Speed

[Robert E. Rathke]

Within the past hour I returned home to Lake County from downtown Chicago
via a Metra commuter train.  The train covers 35 miles in 48 minutes,
including 6 stops.  The train runs at 50-60 mph and the ROW  for about 10
of those miles is in a suburban area with back yards (many without
fences) right up to the tracks; many homes are within 100 feet of the
tracks.  It reminds me a lot of Drake.

I'm not saying that ROW doesn't need to be separated from residential
property, but in many cities like Chicago suburbs, the two are in open,
close proximity.  With the heavy commuter rail operations here, there are
accidents, but they usually involve cars driving around down crossing
gates, and people crossing tracks in stations.

Bob 10/20
                                       -------------------------------


On Wed, 20 Oct 1999 13:01:30 -0700 Jim Holland <pghpcc at pacbell.net>
writes:
>Greetings!
>
>John Swindler wrote:
>
>> The discussion about Broadway operation in Beechview leads to 
>speculation
>> about the following:
>> 
>> - So what exactly is a "light rail" line???
>
>	Some great observations, John, to really make one pause and 
>think!
>
>	This discussion has come up in a number of places.  At first 
>*blush*
>light rail seems to refer to tonnage.  Railroads are heavy rail -
>streetcar lines are light rail - BART, MARTA, etc are somewhere in
>between.
>	But this is *not an entirely correct* assumption according to 
>the
>following definition:
>
>	Parkinson & Fisher's North American Public Transportation 
>Glossary
>has 		the following entry as a definition of light rail:
>
>	transit system, light rail (LRT) - as defined by the TRB 
>Subcommittee 	
>on Light Rail Transit, "a metropolitan electric railway system 	
>characterized by its ability to operate single cars or short
		trains
>along exclusive rights-of-way at ground level, on aerial
		structures,
>in subways, or occasionally, in streets, and to 		board 
>and discharge
>passengers at track or car floor level." 		Derived from 
>the British
>Light Railways Act of the last century 		which permitted 
>construction of
>unfenced railways to "lighter" 		standards than mainline 
>railways.
>Reintroduced as light rapid 		transit in the 1960s with 
>the above
>meaning. Rapid 		transliterated into rail as it crossed 
>the Atlantic a
>decade 		later. Light refers to lighter and less 
>expensive 	
>infrastructure, the light rail vehicles themselves often
		weighing 
>more
>per passenger space than heavy rail cars!
>
>> - And how is it different from a "streetcar" line???  Or a "tram" or
>> "trolley" line???
>
>> - Is it the vehicle or the right-of-way - or both that define a 
>light rail
>> line???  Or something else???
>
>	It seems that it is mostly the infrastructure that defines a 
>light rail
>system.
>
>	Remember that after WW2 as the car became more popular, it was 
>quite
>unpopular to have streetcars.  Streetcars were disliked, ridiculed,
>laughed at,  . . . . . . . [fill in the blanks].
>
>	With the realization that some kind of rail transportation was 
>needed
>in the cities (by the late 60s into the 70s) one wouldn't be able to 
>use
>the term streetcar because of all the negative press that had been 
>given
>to that term.  So the term *light rail vehicle* was introduced.
>
>	Strictly by the above definition, the old 42 DORMONT could be
>considered light rail.  It could discharge passengers at track level, 
>it
>had much exclusive right of way, a tunnel, and some street running.  
>And
>even with the use of downtown city streets, there is little difference
>in time between the old streetcar lines and the modern lrv to get from
>SHJ to downtown and back!
>
>	And again, by the above definition, the lrv line thru 
>Beechview,
>Dormont, Mt. Lebanon to Castle Shannon and on to SHV is also light 
>rail.
>
>	A-N-D  the old PCC as well as the Peter Witt as well as the 
>PRCo
>low-floor cars as well as the Philly Nearside as well as . . . . . 
>(you
>fill in the blanks) could also be considered light rail vehicles 
>because
>many of them performed on lines to fulfill the above definition.  Many
>today would want to dispute that but that would seem to be from 
>personal
>prejudice.
>
>	But in the end, and especially in Pittsburgh, while the route 
>is
>different than PRCo routes, it is still serving the same identical
>destinations over the same old PRCo prw (with the exception of the
>little leg into SHV) and still serving the very same  OLD  PURPOSE  -- 
>
>CARRYING  PEOPLE  FROM  POINT  'A'  TO  POINT  'B.'  The modern lrv
>ain't doin nuttin different than the old streetcars - they just give 
>it
>a souped up name - just psyching the public!
>
>	I think it is unfair to compare the Beechview line to the 
>Norristown
>line; the former starts in downtown and goes into the suburbs while 
>the
>latter starts in the suburbs and goes much further into the suburbs. 
>The said suburbs in Pittsburgh are much more dense than the suburbs
>surrounding the Norristown line.  The Norristown line is much more 
>grade
>separated all the way and the two lines are totally different.  Those 
>at
>the Museum know Paul Vassallo and about 1970 he had said that is was
>very uncommon to have people walk along the tracks on the Norristown
>line; he could not say it didn't happen, but that it was very 
>uncommon.
>
>> - Have you considered that the Duewag U-2 car is not a light rail 
>vehicle?
>> It's a "Stadtbahn" (or city railway) car from Frankfurt, (W.) 
>Germany.  (And
>> therein might lie some of the problems with Broadway.)
>
>> There's a story that Ed Tennyson (Deputy Sec. at PennDOT during 
>1970s) likes
>> to tell.  Gov. Shapp once asked him "what is this 'light rail' 
>thing?"  Ed
>> asked the governor if he had ever used the Shaker Heights line when 
>he went
>> to college in Cleveland?  When Gov. Shapp said "Yes, and it was good
>> transportation", Ed replied, "well, that's what light rail is!"
>
>> And maybe that's what the 42S line through Beechview - isn't.  It's 
>still a
>> streetcar line (operating in mixed traffic), and will always be one. 
> It's
>> just not worth the cost to upgrade to eliminate mixed traffic.  And 
>it would
>> also be less accessible to local residents.  Instead, perhaps 
>Pittsburgh has
>> always had a light rail alignment through Overbrook.  And what PAT 
>does with
>> it remains to be seen.
>> 
>> Just some random thoughts.
>
>James B. Holland
>------- -- ---------
>        Pittsburgh Railways Company (PRCo), June of 1949 -- June of 
>1953
>    To e-mail *off-list,* please click here: mailto:pghpcc at pacbell.net
>N.M.R.A.  Life member #2190; http://www.mcs.net:80/~weyand/nmra/

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