Railway Gazette (Intl) of this date carries the following headline:
“Rio Tinto to introduce driverless trains# by 2014”
20 February 2012
FTA:"…AUSTRALIA: Rio Tinto confirmed on February 20 that driverless trains would begin running on its Hamersley and Robe River iron ore network in Western Australia’s Pilbara region during 2014…"
FTA_“…Rio Tinto is currently investing A$14bn over five years to expand its iron ore production from 225 million tonnes per annum to 353 mtpa by 2015…”_
FTA_: "…****At present the 1 500 km rail network operates around 300 trains a week, using a fleet of 148 locomotives and 9 400 wagons to move 630 000 tonnes of ore a day. Each train is typically 2·4 km long, with a loaded weight of 30 000 tonnes and a top speed of 75 km/h._
Admittedly, The Rio Tinto systems are closed and would not involve equipment and outside personnel. The main question that seems to be 'How would the area of the Cab and track in front of the Trains be monitored? Would they just put someone on board to watch and report in event of an accident?
Yes, Black Mesa and Lake Powell in Arizona was crewless as far back as the 70s I believe…not sure if that is still the case however. And google had a driverless car a year or so back that apparently drove itself across Nevada.
It was designed to be crewless, with an “observer” riding along if something failed. I think there was a Trains article on the BM&LP that said they never were able to get it to work so were using two person crews.
The Muskingum Electric Railroad also trialed crewless operations back in the late '60s.
Railroads in the Pilbara region of Australia have to pay a premium for Traincrew and Miners due to the extreme remoteness and harsh conditions. The locomotives have Microwaves and CD players, etc. Crews work on a rotational basis, with no family and they live in relatively austere quarters.
The state of Navada has decided to allow robot automobiles on to their highways for test purposes. They have to carry a special license plate identifying them. We already have drone aircraft piloted remotely. We could have drone trains also. While not crewless, they would have the advantage of having remote crews that would report to the same place every day on a predictable time schedule. No crew fatigue.
I guess I can see a closed railroad, a closed loop system perhaps, that would’t need an onboard tender or human. Built in cameras and sattellite GPS should cover all situations so that everything could be automatic with remote override possbile from anywhere in the world. There’s a neat 21st Century target business…one that will operate all the trains on any and all systems from wherever their headquarters are: jet rocket helicopter service on standby in case of trouble; back up computer system at four universal locations; back up sattellites at four quadrants; can handle any number of trains on single or multi track railroads, 24/7; and live operators to take your calls.
Maybe that can be done from a home office as well. Time to log in as I’m running a double stack over Cajon in a minutes…but before I do I’ll put out the trash and feed the dog.
How interesting things will become when hackers learn how to hack the train controls. The TSA will have lots more to worry about than a grandpa standing trackside, or a grandma trying to ‘smuggle’ her shampoo on board an aircraft, resulting in a strip-search.
But at least the news will become more interesting; too bad for those that will be paying the price…
But it affects us all…no one is immune. All we can do is embrace change and try to keep up. Although I say that, I find it as hard as anyone to do it…I grew up in the 70s when high technology was a black and white TV and a telephone in the house. Now I’ve got customers who want to know if I’m hooked up to “the cloud” (back in the day that could have been taken differently as well…ha ha) !.. I’m just getting around to learning what all that is…and I always seem to be behind the eight ball on technology. Personally I prefer simple… not everything needs a GPS or a camera… And kitchen appliances don’t all need to whistle or play melodies, but that’s just my “outdated man from the 70s” opinion. Anyone remember appliances that you turned on by pressing an ON button? In retrospect that’s so intuitive…now it seems you’ve got airplane controls for everything and you’ve pretty much got to do a raindance to get anything to work properly anymore.
I’m not a fan either…but I can see it coming. Sure, technology can go awry…but terrible things can happen when people are at the controls as well…anyone remember the CN accident near Hinton, AB in the 1980s? Two fully crewed trains ran head on into each other… no attempt to apply the brakes by either crew was made although passengers in the dome car of the VIA train who survived the collision could see it coming well in advance, one man reportly shouting OMG he’s on our track!!!
I am always looking for progress, safety, something new…but this conversation is making me think we are dangerously eroding the integrity and self preservatoin of mankind dismissing him off into a role of just observing life going by instead being a part of it. I know this comment has no place here on a railfan page, but the comment is begged by the content.