Any thoughts on the CAM (Cambridge Autonomous Metro)?

[Bald Rick]

Just build a standard light rail tram. If you want to put it underground, put it underground. If you want to fit ETCS based ATO and run it like the DLR as "guard only operated", do that. But keep it standard. There is no need for the gimmickry. It will never win out in the end except in something simple like an airport shuttle where you'll run it self-contained for N years then rip it out and rebuild it. You want an extensible system for the long term, and steel rails two horses' backsides apart and DC "fizzy knitting" is the way to achieve that.

Stop being sensible!

 

[Ianno87]

I can just imagine a viaduct like that winding its way past King’s College.

Sorry, I now can't find the genuine artists impression someone came up with of exactly that!

 

[MarkyT]

I don't entirely get why we're looking at proprietary systems at all. They lock you into one vendor, so will always in the end cost you more.

Just build a standard light rail tram. If you want to put it underground, put it underground. If you want to fit ETCS based ATO and run it like the DLR as "guard only operated", do that. But keep it standard. There is no need for the gimmickry. It will never win out in the end except in something simple like an airport shuttle where you'll run it self-contained for N years then rip it out and rebuild it. You want an extensible system for the long term, and steel rails two horses' backsides apart and DC "fizzy knitting" is the way to achieve that.

Such proprietary and often experimental systems have always had trouble gaining hold with mature transport authorities because they know the dangers of becoming locked in to one turn-key supplier to engineer further extensions, purchase extra vehicles and ongoing spares requirements. How do they maintain support if the only proprietory supplier goes out of business for instance? Were the authority's contract lawyers clever enough to ensure rights to IP are secured and can they find an alternative supplier to reliably produce extra or replacement vehicles and components to those designs? All very expensive as overheads, especially for developing systems, and small cities making their first forays into guided transport run much risk of backing the wrong horse. I think there are examples of such systems in France that have been or are being replaced with more conventional technology after only a few years service. The world of autonomous pod tech is also replete with such proprietory lock in hazards. Your approach would be far more sensible and the local transport authority sector would do well to attempt to draw together common standards for various levels of transit system so different manufacturers' products can work together more readily.

What does this do for derailment containment? The parapet appears to be non-structural so this is entirely reliant on the rail guidance to keep it on the viaduct.

The Translohr single rail guidance system employs two opposed flanged wheels on the steering arm assembly, each inclined at approx 45 deg to the vertical. Their flanges reach under the specially shaped railhead to effectively clamp the vehicle to the rail. I expect the twin power supply rails on the NeoVAL implementation in Rennes might also provide some containment on plain track should the steering mechanism fail catastrophically.

Bombardier's similar GLT system had a single double-flanged guide wheel without Translohr's clamping feature, and installations suffered from derailments on street running sections. The GLT system is no longer supplied.

 

[HSTEd]

I don't entirely get why we're looking at proprietary systems at all. They lock you into one vendor, so will always in the end cost you more.

This isn't true for VAL however.

VAL vehicles have been built by multiple manufacturers, given that they are actually fairly simple. [Taipei fell out with Matra, and ended up maintaining its fleet without their assistance, then ordered replacement vehicles from Bombardier!]

Trams are not some magical tech that is uniquely immune to manufacturer lock in.

The real place technological lock in on these things happens is CBTC.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Trams are not some magical tech that is uniquely immune to manufacturer lock in.

No, they're indeed not magical. However they are completely immune to manufacturer lock-in, because the basic principles of them are not under patent. They are also well-tested, reliable, widespread and well-understood.

I just don't get rubber tyred metros other than in extreme cases like Lausanne where it was that or a rack railway/funicular due to the extreme gradient. They don't appear to have any advantage whatsoever and a lot of disadvantages. According to Wiki, there are just 8 systems worldwide. How many tramways are there again?

As for CBTC (Communications-based train control) isn't ETCS a standard, thus you can get your kit from any manufacturer? Though TBH I can't really see why a conventional tram with a squishy thing in the front seat would not work in this context. Just put some of it in tunnel (see Den Haag) if that is necessary.

Just build a tramway. It is the obvious, practical, inexpensive, standardised, off-the-shelf, extensible option. If you need to stick some of it in a tunnel, do so, building the tunnel based on existing, well-established road/rail tunnelling practice.

 

[MarkyT]

The real place technological lock in on these things happens is CBTC.

Which is a major reason why mainline railways have been pursuing open interoperability standards in that area for decades through the UIC, even before the EU got involved, and why NR desired an ETCS-based solution for the Thameslink core. The manufacturers were of course dead set against such efforts until European directives gave the standards some force in law, but what did the EU ever do for anybody?

 

[HSTEd]

Which is a major reason why mainline railways have been pursuing open interoperability standards in that area for decades through the UIC, even before the EU got involved, and why NR desired an ETCS-based solution for the Thameslink core. The manufacturers were of course dead set against such efforts until European directives gave the standards some force in law, but what did the EU ever do for anybody?

Manufacturer lock in wasn't even an issue for signalling systems until the death of vertically integrated railways.

 

[MarkyT]

Manufacturer lock in wasn't even an issue for signalling systems until the death of vertically integrated railways.

Yes it was. National railways were largely beholden to what products established suppliers were prepared to offer and support in that country. Signalling interoperability has been a core aspiration of the UIC on behalf of its national railway administration members since formation in the 1920s. Whatever your political views about Europe and the structure of railways, changing traction at borders simply to suit varying power systems and signalling is no longer sustainable, and impossible for multiple unit trains. Having to accommodate large numbers of separate proprietary onboard safety systems and their antennae in order to cross borders is also problematic as cross-channel operators found with the 373s and 92s, and ETCS even offers smart solutions to this by being able to safely emulate legacy systems using the onboard ETCS computer and DMI with plug-in hardware modules for antennae as required.

 

[Jozhua]

I don't entirely get why we're looking at proprietary systems at all. They lock you into one vendor, so will always in the end cost you more.

Just build a standard light rail tram. If you want to put it underground, put it underground. If you want to fit ETCS based ATO and run it like the DLR as "guard only operated", do that. But keep it standard. There is no need for the gimmickry. It will never win out in the end except in something simple like an airport shuttle where you'll run it self-contained for N years then rip it out and rebuild it. You want an extensible system for the long term, and steel rails two horses' backsides apart and DC "fizzy knitting" is the way to achieve that.

100% agree.

If it's going to be in a tunnel, more Metro-style, I'd like to see a high floor tram, perhaps one that supports decent top speeds if covering a long distance. But these are all things that exist within the remit of light rail already.(high floor trams - M5000's, decent tram/train top speed (62mph) - Class 399/Citylink). To be honest, I think most tram systems would benefit from high floors, but that's a conversation for another day!

You can do something innovative without trying to reinvent the wheel. For a city the size of cambridge, having a proper light rail/metro system, with underground tunnels, would be something quite new. Slap in some integrated fares, bike sharing and more busways and you have yourself a transit system that is pretty world leading.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I would go low floor, because it will make expansion easier, e.g. if there is a later plan to convert the Busway and connect it to that.

 

[stuu]

Whilst a tram would be ideal, I think there is logic to a guided bus tunnel as then services from everywhere can be improved from day 1, and then new segregated segments opened as necessary. I find it hard to imagine the Treasury funding tram routes out to Cambourne or wherever.

What I agree with others about is that trying to reinvent the wheel is completely pointless. They have a functioning guided bus system already, why on earth would you not just use that system?

 

[SargeNpton]

A Translohr tram in Clermont-Ferrand (home of Michelin so you can guess who supplies the pneumatic tyres).

 

[Bletchleyite]

A Translohr tram in Clermont-Ferrand (home of Michelin so you can guess you supplies the pneumatic tyres).

Translohr is a bizarre scheme - purely political just like the Michelin tyred metros in Paris. There is no benefit at all over a conventional tram and plenty of disadvantages.

 

[Jozhua]

A Translohr tram in Clermont-Ferrand (home of Michelin so you can guess you supplies the pneumatic tyres).

Translohr is a bizarre scheme - purely political just like the Michelin tyred metros in Paris. There is no benefit at all over a conventional tram and plenty of disadvantages.

Conventional steel-wheeled trams can do surprisingly steep grades! Sheffield Supertram has a 1 in 10 section going up to Meadowhall. Considering this, are rubber tyres even that nessacery?

Plus, steel wheels aren't really impacted by snow, ice, use less energy, don't wear out as much and don't suffer from tyre blowouts.

Translhor is more expensive (capitally and operationally), has worse ride and is less reliable.

The key issues with a lot of infrastructure is mostly due to right of way. The CAM plans have mentioned reducing tunnel bores as a way of reducing capital costs for that, but frankly the width of tunnels has little impact on capital cost of a tunnel-based project. Stations typically end up being the most expensive part of an underground rail system, changing the vehicles moving within that system will have essentially no impact on that.

If you do trams with a decent right of way and don't shove too many sharp curves in it (a.k.a Metrolink), it can be pretty quick. Using the existing busway corridors with tram train could work really well!

 

[D365]

Conventional steel-wheeled trams can do surprisingly steep grades! Sheffield Supertram has a 1 in 10 section going up to Meadowhall.

On the Meadowhall branch? I thought the steep gradients are towards Halfway.

 

[Bletchleyite]

If you do trams with a decent right of way and don't shove too many sharp curves in it (a.k.a Metrolink), it can be pretty quick. Using the existing busway corridors with tram train could work really well!

Precisely my thought - the Busway is ripe for conversion to tram at some point.

 

[camflyer]

Whilst a tram would be ideal, I think there is logic to a guided bus tunnel as then services from everywhere can be improved from day 1, and then new segregated segments opened as necessary. I find it hard to imagine the Treasury funding tram routes out to Cambourne or wherever.

What I agree with others about is that trying to reinvent the wheel is completely pointless. They have a functioning guided bus system already, why on earth would you not just use that system?

The Guided Bus is functional out of town but as soon as you hit the city centre you are sharing the same roads with cars, bikes and lorries.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The Guided Bus is functional out of town but as soon as you hit the city centre you are sharing the same roads with cars, bikes and lorries.

Nowt to stop you putting it in a tunnel. But to me the tunnel is going to be the expensive bit, so why go for an inferior technology (road buses) over a superior one (electric trams) just to save about 50p on the overall cost?

 

[stuu]

The Guided Bus is functional out of town but as soon as you hit the city centre you are sharing the same roads with cars, bikes and lorries.

Yes, so use that as the technology for the tunnel!

I find the notion the Treasury will pay £50m a mile to build tramways in semi-rural Cambridgeshire somewhat laughable. They may, just, be prepared to pay for some form of tunnel. But I can't see them going for anything with any technology risk

 

[Bletchleyite]

Yes, so use that as the technology for the tunnel!

I find the notion the Treasury will pay £50m a mile to build tramways in semi-rural Cambridgeshire somewhat laughable. They may, just, be prepared to pay for some form of tunnel. But I can't see them going for anything with any technology risk

What "technology risk" is there on a conventional tramway?

 

[stuu]

What "technology risk" is there on a conventional tramway?

I meant the proposals put forward recently

 

[Jozhua]

Yes, so use that as the technology for the tunnel!

I find the notion the Treasury will pay £50m a mile to build tramways in semi-rural Cambridgeshire somewhat laughable. They may, just, be prepared to pay for some form of tunnel. But I can't see them going for anything with any technology risk

I think the idea is that CAM will bring some magical 2x cost reduction. Whereas the real cost is the right of way, stations, not the mode.

Autonomous cars, Hyperloop, or any kind of gadgetbahn succoms to the fact you have to find somewhere to put it, wether that's on houses, woodland or in a tunnel, it's gotta go somewhere. At that point, you might as well go for the mode that can provide the most capacity on a given corridor, that usually ends up being rail of some sort, or buses in some circumstances.

Modern rolling stock can accelerate and brake very quickly, light rail can offer up to 62mph on newer vehicles, with decent levels of capacity and low dwell times.

It would be good to see if they could poach some of the workforce off Crossrail once completed, I'm sure there would be a lot of skilled people who would be well suited to a project like that. With the lessons learned on Crossrail, a CM (Cambridge Metro) could be delivered quite smoothly.

 

[ashkeba]

I am surprised that someone does not figure out a way run roll-on-roll-off services for bikes on the busways and connect it to Danish style easy biking measures to keep bikes moving around and across the centre. It could deliver volume and wide area coverage, while a bus tunnel only offers volume.

 

[Ianno87]

I am surprised that someone does not figure out a way run roll-on-roll-off services for bikes on the busways and connect it to Danish style easy biking measures to keep bikes moving around and across the centre. It could deliver volume and wide area coverage, while a bus tunnel only offers volume.

The busways themselves have excellent parallel cycle paths along them.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The busways themselves have excellent parallel cycle paths along them.

They do, but it is a good 30-something miles round trip (I've done it myself a couple of times). Would be nice if one could cycle one way and put one's bike on public transport the other way, but I do recognise the issues with too many people doing that. A cycle hire scheme like London's is probably the way to deal with that, I'm actually fairly surprised Cambridge and Oxford (as the UK's big cycling cities) don't seem to have them.

 

[Ianno87]

They do, but it is a good 30-something miles round trip (I've done it myself a couple of times).

Though it's well used for shorter journeys, e.g. to/from Histon/Impington in the north, or to/from Addenbrookes/Trumpington in the south.

Would be nice if one could cycle one way and put one's bike on public transport the other way, but I do recognise the issues with too many people doing that. A cycle hire scheme like London's is probably the way to deal with that, I'm actually fairly surprised Cambridge and Oxford (as the UK's big cycling cities) don't seem to have them.

There's been a couple of schemes in Cambridge; Ofo bikes for one. Except within weeks most ended up with locks smashed off and/or dumped in the river, so Ofo pulled out (though you still see people cycling abandoned/stolen ones around)

Trouble in Cambridge for a "Boris Bike" type scheme is finding pavement space for docking stations in enough places to make it convenient. Plus, the proportion of cycle ownership amongst city residents themselves is very high, and there's a very good second hand market for cheap bikes as a result, to get around day-to-day.

 

[Bletchleyite]

There's been a couple of schemes in Cambridge; Ofo bikes for one. Except within weeks most ended up with locks smashed off and/or dumped in the river, so Ofo pulled out (though you still see people cycling abandoned/stolen ones around)

In a way quite surprising to hear of that somewhere as genteel as Cambridge when it didn't happen in rough London. I wonder if the docking stations are key to that, though? If a bike is fixed in a docking station, it's not an easy and quick thing to do to pick it up and chuck it in the river.

Trouble in Cambridge for a "Boris Bike" type scheme is finding pavement space for docking stations in enough places to make it convenient.

Yes, true.

Plus, the proportion of cycle ownership amongst city residents themselves is very high, and there's a very good second hand market for cheap bikes as a result, to get around day-to-day.

I suppose there's also that. That's the reason I've only ever used the MK system once - typically if I want to be "out and about" by bike I'm riding my own, and there's more of a case for it in London as, unlike basically every other British city, the centre of London is vast.

 

[Ianno87]

In a way quite surprising to hear of that somewhere as genteel as Cambridge when it didn't happen in rough London.

Cambridge has its rough parts, pretty much like any city!

 

[D365]

Cambridge has its rough parts, pretty much like any city!

Can vouch for that.

 

[ashkeba]

There's been a couple of schemes in Cambridge; Ofo bikes for one. Except within weeks most ended up with locks smashed off and/or dumped in the river, so Ofo pulled out (though you still see people cycling abandoned/stolen ones around)

I think ofo lasted months not weeks but previous ones I think failed quicker. There are accusations of organised efforts to gather and trash hire bikes, each time.

Hire bikes are all well and good for people travelling in by train or coach but it is difficult to make a mass transport system from them without subscriptions and still the cycleway easements.

But I think people would prefer to ride their own bikes and not have to worry about being limited to luggage compatible with hire bikes. Some sort of "bike road ferry" seems like one possibility. Maybe it can even use the CAM tunnels after it fails.

Besides the obvious trams, maybe there are other possibilities but can anyone think of them?