Read all about it.
Newpaper article comparing costs and results with IL effort. Regular 110 mph operation to start this year!
http://www.southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051231/News01/512310376/CAT=News01
Fairly detailed ITCS presentation from March 2005.
http://www.ntsb.gov/events/symp_ptc/presentations/07_Kollmar.pdf
Locomotive hardware is Ultracab based. Another positive outcome from the Chase MD tragedy.
Interesting!!
Can you spot the reason why the Michigan project is working and the Illinois one is struggling?
Look at who is the project manager, GETS - Signals (formerly Harmon Ind.) for Michigan,
Lockheed-Martin for Illinois. Looks like another Aerospace company is trying to reinvent the wheel, and Illinois is paying for L-M to learn. Why oh, why couldn’t they get US&S, GRS, or Safetran, Siemens, or Alcatel involved. Somebody who doesn’t have to start from scratch.
I agree!
In my experience, Harmon has a better “git-r-done” attitude than any of those other “old line” suppliers, too.
But, in fairness, the ITCS project still uses fixed blocks but the IDOT-PTC is attempting moving blocks. (why? I have no idea. Mainline track capacity is rarely the problem when congestion occurs. It’s getting in and out of the terminals.)
The Europeans can’t seem to get Moving Block to work yet either, and they have been pouring more money into the effort than Illinois has been.
Then, I say, lets get on with it!
Since the loco hardware for ITCS is an Utracab derivative, it may not be all that expensive to retrofit to NS and CSX locos already Ultracab equipped.
If there were 80/20 funding for capital improvements, we’d see things start to happen all over the place.
Don-Thanks for bringing this up.
I have often felt that the 100 to 110 mph operation, mid-speed if you will, could produce a decent service at a reasonable cost. Without getting all the details as to what part was R&D and how much the starting point benefited the porject cost, I would have to say that $40 million for 66 miles is a great deal. Hemphill had once said that lineside signal CTC installation runs about a million a mile, so I would have to share your view that it comes in fairly cheap.
Jay
…and that $40M included the upgrade to class 6 track!
But, that’s a fairly straight and flat piece of RR. And, they don’t have to deal with much frt traffic.
Even if you have an area with lots of 2 degree curves, you can jack up the superelevation to 6" and use tilting coaches ala Acela or Talgo and still get going for pretty cheap.
some how this design looks like a flash back like the old turbo liner???[?][?][?]
It is. It’s just part of my signature. They guy in the blue sweater is me…a few years ago.
Was able to get a cab ride through the MI section last fall. Impressive, but noisy, control system. Lots of beeps and alarms to keep the engineer alert. Will make a penalty brake application if engineer takes insufficient action.
This is really what the NTSB is after as an answer to the two similar Metra wrecks at 47th St and others.
Cost figures are not too unreasonable for a simple “overlay” on top of an existing CTC system. Big cost if you have to put in the CTC also, though. Federal regs also insist that every engine operating on the territory be equipped with the control system, so it can get interesting if you are a commuter operation that also hosts or runs on a freight line.
Bottom line is that it makes all engineers equal to the power brake curve assumed for the consist. A “hot” engineer would not be allowed to run up on a restriction/station/whatever and make a hard application in the interest of making time. System would enforce a prescribed speed reduction. Not necessarily a bad thing, but it does remove some of the individuality of operating.
Dan
Curious. Where was the picture of the turbo train taken. For a while it was in Chicago-St Louis service on the ex Alton& Southern line maybe about 1973 or 4. Don’t know where they went after that, maybe just to storage until the Amtrak-State of New York fiasco?
Jay
Both the French TGV and the German ICE use a combination of cab signals and trackside CTC. Both systems run trains up to 190 mph, but they are still terrestrially based. A few years ago, I remember reading that the US Navy had decided to quit teaching sailors to use a sextant, as all ships are now using a satellite based GPS system. Sounds great, but what if… communications are disrupted, a satellite malfunctions, the lag time causes problems, etc., etc.