innsertnamehere
Superstar
Judging by the length of it just 2. I doubt the UPX will ever really need more than that either.
Awesome updates, Drum and Mafalda! Thanks!
Does anyone know the design specs for the UPX Pearson station? Will it be able to handle 4-car trains or just 2?
I think the answer is neither. They order is for 2 end cars and 1 middle car I think.
They exercised the option. According to this page, "two to three" cars per train, so my guess would be everything's being built for at least three. Agree that the Pearson station doesn't look long enough for four.Pretty sure the middle cars are options, but I haven't found much definitive on the train length recently, I do recall back when they were planning to use budd cars they were talking about three car trains.
That should mean some good close-up photos of the new station and guideway.Not sure if it has been mentioned (sorry if it has) but November 8th is the date for the relaunch of the airport people mover.....not directly related to the topic but a clear sign of the progress being made.
I think the answer is neither. They order is for 2 end cars and 1 middle car I think.
Does anyone the specs on the new DMUs? I did a quick search, but I can't find much.
The Georgetown South corridor will have speed limits up to 90 mph (145 km/h), but the Sonoma-Marin line (with which we are sharing the order) is only being built for 79 mph (127 km/h). I hope the trains are fast enough to make use of our higher speed limits.
Here's a file that specifies the minimum design requirements that Sonoma-Marin desired;
http://www2.sonomamarintrain.org/us...Draft DMU Technical Specification 1-20-10.pdf
The UPE order was tacked onto the Sonoma-Marin one, so I'd imagine the specifications would be very similar if not exactly same. In the document it says the design speed is 90mph but the maximum revenue operating speed is 79mph. So perhaps the car itself is capable of 90mph but S-m didn't require that? Not sure. Anyhow that's the only public documentation I'm aware of myself.
Here's a file that specifies the minimum design requirements that Sonoma-Marin desired;
http://www2.sonomamarintrain.org/us...Draft DMU Technical Specification 1-20-10.pdf
The UPE order was tacked onto the Sonoma-Marin one, so I'd imagine the specifications would be very similar if not exactly same. In the document it says the design speed is 90mph but the maximum revenue operating speed is 79mph. So perhaps the car itself is capable of 90mph but S-m didn't require that? Not sure. Anyhow that's the only public documentation I'm aware of myself.
The 79mph number comes from the FRA regulations regarding passenger trains running on rail lines without any additional wayside safety systems (such as ATC or ACSES). They will run at up to 90mph in Toronto.
Vehicle specs say "Standard is 79 mph, option - 90 mph" (source: http://www.nipponsharyousa.com/nisshadmucatalog.pdf), so perhaps Metrolinx exercised the 90 mph option on their portion of the order.
The two manufacturers of DMUs that will be examined in this effort are both manufacturing
FRA compliant vehicles, and both indicate that their vehicles are capable of 90 mph service,
but both are also currently high floor vehicles. Nippon Sharyo does have DMUs in other
countries that are both low floor vehicles and are operating at 120 mph and higher. With the
proper track improvements all of these vehicles could exceed the present 79 mph limitation and
provide higher speed than existing service.
Because of the 90mph ability of the Nippon cars and their faster acceleration and deceleration,
additional station stops might be considered without degradation of travel times. The Metrolinx
Toronto analysis anticipated lower operating and maintenance costs from DMU equipment.
To add to the discussion of UPX fares (which for some reason is located in the Eglinton-Crosstown thread), I looked up some of the other Airport Rail Links that often get compared to UPX, and calculated their average speeds.
The services higlighted in blue charge a premium fare. You'll immediately notice that UPX is nowhere near the speed of other premium airport services, instead being more in line with ordinary commuter rail services.
Heathrow Express is often compared to UPX to justify high prices terms of service type. But it covers the 23 kilometres from airport to downtown in 15 minutes, compared to 25 minutes for UPX.
The pricing of other airport links should not be a justification for high ticket prices on UPX, because they provide a much more valuable service.
In 2020 when the ECLRT opens, i'd like to see both Bloor and Weston stations eliminated from UPX, to be replaced by Mount Dennis station. Hopefully by then we'll have plenty of local GO service along the Weston corridor so the loss of UPX will be inconsequential to those two stations.