Colorado Diesal Railcar-
90 people
2 miles per gallon
100 miles=50 gallons to go 100 miles or .555 gallons per person.
Automobile
4 people in a carpool
35 miles to the gallon
100 miles=2.86 gallons to go 100 miles or .71 gallons per person(4 people)
Desiel Train hauling 10 cars
1000 people
5 gallons per mile
100 miles=500 gallons or .50 gallons per person
So the train is only slightly more effciant and when you factor in the cost of the track and crew it comes out even. The cost per seat on Colorado railcar is 17,000 a seat add in a buck a mile for track rental and 100.00 a hour for crews and you might as well buy every one a 15,000 Ford Pryus
Your logic has several flaws, perhaps the two most noteworthy being the assumption that all seats on the 10 car train will be full all the time…and that in the car pooling scenario, that all 4 riders will have common origin and destination points (a real rarity)
Again, land use is not considered. A double track railroad carries as many people as an eight lane highway. And if the railroad is electrified, coal or nuclear power or hydropower or whatever can be used instead of (imported) oil.
Another flaw is the asumption that there will be 4 people in a car instead of 1 person each in 4 cars.
However I agree that rail is not nearly as efficient as advocates claim.
Mass transit (both rail and bus) travel many underutilized miles (miles in which their gallons per passenger mile usage are far worse than any auto) in order to provide service. Notwithstanding joy riding the auto is parked except when needed for transportation.
An honest evaluation would probably show that overall some transit systems result in the use of more fuel than if the riders drove themselves.
I used to reguarly drive (once a week) between Fairfield CA and Sacramento. Nearly every trip I saw a commuter bus with only one passenger. That seems like a real waste, but it is likely that bus needed to ma
Railroads likes lot of stuff that moves from point a to point b and no stops in between.
If I could get 1000 people to agree to ride the 5:55 train every day from Niagara Falls To Buffalo and sign a monthly contract for a year it might make it worthwhile
I have been actively pursuing fuel-mileage numbers for trains as well as annoying people on this Web site about how trains are not as fuel-saving as people think. On the other hand, I have “issues” with the Colorado Railcars 2 MPG rating – it seems way too low.
I am told an intercity bus gets about 7 MPG on #2 Diesel (about 6+ MPG gasoline equivalent). Most of the power consumption on the bus is overcoming air drag because the high-pressure tires on a bus are reasonably low rolling resistance and the bus is mostly at constant speed on the Interstate and not pulling tonnage over big hills like a coal train.
A Colorado Railcars DMU is “supposed to get” 2 MPG according to the Colorado Railcars Web site (I suppose they should be able to rate their own equipment). A DMU carries 90 people or about two busloads, so it is getting, per person, only 2/3 the fuel mileage of a bus.
Now, a bus that is 8 feet wide and 12 feet tall has a projected frontal area of 96 sq feet. A Colorado Railcars DMU is 10 feet wide and 14 feet tall to the tip of its rooftop radiators or about 140 sq feet. That tells me that the DMU should get over 4 MPG, but on a per seat basis do about 50 percent better than an intercity bus. Instead, per person it gets 2/3’s the mileage of an intercity bus.
That Colorado Railcars only claims half the fuel mileage that they should get based on bus standards (the thing has bus/truck-style Diesels in it anyway), I wonder what is going on.
One possibility is that the 2 MPG is in commuter service with frequent stops – Colorado Railcars may believe that their market is selling to Metra instead of to Amtrak. The DMU, meeting all of those FRA safety standards and having its own propulsion, is a real brick, weighing in at around 85 tons according to their Web site. An intercity bus weighs in around 15 tons (about 30,000 lb – you can kind of figure that out because they are 8-wheeled – two steering wheels and 6 rear wheels split between two tan
Forgot the bus…Seems like the Bus wins in Fuel efficency and service if Greyhound would have there own lanes on the highway in denesly populated corrodors. We need to lower the FRA standerds and have lightweight europeon trains
The assumption of a 10 car pasenger train burning 5 gallons per mile is WAY off.
Let’s use an F59 locomotive as an example.
Let’s also assume a 10 car commuter train + the locomotive weighs 720 tons.
In Run 8, an F59 burns 150 gallons/hr and produces 3000 HP. At 60 mph this equals 2.5 gallons/mile. At 90mph this equals 1.6 gallons/mile.
So you can see, even at a constant Run 8 throttle, the 5 gallons/mile is way off.
But here is the kicker:
To move the above 720 ton, 10 car train at 60 miles/hr only requires around 950 HP!
That is Run 4 on the F59.
In Run 4, a F59 only burns 52 gal/hr which is 1.2 MILES PER GALLON!!
Much, much better than the orginal poster assumed.
Using his 1000 person per train example, a 100 mile trip (at a steady 60 mph)would require just 84 gallons of diesel. That equals 0.084 gallons per person.
Of course, this assumes a steady 60 mph on level track. You would also have to account for acceleration from stops, and going up any grades (but you get a free ride on a down grade, so this probably equals out).
In any event, I think you can see why railroads really are a much more efficient form of transportation than highway travel.
The 10 cars behind an F59 – am I to assume this is the Toronto GO Transit setup? A steady 60 MPH, 1.2 miles per gallon, 10 car train with 1000 seats, we are talking 800 seat miles per gallon or about 4 times better than a bus or 8 times better than a car. As far as the 950 HP at 60 MPH, are you talking about the Bombardier double decker cars? What is the air drag coefficient of one of those things when it is leading in push-pull and what is the coefficient when it is trailing? What is the drag coefficient on the F59 locomotive when leading and when trailing in push-pull?
On the subject of a 10-car commuter train pulled by a single F59, I am not sure it is operated at a constant 60 MPH in commuter service. With that small amount of locomotive pulling that many cars, I bet that puppy is in Run-8 just trying to accelerate that load up to any kind of speed until you have to cut the throttle and brake for the next station, and if Metra operations are any guide, your average speed is about 35 MPH in this kind of service.
But let’s focus on intercity operations. I find hard data on intercity train fuel use hard to nail down, although the generally used number is that Amtrak peaked at 50 passenger miles per gallon in the 90’s and lately they have been in a slide down to 30 passenger miles per gallon according to ORNL stats.
Here is a data point. L. Marre, The Contemporary Diesel Spotter’s Guide, 2nd Edition, page 294 talks about Amtrak experimenting with a 9300 gallon fuel tender to make Chicago-Seattle on the Empire Builder without enroute fuel stops. Add another 1000 gallons for each of 3 F-40’s (back in the day), you are talking about 12,000 gallons to go 2500 miles. Allow that they want to leave some margin and not coast into Seattle on fumes, figure 4 gallons per mile. Also figure on 5 Superliner coaches and 5 Superliner sleepers for 550 seats on this train, that is about 140 seat miles per gallon, about a factor of 5 off the F-59 pulling 10 cars.
It costs more a year to handle the roads construction than for a railroads. They probably do maintenance on the roads more than 8 times what they do on the rails in a year. Besides, “daveklepper” is right. A double track can carry as many as an eight lane highway. I am one of those people though who just sticks for railroads. I still say roads are alot more money to maintain though.
I have been seeing Helm units my whole life. I was wondering if anyone ever sees HLCX, HATX or HLGX out there in the west with BNSF or UP? I’m out here in Ohio and CSX is a lease freak, and all 3 of those leasers always come. BNSF I heard leases from FURX aaand LMX. I heard UP leases a WAMX??? But is there any Helms’ out west?
Gee, what is a Megajoule per passenger-km mean? A joule is the same as a watt-second which turns out to be roughly as much as a BTU, of which there are 125,000 BTUs in a gallon, and when the dust settles . . .
European trains and buses are neck and neck at 100 Passenger miles per gallon. Cars are at about 50 passenger miles per gallon, and planes (for their short trip lengths) are around 25-30 passenger miles per gallon.
You are worrying too much about drag coefficents. In Railroad physics, at the speeds we are talking about, train mass and rolling friction play a much, much greater role than the drag coefficient difference between say an F40 vs. an F59 or P42.
It really dosen’t matter much if the commuter train is push-pull, or has single or bi-level cars. What really counts in fuel consumption is the overall efficiency of the locomotive, the rolling resistance, the mass of the train, and track gradient and curvature. The Davis Equation clearly shows this.
As far as acceleration, 3000 HP can get a 7-10 car commuter train up to 60 mph within 2 minutes from a station stop. Unless the stops are very close, or there is an upgrade from the stop, most of the time between stops is partial throtttle operation.
I think you are also grossly underestimating the power of these locomotives. Boston’s MBTA has no problem pulling packed “crush hour” commuter trains on a tight schedule, with many stops, at 70+ MPH with a single GP40 or F40.
You average speed of 35-40 mph sound about right (exception will be expresstrains with fewer stops), but most of the time is lost sitting at stations waiting for hundreds of passengers to get on/off.
I got my figures directly from EMD Engineering, so if you want to argue with them from something you found in a railfan publication, be my guest.