New Tramways - Does anybody know persons to present the idea
Mathias Boelckow
I am an activist in the green party of Hamburg. Actually we are trying to
promote a new tramway-system for Hamburg. The old tramways last service was
in 1978.
We have now two major problems in the promotion of the system, that
contains a 42km network and will replace in the beginning some overcrowded
bus-lines. The first is, citizens have still the old system in mind with
cars from the 50ies, not very fast and comfortable but noisy. The second is
the prejudice that tramway-systems are nothing for metropolis, that shall
have metro-lines, but for smaller towns. And this is my question about:
Does anybody know any activists for new tramway-systems in towns >1.5
Million inhabitants being put successfully into service in last 10 years,
preferably in Europe?
Gruß, Mathias Bölckow
Palle R Jensen
Denmark called the RUF system. Its development is supported by the Danish
Government and EU together with private companies (Siemens and
others). See: www.ruf.dk or download www.ruf.dk/ruf.doc
It is a system based upon the Dual Mode principle. This means that all
vehicles can both drive on the roads and "ride" on top of a monorail.
This new principle can solve a lot of problems:
Electric cars can be implemented without battery problems since small
batteries can be recharged on the monorail.
Congestion can be eliminated because the vehicles use the monorail in stead
of the highway.
Energy consumption can be reduced by a factor of 3 at high speed because RUF
cars are closely coupled in trains while they use the monorail sections. Oil
dependence will be minimized.
Stress and accidents can be reduced because the vehicles drive automatically
on the monorail network.
RUF combines the best of trains with the best of cars and busses. You can
drive from your home a few miles to the monorail network. Without waiting
you are automatically guided to join the vehicles on the network at 20 mph.
Between the intersections the speed is increased to 95 mph in cities or 120
mph between cities. On the network you can use your time constructively via
the internet connection integrated in the RUF car. The car can safely be
used as a part of the office. You can earn money while you commute.
RUF is not only for cars. A minibus called maxi-ruf can be used for public
transport in a very attractive way. The maxi-ruf can collect passengers at
their doorstep (dial-a-bus) and bring them to the system where the chauffeur
leaves the bus and the bus enters the monorail and becomes a part of a
train. Inside the city, a number of maxi-rufs can run as a kind of "tram".
This "tram" runs without rails and without overhead wires. This is possible
because the batteries are recharged while on the monorail. A new tram-line
is extremely inexpensive to implement since no new construction is needed.
See: http://www.ruf.dk/maxi/p5.htm
All this and more can be obtained without using advanced technology, just a
new combination of known technologies. The concept is protected by 4 patents
but can be built on license anywhere in the world.
The concept has been recommended by many experts. See: www.ruf.dk/letters
A test track in Denmark has proved that the concept works. CNN has covered
the concept in March 2001. See: www.ruf.dk/cnn.doc
EU (program for Sustainable Development) has financed a program showing the
consequenses for Copenhagen. See: www.ruf.dk/rufcph.exe
The Danish Ministry of Energy has financed a simulator showing the
controlled flow of vehicles through a simple junction in the system. See:
www.ruf.dk/rufsim.doc and www.ruf.dk/rufsim.exe
Conclusion:
I think transport in the future will be organised as a Dual Mode system. It
is a very cost efficient and attractive way of handeling traffic problems,
energy problems and safety problems.
Palle R Jensen
RUF International
"Mathias Boelckow" <m.boelck...@gmx.net> skrev i en meddelelse
news:400c193c...@news.individual.de...
Ernst Kers
"Mathias Boelckow" <m.boelck...@gmx.net> schreef in bericht
news:400c193c...@news.individual.de...
> Does anybody know any activists for new tramway-systems in towns >1.5
> Million inhabitants being put successfully into service in last 10 years,
> preferably in Europe?
>
Paris: several lines,
London: Croydon,
Barcelona is under construction.
Mathias Boelckow
>I would like to draw your attention to a new system being developed in
>Denmark called the RUF system. Its development is supported by the Danish
>Government and EU together with private companies (Siemens and
>others). See: www.ruf.dk or download www.ruf.dk/ruf.doc
Well, that might be a solution for something, but not for the problems we
are actually facing in Hamburg.
>It is a system based upon the Dual Mode principle. This means that all
>vehicles can both drive on the roads and "ride" on top of a monorail.
We need something for level zero and a monorail looks not easy to pass for
pedestrians, bicycle-riders and cars. An without a rail, the system will
not stand the expectet chrush-load.
>This new principle can solve a lot of problems:
But none of them I mentioned. The solution is already existing and called
tramway. The task is now to implement it.
Gruß, Mathias Bölckow
Mathias Boelckow
Yes, exept Stockholm I have already the links. I was more asking for
people, who brought the idea forward. I hoped to find here some people, who
are able to bring over the idea of a modern tramway in a big town.
Gruß, Mathias Bölckow
Palle R Jensen
> >vehicles can both drive on the roads and "ride" on top of a monorail.
>
> We need something for level zero and a monorail looks not easy to pass for
> pedestrians, bicycle-riders and cars. An without a rail, the system will
> not stand the expectet chrush-load.
Tram speed is too slow to compete with the car.
RUF has a high speed network of monorails plus the ability to continue in
the streets. Your zero level requirement can be fulfilled together with high
speed. This means that the RUF-system can make cardrivers change to public
transport. This ought to be interesting for a member of the green party.
RUF is much better for bicyclists than a normal tram. There is no rail and
no barrier. The RUF-tram runs noiseless on rubber wheels on a normal
surface.
The cost of establishing a RUF-tram line is much lower than to establish a
normal tram line.
No rails.
No overhead wires.
Capacity is a question about both vehicle size and frequency. RUF has high
frequency and many vehicles can be driven by one chauffeur through the
streets.
I hope you will reconsider RUF
Giovanni Drogo
> cars from the 50ies, not very fast and comfortable but noisy. The second is
> the prejudice that tramway-systems are nothing for metropolis, that shall
> have metro-lines, but for smaller towns. And this is my question about:
I might partially share such "prejudice" (although I prefer trams to
buses, and I sometimes prefer to travel over ground than underground)
> Does anybody know any activists for new tramway-systems in towns >1.5
> Million inhabitants being put successfully into service in last 10 years,
> preferably in Europe?
In Milan (which has the size you ask for) trams were never abandoned.
Recently three partially new lines, called "metrotranvie", were opened,
but they are not so successful. I'll explain the whereabouts.
Milan has just 3 metro lines. Line 1 was opened in 1964 (as a result of
the massive post-war reconstruction works). Line 2 followed in the '70s,
and line 3 much later. This line was very costly, possibly because of
the "political overheads" (you've heard of "tangentopoli", haven't you
?). At the same time there were works for the "passante" (this should
be something like the main S-bahn trunk in Munich ... i.e. an
underground connection between state railways [actually FS *and* FNM]
which could be used also as an urban underground). This is presently
only partially open and is not a "passante" (pass-thru) but a dead end.
Delays were due to high costs and also because money shall come from the
state.
So when the municipal centre-left administration sunk in the
"tangentopoli" era, the following administrations were scared to embark
in any costly work, i.e. construction of new underground lines.
Thus the administration of major Formentini (which at the time was of
the Northern League, i.e. Bossi's party presently allied with Berlusconi
- he now is instead a member of the European Parliament with the
Margherita, i.e. centre-left) invented the idea of "metrotranvie" (a
"tranvia" is a tram line, but the suffix "metro" shall resemble
undergrounds which are called "metropolitane").
The project was funded and started, and has just been (almost)
terminated (last 2 of 3 lines were opened last December).
The present right-wing administration (major Albertini) was forced to
complete the works, but was not happy with them and said no more
metrotranvie but two new underground lines (and despite the fact I do
not like their policy, they may be right here).
The work for the "Metrotranvia sud" in particular were very slow.
Because of the mechanisms of contracts here, contracts have to be
awarded to whoever promises to make the job at the lowest cost, even if
they have no real competence. The original contractor did a huge mistake
with the curvature radius of the rails on a junction, and a new contract
had to be awarded.
The first metrotranvia (line 7) was opened a couple of years ago to
connect the provisional seat of the Scala theatre (Arcimboldi) in the
Bicocca area, where also the second state university was located. The
area had previously poor connections. The line should reach a railway
station close to the theatre and university, underpass the railway, and
connect to the metro line 1 at Precotto, and perhaps continue. Presently
it arrives at some 300 m from Precotto. There was huge contestation by
inhabitants of the area (which also fought successfully the project of
an urban motorway), because they wanted the tram line to be underground.
I took such line only once, and was unfavourably impressed because the
tram stood still at the railway station for some 15 minutes, because the
tunnel under the railway was one-way and it had to let the tram coming
from the other direction get out.
Line 4 or Metrotranvia nord was opened last december in conjunction with
a restructuration of bus and tram lines in the northern area of the
city. I believe it re-uses a former extraurban tram line. Looking at the
letters on local newspapers, people are not happy with its frequency.
Line 15 or Metrotranvia sud was also opened last december. Here the idea
was the following. Previously there were two tram lines from the centre
(n. 3 and n. 15) which connected at Porta Ticinese (i.e. a gate of the
ancient centre), then continued through a somewhat narrow road until a
place called piazza Abbiategrasso, then they had their own seat along a
large road. Line 3 stops at the municipal boundary, line 15 continues to
the external commune of Rozzano (this was a new extension of some 10
years ago). What they did was to build a new track for line 15 from
Porta Ludovica (some 400 m east of Porta Ticinese) to piazza
Abbiategrasso. Unfortunately not all of the track has a dedicated seat
or is in a large-enough road (although one exists some 200 m east where
bus 79 transits). Also the new track has taken over the route of bus
line 65 which has been abolished.
The terminus of line 15 in the centre has been moved, and is now
somewhere in between two metro stations (i.e. you have to walk more than
before). The route is longer although less affected by traffic, so one
does not gain much time. Also they promised to put new low floor trams
(the so called Euro-trams or Sirio, the green-black ones), but I've seen
only very few of them, but the older (not so old) orange jumbo-trams.
I have a disabled friend in a wheelchair in that area. He hoped to be
able to take the new trams from home. Before he could do some 2.5 km
along the large road to piazza Abbiategrasso and take bus 65, where all
buses were low-floor articulated. But now line 65 has been abolished,
and there are virtually no low floor trams on line 15.
I also took some of the new trams, and I must say that, although they
are nice looking and probably climatized during summer, they are not
comfortable (a recent letter said that the choice is "to seat having
one's feet stamped by standing passengers or to stand stamping on the
feet of sitting passengers").
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Mathias Boelckow
Giovanni Drogo <dr...@rn.bastiani.ta> schrieb/wrote uns/us:
>> cars from the 50ies, not very fast and comfortable but noisy. The second is
>> the prejudice that tramway-systems are nothing for metropolis, that shall
>> have metro-lines, but for smaller towns. And this is my question about:
>
> I might partially share such "prejudice" (although I prefer trams to
> buses, and I sometimes prefer to travel over ground than underground)
Maybe I was not clear enough. Hamburg has a metro-system since 1912. The
system was starting with a circular-line and was extended especially in the
60ies so we do have now 3 lines. But in the 80ies and 90ies due to
extending costs and limited resources there were only a few stations new
build. Still we have several quarters with large amounts of inhabitants
that are only connected by bus. Also tangential connections are totally
missing exept this former inner circle. With the actual speed of new
construction it would take the century to fix the most urgend leaks.
>Milan has just 3 metro lines. Line 1 was opened in 1964 (as a result of
>the massive post-war reconstruction works). Line 2 followed in the '70s,
>and line 3 much later. This line was very costly, possibly because of
>the "political overheads" (you've heard of "tangentopoli", haven't you
>?).
No, I have not heard of.
> At the same time there were works for the "passante" (this should
>be something like the main S-bahn trunk in Munich ... i.e. an
>underground connection between state railways [actually FS *and* FNM]
>which could be used also as an urban underground). This is presently
>only partially open and is not a "passante" (pass-thru) but a dead end.
>Delays were due to high costs and also because money shall come from the
>state.
We have it like in Munich, but the commuter-trains split into the two lines
between the major knots central-station and Altona, that was a town of its
own until 1937. The commuter trains take either the tunnel build in the
early 70ies or the old line next to the far-distance trains.
[lots of bad experience deleted]
OK, seems like Milano is not a good example. Well, I do expect less
problems as all lines will have passengers for an 10min frequency over the
day at least and each line can be build within a very few years.
Gruß, Mathias Bölckow
Giovanni Drogo
> Maybe I was not clear enough. Hamburg has a metro-system since 1912. The
> system was starting with a circular-line and was extended especially in the
> 60ies so we do have now 3 lines. But in the 80ies and 90ies due to
> extending costs and limited resources there were only a few stations new
> build.
The matter of costs is in part the same here (aggravated by the
"tangentopoli" effect, see below). And also by the availability of
resources ... Metro lines 1 and 2 were built, AFAIK, mainly with local
(municipal) funds (including special local taxes and public loans). Now
metro lines and passante (S-bahn like) require funds from the State, no
more local autonomy. May be this is better for you (is Hamburg am
autonomous Bundesland, isn't it ?)
> Still we have several quarters with large amounts of inhabitants
> that are only connected by bus. Also tangential connections are totally
> missing exept this former inner circle.
What is the area of Hamburg ? Milan municipal area (Gemeinde for you) is
quite small (186 kmq, inhabitants decreased from 1.8 to 1.3 million),
the surrounding smaller comuni (Gemeinden) together double the number of
inhabitants, but are not coordinated for transport.
Anyhow we never abandoned our tram network. Not all area of the city are
reached by metro or other urban railway, but most are reached by some
tram. However what you call tangential connections are somewhat poor. We
always had a tram circular line around the historical centre (now zone
1), and a circular trolleybus line around the boundary of the 1911 area,
plus two slightly outer lines (a trolleybus and a bus) doing about 270
degrees from NE to NW ... the north area is "open".
Nevertheless I'd prefer for speed a metro line (there are talks of line
4 and 5) to a tram.
> >the "political overheads" (you've heard of "tangentopoli", haven't you
> >?).
>
> No, I have not heard of.
Perhaps you've heard of it in another way. You surely heard of prime
minister Bettino Craxi, and of the scandals which lead to the
disruptions of PSI (socialist party) and DC (christian-democrat party)
in the '90s. A "tangente" is a sort of bribe or overhead which
contractors of public works paid to the parties (you had something like
that on lesser scale with chancellor Kohl). "tangentopoli" (the city of
tangenti) was the nickname of Milan at the time of such scandals.
Costs of public works were artificially inflated. We (taxpayers) paid
and the extra went to political parties.
> OK, seems like Milano is not a good example. Well, I do expect less
> problems as all lines will have passengers for an 10min frequency over the
> day at least and each line can be build within a very few years.
I do not understand the link between "less problems" and a "10 min
frequency" (are you considering that high or low ?). We have 90 sec
frequency on metro line 1 in peak hours, and that's saturated. We try to
have 5 min frequency on "force" tram lines during peak hours (consult
http://www.atm-mi.it/eng/oraper.htm for details), but car traffic is in
the way. Anything less frequent than that might not be considered
appealing for passengers.
I have nice recalls of 15-min frequency when I lived in Darmstadt, but
that is one tenth of Milano or Hamburg as inhabitants (and also traffic,
and had large roads with dedicated lanes ... I presume a collateral
effect of WWII bombing :-( and times could be kept).
What I believe is not good in Milan is the idea to leave technical
choices to politicians.
ATM had a nice line planning s/w already in 1975. I have copies of a
study commissioned by the Comune at the time (pre-tangentopoli era !).
The thing ran on some mainframe and produced plots on some calcomp
plotter, but the concept was sound, and the thing could probably run
much faster now. Essentially they projected passenger flux (which
included both public transport and car traffic) on existing or planned
lines, based on some parameters of "attractivity".
What I can criticize was the fact that the study was intended to
optimize load on the lines instead of "commercial velocity", but the
underlying software was sound.
One of the result of such study was for instance that the conversion of
the circular trolleybus into a metro line was not worth.
However such tool was apparently not used later (e.g. to plan metro line
3 or the new metrotranvie). Also there were other debatable choices of
political reasons. E.g. metro line 3 HAD to be opened at the time of the
football world championship (choice of major Pillitteri, who was the
brother in law of Bettino Craxi). The line was not ready, so they opened
only the stretch from Central station to Duomo. But this did not allow
trains to reverse, so they used just two trains, one per track in a
shuttle way, with a 10 minute frequency. Since tracks are on different
floors, one never knew which level the next train was departing. So
people still preferred trams to metro. Even later, when the rest of the
line was opened, stations are too far (about 800 m instead of 500) and
people preferred trams if available. And even now that line seems to me
undersaturated w.r.t line 1.
If you can plan your new tram lines on purely technical matter without
politicians meddling in, and if you can ensure they are not affected by
car traffic, possibly you could get less expensive results with tram
w.r.t. a metro.
I presume road crossings are the critical item. We have several
dedicated tram lanes, definitely more than any other place in Italy.
They are only mildly affected by traffic (most of them can be shared
with buses and taxis, some are really tram-only), but we have no
"semaforizzazione asservita" (just talks, I mean the fact that traffic
lights are slaved to trams). I've seen places in Holland where tram
lines underpass roads instead of crossing at level. If you can afford
that cost possibly a tram will be effective w.r.t. a metro.