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| Great Continental Railway Journeys 05/12/2012 at 23:54 #38767 | |
Ben86
126 posts |
Just a quick note on the BBC series that's coming to a close, in case you're interested and want to catch up on iPlayer. This is the European follow-up to the British version fronted by Michael Portillo, and has covered places as far afield as the French Riviera and Budapest. There is a repeat of the Swiss episode on BBC2 at 00.10 GMT tonight, which culminates in the climb up the Jungfrau. There is a brief scene in the signalling 'Control Tower' at Zurich (not sure whether that's how they refer to it locally), where one of the signallers describes the true extent of some of the delays on the Swiss railway and another outlines an interesting timing pattern for trains arriving and departing. If you are in the UK, you can view this video here- skip to 25m30s if you just want to view the Control Tower scene. Log in to reply |
| Great Continental Railway Journeys 06/12/2012 at 10:00 #38777 | |
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Jan
906 posts |
Are you referring to this building? It's official designation is "Zentralstellwerk Zürich", which, if literally translated, means "Zürich Central Signal Box". In Britain, it would probably simply be called Zürich PSB.
Two million people attempt to use Birmingham's magnificent rail network every year, with just over a million of them managing to get further than Smethwick. Log in to reply The following user said thank you: Ben86 |
| Great Continental Railway Journeys 06/12/2012 at 10:30 #38778 | |
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kbarber
1742 posts |
" said:Are you referring to this building? It's official designation is "Zentralstellwerk Zürich", which, if literally translated, means "Zürich Central Signal Box". In Britain, it would probably simply be called Zürich PSB. That's the one. Equipment inside seems an interesting mix - the sort of synoptic diagram used with NX panels, but worked by VDU workstations (that also have a full track display as well). I suspect substantial re-equipment over the last 20 years (there have been some significant enhancements to the Zürich rail network during that time) but the original indication panel retained (probably enhanced) to give a full overview. From observations at Kandersteg some years ago (and assuming the BLS system is the same as SBB - I can't imagine it's otherwise) the method of operating is rather different to what we're used to. It seems that NX operation has been abandoned. Rather, the Fahrdienst (Signalman) clicks on the description of an approaching train and gets a drop-down menu of routes/destinations to select from. I wasn't able to tell how far ahead the route would set (or what discretion there was to set a part-route so a conflicting move could be allowed first or whether alternatives could be selected at will). But it seemed a very efficient system - this was one of the busiest weekends of the year, in August, and at the time Kandersteg was dealing with car carrying shuttles at 15min intervals each way plus the full passenger service (with some extras) and even the occasional freight. Moreover he was granting an engineers possession on one line down the valley near Blausee-Mitholz. The old NX panel was still present and certain routes had to be unset and set on the panel to grant the possession, so it looked as if routes needed to be called (or at least authorised in some way through the panel locking) before the VDU system could take over. (This was before the base tunnel opened and I suspect control has subsequently been transferred to the new zentralstellwerk at Spiez, which had already taken over the line from Spiez to Interlaken.) The Swiss timetable is something to see in operation! The timing pattern is even more carefully devised than the signaller describes. At every station where connections are made trains (and buses - they're completely integrated and co-ordinated) arrive in increasing order of importance. The most important arrives last, has the briefest stop then departs and is followed by all the others in decreasing order. (Obviously there are plenty of parallel moves at the bigger locations.) This happens at every station in Switzerland, every hour, throughout the day. And you can set your watch by it. (Just to illustrate how precise their operation is, some years ago we stayed at Erstfeld, on the Gotthard line, at a time when there was an engineering blockade on one of the two tracks alongside lake Lucerne; obviously it wasn't possible to get all the trains through without delay so there was some late running. But every train was the same minutes late every hour of every day - and you could still set your watch by them!) Incidentally, an article in Modern Railways some years ago describing the introduction of the regular-interval timetable (the Taktfahrplan as they call it) said that Zürich Hbf was chosen to be the central node from which the whole timetable was developed. Log in to reply The following user said thank you: Ben86 |