Will it work?
Could ten or so containers of pork originate in Waterloo, IA, run autonomously to an NS IM terminal in Chicago, and then add themselves to a regular ole freight train for movement east?
I’d like to think so, but I don’t think I’ll live to see it.
Having every car powered would sure add to maintenance woes.
Would there not be signalling concerns on some rail lines with a single autonomous railcar running?
Since it appears the first version to be for car load type movements, bulk or box car type, they’re going to have to reopen a lot of spurs to factories and warehouses. Of course those that were built, as a majority have been, within the last 30 or 40 years, no where near a railroad track are just SOL. Until they develope their intermodal version.
The dispatching and control will also need to be automated. Railroads will probably need to become “open access” infrastructure companies, either in part (separate infrastructure and operating divisions) or in whole (only infrastructure).
Who’s going to plug in the vehicles to recharge the batteries? How often and where? Will the shipper be responsible to ensure the thing is fully charged before leaving their facility? What if it needs to be recharged before it reaches it’s destination? Whom ever owns the things will have maintenance facilities, but enough and properly sited to take care of them?
Possible? Yes. Practical?
Jeff
Few issues after reading this article… It says the vast majority of railcars are waiting for locomotives… Incorrect. Out of North Americas 2.1 Million carfleet. 1.65 Million are private cars. Those cars are not waiting for engines to move them. Private carriers have various uses for their cars; SIT(Storage In Transit), storage of product, holding for product.
Also what’s the increased tare weight of the autonomus cars with their batteries? How much will this eat into net weight? These independent cars will be designated as trains for track authority. How will that be achieved on a Class 1? Who pays for access fees? Where will these cars transload product at?
While it’s an idea. Not sure if it’s one that’s feasible in its projected role as of now.
Well, if you consider all the cars that are parked in classification yards getting sorted and waiting to connect to outbound trains, you can “maybe” see what they’re trying to pass off, but it’s definitely a gross mis-characterization of how railways work and a “bit of a stretch” to say the only reason they’re waiting is because they need a locomotive. The idea that autonomous railcars would solve that is just ridiculous.
And the corralry - how many locomotives are sitting waiting on the avilability of a crew to operate it?
Just an attempt at applying the autonomous truck concept to the rails.
What’s next? Autonomous barges?
If an autonomous train hits and autonomous barge and no one is there to hear it, does it make any sound? [:-^]
Didn’t the UK have something like this at one time? I think they were like big flatbed trucks on railroad wheels and you just hooked them nose to tail.
Ken:. Surprise!! I agree with you that it could work if you can overcome the typical “can’t be done” obstacles you are so familiar with.
With all the added “trains”, would blocks have to be shortened to fit them all? If blocks are shortened, how will that affect trains of normal length? What happens on grades where they don’t have enough power to get over them?
These guys do not understand the problem, which is aggregation and disaggregation.
They do offer a solution to the aggregation issue, short, direct, single purpose trains. Their marketing problem is that the solution can be attained with conventional locomotives. There is no technical reason that the IC can’ run a day’s worth of intermodal traffic from Waterloo to Chicago behind one unit. If these guys can automate their vehicles, the rail carriers can automate their trains.
The problem with their solution is that if widely adopted, the results will be many more train movements. On a single track line increasing the number of movements increases the number of meets by the square of the number of trains per unit of time. Can you spell gridlock? You can prove that to yourself with a piece of paper. Construct a model subdivision, say 200 miles. Assume time on duty not over 12 hours, say not over 10 hours departure to arrival. Space sidings say 30 minutes run time apart, say 20 miles. You have 9 intermediate stations. Now start dispatching trains. At 1 train per day have no meets. At 2 trains with 12 hour staggared start have no meets, but if both start at the same time have one meet. Add trains. Meets will increase as the square of the number of trains.
Even with double track, trains would be so dense that maintenance windows would become impossible, so third main track would probably become the default configuration on many main lines. Hot flash, track, signals and dispatchers aint free!
Mac
This was practical with John Kneiling’s integral-train equipment using something like the BR ‘wiggly-wire’ control system… circa 1967. It becomes much easier with battery-hybrid power and effective CBPTC.
Part of the point, then and now, is that the autonomous cars aggregate into ‘trains’ to occupy the main and then separate (whether on the fly or in a yard) for last mile and then ‘as necessary’ probably with human attention last-mile. The idea of lots of little ‘rail trucks’ running around separately is a bit better than the original Pennsylvania State railroad in the 1830s, with electronics replacing the half-way posts… but it was unworkable for any particular scale of PRT in the mid-'70s and not much has changed since then.
The British slip coach
I never quite understood why they did not try this with motor trains for services like the ACE; there was certainly precedent with the Brighton Belle for that general style of equipment…
When I was very small I thought the New York Central ran MU trains to Harmon where a locomotive would attach on the fly to speed the trip to Chicago…
I like the general line of thinking. Just stand trackside along today’s supposedly busy mainlines. At Berea or Rochelle, for example, where two vital double track mains cross or run alongside one another, you can sit for 2-3 or more hours sometimes without a train in sight! Of course there are plenty of less-busy rail lines that see far fewer trains per day, and in some cases where train counts are in single numbers per week. That’s when the idea starts to make sense. Why shouldn’t these rails be as truck-busy as the nearby Interstates!
Most of the daylight time when you are not seeing train action at Main Line railroad what you are actually seeing is MofW working somewhere outside your location. Daylight Dispatchers generally work in concert with MofW for those people to get all the duties they are required to accomplish - the weekly and more frequent routine inspections on to large gang operations such as tie & surfacing, curve patching (transposing and/or installing new rail) as well as rail gangs installing new rail. Additionally bridge gangs are working on bridges and need protection from trains.
The Big Picture is much more expansive than a rail fan can see from their own location.
Deshler gets, on average, 50 trains a day, more or less. That’s an average of about two an hour.
As mentioned, sometimes you’ll see a couple of hours pass with zero traffic on either line.
And there are times when Deshler is like a parking lot - three trains at South Deshler, trains waiting west of town (or east), and trains dragging through eastbound because the NorthWest Ohio intermodal facility is clogged.
I see a similar phenomenon at Utica when I’m there, although sometimes that’s the “halo” around Amtrak.
Well, they can’t take the railroad to gridlock. And there must be MofW time.
But many rail lines have some unused capacity and this just might be a way to use that capacity profitably. Let’s go with Waterloo, IA - Chicago interchange. And do not forget to add in Cedar Rapids - Chicago interchange.
The big Kahuna in Waterloo would be Tyson pork. I don’t see one train per day meeting the market need. A telling complaint that I’ve heard more than once is that if a shipper is 20 minutes late to an IM terminal it will cost 24 hours delay because they’ll have to wait for the next day’s train. Not good.
With this equipment it MAY be possible to run inexpensive short intermodal trains east after each Tyson production shift. And possibly such trains could hold for a load that was going to be a few minutes late to the terminal.
The target market in Cedar Rapids would be breakfast cereal from Quaker and General Mills. These IM trains could “Convoy” right after the Waterloo trains.
East and south of Chicago the equipm