller role. Often this department will make recommendations on large rail projects, and be involved in long term rail planning.

•Professional consulting companies, who provide specialist advice on the management of rail companies and services. There are many of these, and one well known example, especially in the US, is Parsons Brinkerhoff. These companies may specialise in the rail industry, or provide more generalised advice to many different heavy industries. The rail industry is very large and has many niche engineering areas, and even the larger rail consulting companies struggle to provide a complete range of services to rail projects.

•Universities, especially ones with specialised departments researching in rail technology and planning. These departments can be very large, hundreds of people, and can be very influential in the development and approval of large rail projects. These departments are often very strong in economic analysis of rail and large infrastructure projects.

•Construction companies, which project manage the construction in any major project. These companies specialise in project management of construction projects, and often have large numbers of civil engineers. These companies will often manage large projects for rail companies or governments, and subcontract out many different parts of the construction project.

•Companies that provide management of transport within cities or sometimes even countries. Some companies specialise in management of transport systems, and this can be useful when a government wants to franchise out the management of the rail sector or a part of a rail system. Perhaps the best known of these companies is Veolia, a French company, which manages transport for buses and trains.

•Specialist maintainers of equipment, who maintain equipment for a fee. This type of company will maintain almost anything, and several in Australia have grown to be very large, both in revenues and number of employees. There has been an upsurge of activity in this sector, where private companies are now maintaining more and more of the assets in a railway. The experience in Australia with this type of company has been mixed. This type of company may be involved in the bid for any project that is design-build-maintain.

There are of course other participants, but these are the main ones.

Another organisation that should be mentioned is Comet Nova. This organisation benchmarks the performance of many different railways across the world, and writes reports on rail related topics. This organisation is managed from Imperial College in London, and they collate a lot of the information and write a lot of the reports. This information can be useful should the reader obtain access to the reports produced by them, but this is challenging. Even for a rail employee to get access to this information is very difficult, and access is limited to a small number. Often rail companies publish graphs and other items from Comet Nova reports, and those with an understanding or have seen other complete reports can reconstruct what these reports actually mean. Someone on the outside without any prior exposure would have difficulty in using the reports effectively.

A large railway will be dealing constantly with all of the different organisations listed above. The interface between each of these organisations is often managed by specialised liaison managers, who provide information, create and monitor contracts, and report to their respective departments on the goings on in the other organisations. The author’s experience has been that many of these interfaces are difficult, but not unmanageably so. The relationship with government departments often depends on the history of the rail organisation in that country, where there have been accidents and poor operating performance, then the relationship is poor. Where the rail system is widely respected, the relationship is better.

The writing of contracts is key to the management of some of these interfaces. In not all cases will a contract be appropriate, and between two government departments a contract has relatively little meaning. A contract should be precise and clear as to the responsibilities on both sides. A poorly written contract can have a large impact on the financial performance of the respective organisations that signed it. Interface contracts are created in substantial numbers, and usually contain key performance indicators that are relevant to the management of the rail business. The success of each company is measured against these KPI’s.

Within a rail operator, typically there are a number of key business units, who deliver services to customers. Depending on the nature of the business, there will be the following business units:

•An operating division, that contains train crews, i.e., drivers, guards, ticket inspectors, passenger attendants, and any staff that serve food in bistros or other serving outlets

•Station staff, who sell tickets, clean stations (sometimes), provide information to customers, refund money, etc

•Signalling staff, who set signal routes, and control the movement of trains. In some railways this function is fully automated, or a very small number of people perform this function.

•The control centre, from which the network is operated. This is usually a large room with a large central control panel or view screen in the middle of the room, which displays the position and status of trains. There are varying levels of automation for this type of system.

•A business unit that deals with liaison with external parties, such as government, other companies, infrastructure companies, and customers. This unit is sometimes referred to as media relations.

•A department that contains cleaners, both for trains and stations. Rail companies, especially ones that move people, need a lot of cleaners. This type of work may or may not be outsourced.

•Support services, such as Human Resource Management, payroll, Information Technology, legal, finance and the like.

•Auditing and business reform, and this group often contains project people, who are responsible for implementing some types of business improvements. This group may also perform audits to standards and other quality like documentation.

•A safety department, who are responsible for some parts of safety. This group may perform audits, and investigate incidents that potentially may have become accidents. This group is also responsible for publishing a list of rules for how trains are managed and driven.

There may be other departments, and each rail operator is different.

The other type of rail organisation that will be discussed in detail here are rail infrastructure companies. There are lots of these as the EU requires member countries to separate out these functions from rail operators. A lot of information is available on the internet on the details of these companies, and many of them are very large. These companies can be split into operational groups that include:

•Minor maintenance, where the workers perform routine maintenance, and inspection equipment. This is a large part of the overall company in terms of numbers of staff.

•A group that performs larger maintenance, which requires heavy and specialised equipment. This group may also complete projects. This department often has a large part of the overall maintenance budget.

•A safety assurance group, which inspects and assures maintenance is performed to the standard expected.

•An engineering group, which maintains corporate knowledge of new engineering systems that are available for rail technology. This department will often publish the network statement, which details under what conditions trains can travel through the network. Network statements and similar documents are discussed further in the chapter on freight.

•A planning group, which decides what projects and major work to perform. This group will also often liaise with external parties and other companies.

•A procurement group, that either organises or supervises the purchase of major materials and equipment

•Support functions, such as finance, HR, legal, and others.

Rail infrastructure maintainers have large budgets, and are often unable to recoup their costs through access charges. Governments usually provide a substantial subsidy to these companies to keep them solvent. As a rough rule of thumb, maybe 25 -50% of their costs may be recovered from fees and other charges to rail operators. The rest usually comes from government, although in some cases may come from land or other taxes in the area around the railways. The author has seen many company reports for this type of company, and they often feel the need to have a long complex annual report with much financial information. They always report a profit, which is a bit strange as most of their funds come from subsidies or taxation.

All large industrialised countries have extensive rail systems, although the purpose to which these railways are put varies widely. Almost all Western countries have sophisticated rail systems (even the Vatican has a small railway!). Andorra has no railway. Most of the European railways are very extensive and have been in existence for at least 100 years. Europe is cris-crossed with large numbers of rails and tracks. Rail is a central part of the lives of most Europeans.

The situation is the United States is rather different from Europe. The rail system in the US is dominated by freight, and passenger networks whilst large are rather small when compared to size of the population. There is almost no high speed rail, and commuter rail systems are mostly limited to the New England area. Light rail is common in the US, and there are some large systems, for example Los Angeles. For a country that has displayed a high degree of technical leadership in many fields, it is surprising to many that the rail industry in the US is so quiet, or at least this is how it seems in Australia. Countries that are active in the rail sphere are France, the UK, Italy, China, Germany and Japan.

This has a profound impact upon the rail industry, and the effect of this cannot be overstated. A complex industry such as rail lends itself to the establishment of one country as a leader in the field, who can define the overall direction of the industry, initiate innovations, and develop new technology. There is no real substitute for the US as technical leader, and so often things in the rail industry can be unclear. For example the development of clear high quality technical documentation within the rail industry is rather ad-hoc, somewhat disappointingly.

The rail industry in Japan is an interesting one, and there is much to learn from that country. Japan has a number of large rail companies who manufacture rail equipment, such as Mitsubishi. The Japanese have invested heavily in research and development in rail technology, and their understanding of rail concepts is generally good. Their high speed rail systems are well run and well maintained, and their technology, especially for tilting trains is excellent. The Japanese rail industry is however very fragmented, and there are numerous rail companies in Japan. In cities such as Osaka there may be 4 or 5 smaller commuter railways, in addition to the subway, that move passengers from the city centre to the suburbs. The high degree of fragmentation, in the author’s view, robs them of the ability to demonstrate their ability in rail systems. Their rail companies do not seem to have the critical mass to create a persona in the larger rail industry, which means that their excellent rail technology and systems seem to go unnoticed.

Japan was the first country to implement high speed rail. Their high speed rail system is very good, and has operated for almost 50 years without any fatalities from train collisions or derailments (but other deaths have occurred, and they are difficult to prevent entirely). Japan has a very large number of rail systems, much of which is narrow gauge. The high speed rail system between Tokyo and Osaka is the busiest in the world, and operates profitably.

Japan itself has a large number of rail lines, but limited rail freight. Metro systems in Japan are common, and can be very large. Tokyo has a very large commuter system as well, and the high speed rail system that is so well known. Japan also has the busiest monorail system in the world, as well as the world’s busiest metro system. The Tokyo metro system is extremely large, and moves the most people per day of any rail system in the world.

Within Europe the French seem to be the most advanced for rail technology. They too invest heavily in developing it, and their high speed trains are very good. In Paris the metro system is operated by the RATP, and this company manages transportation systems in dozens of countries. France is home to the International Union of Railways, the UIC, which publishes standards and other documentation on rail technology and the management of rail systems.

Canada has some interesting rail systems. There are two old metro systems in Canada, located in Montreal and Toronto, and some large light rail systems in Calgary and Vancouver, and some others. There are two very large freight companies in Canada, who run large operations. There are also significant commuter railways operating in Toronto, as well as Montreal. Perhaps the most interesting railway in Canada is the Vancouver Skytrain, which is a fully automated light rail system. This system is discussed extensively below.

The Calgary C-train is an interesting rail system because its costs of operation are so low. Railways often benchmark the cost for each passenger journey, and this is an important number. Calgary has a cost of operation at about 30c per trip (Canadian 2005), a very low amount. They set the standard for reducing costs to a lower level, and have written interesting documents on how to reduce costs.

It is possible to do a lot of benchmarking with Canadian railways. They have every different type of system, and publish interesting articles on rail planning and the management of railways. The author recommends in any rail planning work, to make a quick comparison with one or more Canadian railways, as there is usually some good information to draw upon. The Canadians also have a good understanding of the operation and management of railways, and can be trusted to produce good quality materials.

South East Asia has very good rail systems. The rail system in Hong Kong is truly outstanding, and this railway is considered by many in the region to be the best in Asia, if not the world. This sometimes provides some amusing situations, as rail professionals from Europe know little of the system in Hong Kong, whereas in Australia and Asia the rail system there is held in the highest regard.

Hong Kong’s rail company is called MTR, short for Mass Transit Railway. It operates a very impressive railway, and is one of the few profitable railways in the world today. The MTR network is a professionally run efficient operation, and there is much to be learned from travelling through their system. In this book many examples are used from Hong Kong. The main system in Hong Kong is a metro system, although there is a moderate size light rail feeder system in Tuen Mun. Some of the things that make Hong Kong’s system so good are:

•A simple ticketing system

•Well laid out stations with good passenger information

•Cheap tickets

•Stations placed in useful and convenient places

•Extensive shopping centres and other facilities placed over the top and near stations

•Shops within the stations themselves, usually bakeries, banks and convenience stores

•It’s clean, tidy and safe

•Extremely impressive station design, allowing for very efficient transfers from one line to another

•Easy to use ticketing machines, in multiple languages

•Obvious help points, with staff empowered to offer refunds

•Fast travel times

•Large number of interconnections with surrounding buildings and facilities

•Good cost control

Hong Kong is an example of a rail system that has been improved through constant innovation and attention to detail. There are a large number of innovations installed throughout their system, and in many of the chapters in this book there is some discussion of these, and how they work. Perhaps the greatest advantage of the MTR system is its simplicity, and ease of use.

Whilst there are some railways that produce profits, most are financially very poor performers. Many railways require constant financial support from government, although there are some railways where support is not needed. It is possible to operate a profitable railway, but it’s not easy. The vast majority of railways are loss making, and require substantial subsidies to remain in operation. Railways that are profitable are usually drawn from the following list:

•Metros that have very high numbers of passengers, or have some level of property development that supplements their income

•High speed rail services that are well designed and operate between two very large cities (such as Tokyo to Osaka)

•Tourist railways that can charge large amounts for the pleasure of the ride

•Some freight railways, especially ones that move coal or other bulk materials. In Australia these railways are so profitable that they can even support the entire cost of the infrastructure in addition to the cost of rollingstock

•Train services where the cost of the infrastructure is not paid for or the government provides the use of the infrastructure at a greatly reduced rate

•Rail cruises, where very high prices are charged for long distance travel on trains, usually over several days or even more

The key to operating a rail system that generates a profit is a well designed system, and the movement of lots of people or freight. Both are required.

Rail cruises are a very interesting new type of rail company and service. Whilst they do seem to be a relatively new innovation, the Orient Express is one type of rail line that is often seen as being very similar to a rail cruise. Rail cruise trains are often very luxurious and richly furnished. Australia has a small number of these, and there are some in Malaysia and India. They provide high quality food and accommodation to guests. This type of service is almost always privately operated for a profit.

The kinds of systems that operate at a substantial loss are:

•Most metros

•Almost all light rail systems

•Tram systems

•Most commuter systems

•Train systems operating in airports, which don’t charge money for the trip, but are paid for by the airport

•Some high speed rail systems

•Monorails with low levels of patronage (which is many of them)

Light rail systems are particularly poor in terms of returning their costs of operation, although there are always exceptions. The problem is that the light rail as a system is characterised by low capacity, and struggles to move enough people to recover its costs. Some light systems were very expensive to build, and the Vancouver Skytrain, an automated people mover, being a good example. Intermediate capacity metros also sometimes suffer from the same problem.

Another particularly interesting light rail system is Metro de Porto, in the Portuguese city of Porto. This system is really a light rail system, but has many of the features of a metro system. Built at substantial cost, and always losing money, this system is very pretty and looks visually very impressive. This system has also won awards for energy efficiency, which makes it useful for benchmarking and comparative purposes.

Combining rail systems with property development and management can be a very successful way to raise revenue. Hong Kong MTR has really pioneered this type of rail planning and construction, and it seems to be relatively uncommon in Europe and the US. This is sometimes called Transport Orientated Development, or TOD. In the construction of the New Delhi metro, this model was closely followed. There is a lot to be said about how to go about this, and there is a chapter in combining property development with rail project further down in the book.

The list of metro systems that produce a profit is interesting. The author is aware of at least the following:

•Tokyo metro

•Taipei metro

•Hong Kong MTR

•Singapore SMRT

•New Delhi metro

•Moscow metro

•Osaka metro

Hong Kong MTR has shares listed on the stock exchange, and is easily the best known profitable railway. Their annual reports make for very interesting reading, as the focus is clearly on property management, and not on moving people. The first part of their annual report is entirely devoted to various statistics on property management.

Singapore SMRT and the Tokyo metro are also listed on stock exchanges. Taipei metro is interesting because it operates at an extremely low cost per passenger kilometre, and is able to generate a profit because its costs are just so low. Moscow metro moves huge numbers of people very efficiently.

A number of rail systems exist in airports. Some airports are so big that a train system is needed to get around within the airport. Both Hong Kong and Singapore airports have rail systems which are surprisingly large given they are entirely contained within the airport. Other cities that have these systems include Osaka, and Taipei. All fully automated, these systems operate without drivers. JKF airport in the US also has one of these systems. The rail system typically used in airports is an Automated People Mover (APM), which is a type of rail system where the rail vehicles are very small, and the trains are driverless.

A small number of rail systems code share with airlines. This unusual situation allows customers to buy a combined ticket with an airline that includes travel on a train. This type of arrangement is used in Germany and Switzerland. It is important for the railway, if it is participating in this type of alliance, to have good quality services that are reliable and efficient. Also, a code share agreement would be unlikely with a rail service without reserved seats, such as a metro, but much more likely with a regional service or an intercity connection.

Swiss airways has a code share agreement with Swiss Railways for any trips from Basel through Zurich and then on to any destination as served by Swiss Air. Two tickets are issued for the trip, one for the train trip and the other for the airline. Whilst there is a lot of information on code sharing on the internet, the author has struggled to find information on combined rail/air services. One suspects that this arrangement works only with difficulty, and should be only reserved for cities with no airports, with reserved seating on trains to a city with a large airport.

In general the relationship between rail and air transport seems to be improving. It is becoming more common for rail companies to provide check-in facilities at very major stations for air travel. The way this works is that passengers buy a ticket to the airport on the rail system, and the price of the ticket includes the ability to check-in luggage at the station, for a journey on a plane. Check-in is performed at the station away from the airport, and luggage is transferred by the rail system to the airport.

Checkin for Airlines at a Station

The photo above shows the air check-in counters at KL Sentral in Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. The ticket barriers stop passengers for using the service without buying a rail ticket in addition to the plane ticket. Once through the barriers, passengers go to the check-in counters to check-in their baggage.

REFERENCES

1. Zhang, Y & Yan, X & Comtois, C Some Measures of Increasing Rail Transit Riderships: Case Studies, Chinese Geographical Science, Volume 10, Number 1, pp 80 – 88, 2000

2. BTS Group, Annual Report 2009/2010 (the Bangkok Skytrain)

3. DG-TREN, Final Report BOB Railway Case – Benchmarking Passenger Transport in Railways, Aug 2003

4. Ang-Olson, J. & Mahendra, A. Cost Benefit Analysis of Converting a Lane for Bus Rapid Transit -Phase II Evaluation and Methodology, National Cooperative Highway Research Program, Research Results Digest 352.

5. Taipei Rapid Transit Corporation 2013 Annual Report, http://english.metro.taipei/ct.asp?xItem=1056448&ctNode=70219&mp=122036

6. banedanmark, Profile brochure, http://uk.bane.dk/publikationer_eng.asp?artikelID=915

7. Infrabel, Network Statement, Version of 9/12/2011

8. banedanmark, Network Statement, 2012, Jan 2011

9. Infrabel, Annual Financial Statements 2010

10. CFL, Rapport Annuel, 2011 (In French)

11. Metro de Porto, Annual Report, 2009

12. Jernbaneverket, On Track 2010

13. Koppenjan, J. & Leijten, M. How to Sell Railways: Lessons on the privatisation of Three Dutch Railway Projects, European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research, Sept 2007

14. Prorail, Network Statement 2013

15. Andersonn, M. Marginal cost of railway infrastructure wear and tear for freight and passenger trains in Sweden, Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute (VTI), Department of Transport Economics, 2011

16. Fabian, J. The Exceptional Service of Driverless Metros, Journal of Advanced Transportation, Vol 33, No 1, pp 5-16

17. Kimijima, N. et al New Urban Transport for Middle East Monorail System for Dubai Palm Jumeirah Transit System, Hitachi Review Vol 59, (2010), No 1

18. Cheng, HY. High Speed Rail in Taiwan: New experience and issues for future development, Transport Policy 17 (2010) 51-63, Nov 2009

19. MTR, Annual Report 2012, https://www.mtr.com.hk/en/corporate/investor/financialinfo.html#02

20. Cervero, R. & Murakami, J. Rail and Property Development in Hong Kong: Experiences and Extensions, Urban Studies, 2009 46:2019 Aug 2009

21. Scarsi, G.C. & Smith, G. Different Approaches and Responsibilities for Investment Sustainability in EU Railway Infrastructure: Four Case Studies, EUI Working Papers, RSCAS 2010/88

22. BSL Management Consultants The Cost of Railway Infrastructure Status-Quo and Ways Ahead, Presentation to the ProMain Council of Decision Makers, Brussels Nov 2001

23. Metro de Porto Annual Report 2011, http://www.metrodoporto.pt/en/

24. SMRT Corporation Ltd Annual Report 2013, http://www.smrt.com.sg/Investor-Relations/Annual-Reports

25. Gaylord, MS. & Lester, D Suicide in the Hong Kong subway, Soc Sci Med, 1994 Feb; 38 (3): 427-30

26. The Government of Western Australia Public Transport Authority, Annual Report 2010-11, http://www.pta.wa.gov.au/PublicationsandPolicies/AnnualReports/tabid/106/Default.aspx

27. International Union of Railways Line Comparison Study, Project Report of the UIC Asset Management Working Group, Jan 2011

28. South Coast British Columbia Transportation Authority Translink 2009 Annual Report, http://www.translink.ca/site-info/search-results.aspx

29. Transportation Research Board National Research Council TCRP Report 2 Applicability of Low-Floor Light Rail Vehicles in North America, 1995

Part 2 – Rail Technology and Systems

Chapter 3 - Describing Rail Systems

Chapter 4 - Types of Rail Systems

Chapter 5 - Other Parts of a Rail System

Chapter 6 - Rail Systems Drawing and Configuration

Chapter 7 - Rail Infrastructure

Chapter 8 - Rollingstock, Capacity and Seating

Chapter 9 - Stations

Chapter 10 - Freight

Chapter 11 - Major Facilities and Rail Systems

Chapter 3

Describing a Rail System

This brief chapter outlines how to describe a rail system. There is much in common with many different rail systems, and it is possible to accurately and simply describe many of the different rail systems that exist around the world. It is useful to do this because this allows comparison and benchmarking, and much can be learnt from performing these comparisons.

There are several commonly used parameters that can be used to almost completely describe a rail system. Many of these are described below. Some of them are related to the size of the network, the number of people that use the system, how the system is used by its passengers, and some other useful information. Rail planners will find this information very helpful in comparing rail systems.

Passenger Systems

Number of passengers per day

The total number of passengers is a very important measure. This total is usually calculated from ticket sales, or possibly from the number of people passing through the barriers each day. Normally a work day is used, and weekends are not. Frequently in most rail systems more people use it on a weekday than on a public holiday or on a Sunday.

A person who commutes to work, and then returns home, their trip is counted as two separate trips. A trip is where the person enters the rail system, travels through the system to their destination, and then leaves the system. Where a passenger changes trains, this does not count as two separate trips under normal circumstances. However there are some rail systems when changing trains does count, for example, where two different companies operate trains in the same city, such as Tokyo, or where the passenger changes from one rail system type to another, such as from a metro into a tram.

An alternative name for trips is boardings.

Below is a general guide as to the size of a rail system, and whether it is large or small.

Rail as a transport system is capable of moving very large numbers of people. Buses may only move small numbers in comparison, as a reasonable sized bus may move 60 to 100 people, and a commuter train may move a thousand. One of the great advantages or rail systems is the ability to move large numbers of people. A BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) system that has 20 buses per hour, will only move between 1200 to 2000 people per hour for one line in any one direction, and for rail transport this would be considered a very low number. Even the largest BRT systems are small in comparison to a large rail system.

Route Length

The route length of a rail system is an important metric. Rail systems can be very small, but can also be very effective. A small system can move very large numbers of people, especially if it is a metro, even it is quite small. Tram and light rail systems often have a very small number of kilometres of route length, whereas a regional rail system can be extremely large.

Route length is normally measured in kilometres, unless it’s in North America or the UK. Care