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Chicago L Timetable

You are here: Home > Forum > Simulations > Timetables > Chicago Loop > Chicago L Timetable

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Chicago L Timetable 30/12/2014 at 18:23 #67205
GeoffM
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6376 posts
Good work everybody!
SimSig Boss
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Chicago L Timetable 30/12/2014 at 21:44 #67208
Jsun
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212 posts
I have noticed trains entering at Clinton and Merchandise Mart do not stop to perform station duties and continue right away. Is this a Sim limitation? At current the first real notice you have for Brown trains is the train being checked at the diamonds which causes a delay.
Last edited: 30/12/2014 at 21:45 by Jsun
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Chicago L Timetable 01/01/2015 at 22:29 #67288
leigh
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" said:
I was thinking a fictional timetable might be more fun..
Agreed. I write train timetables for a day job, and find the Chicago timetable very frustrating with all the conflicting movements and trains booked at the same platform at the same time, which is very unrealistic. Although I completely understand why they write the timetable this way.

I think in the future I may try rewriting the timetable to remove all the conflicting movements. It would be any interesting test of capacity on the loop under a number of different service patterns.

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Chicago L Timetable 15/01/2015 at 01:00 #67826
postal
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5264 posts
Run through the full timespan of the TT which kept me on my toes for a lot of the time - thanks to Guy for the TT and the challenges it poses.

One thing I did notice is that every train entering at Roosevelt arrives at the Tower 12 Junctions some minutes before their scheduled times at Harold Washington Library or Adams/Wabash. This means that trains often have to be held at SX6 while trains due round the Loop in front of them make their way over the junctions. Is this prototypical? If not, does anyone know whether there is any recovery time in the real TTs between Roosevelt and Tower 12? Otherwise, is the entry point actually at Roosevelt or at some point between Roosevelt and Tower 12 which would mean that the entry times should be a little later than the downloaded times at Roosevelt?

“In life, there is always someone out there, who won’t like you, for whatever reason, don’t let the insecurities in their lives affect yours.” – Rashida Rowe
Last edited: 15/01/2015 at 01:01 by postal
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Chicago L Timetable 15/01/2015 at 05:25 #67830
GeoffM
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" said:
One thing I did notice is that every train entering at Roosevelt arrives at the Tower 12 Junctions some minutes before their scheduled times at Harold Washington Library or Adams/Wabash.
On the handful of times I have actually been on that segment, IIRC we've always been stopped at that junction. JerseyMike's earlier comment suggested there was a reader device there which might require the train to be in very close proximity before it decides to set a route.

In terms of distance it should be about right (enters in the first block after Roosevelt station). But yes trains do seem to be early. There was an S-curve close to Tower 12 which was eased several years ago (off hand I think it was 10mph, now 25mph) which *might* have a bearing on it.

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Chicago L Timetable 15/01/2015 at 12:10 #67853
Jersey_Mike
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Rapid Transit scheduling is always more about headway management than keeping to the timetable. For New York the public schedules say things like "every 7-12 minutes" or in Philly we have the classic "every X minutes or sooner". Yeah...thanks, real helpful there.

The worst thing you can have happen is bunching. This is where a leading train gets delayed resulting in greater platform crowding ahead of it...which causes even more delay. Meanwhile the follower runs closer to its leader, resulting in reduced dwell times because of the decreased headway. Now you have bunched trains with a packed leader and one or more empty trains running right behind it. Last time I was in Chicago I saw bunching at waiting for an Orange Line train at Clark and Lake. I waited nearly 20 minutes for a train then two showed up back to back.

I doubt SimSig has any mechanism to simulate bunching by increasing dwell times in porportion to how long the headway has been, but bunching requires a concerted effort to eliminate and most transit agencies don't bother, New York being an exception. In my case my Orange line trains stayed bunched all the way to Midway airport, where the leader did a very quick turn and departed almost as soon as he had arrived. The proper way to combat bunching is to either have the first run skip stops (forcing passengers to take a train back if they were getting off) or to hold all the trains ahead of the gap until the followers catch up. The former results in angry passengers, the latter requires a lot more management holding trains.

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Chicago L Timetable 15/01/2015 at 17:36 #67885
Muzer
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London Underground I think are well aware of the issues of bunching, especially because the Circle line used to be an actual circle so there was no chance to recover! (They changed the route a bit quite a while back now so that it's a spiral instead, obviously much easier to handle because it has termini). You frequently hear "this train is being held here to even out the service" or something along those lines (I can't remember the exact words).
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Chicago L Timetable 15/01/2015 at 18:19 #67889
KymriskaDraken
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" said:
Rapid Transit scheduling is always more about headway management than keeping to the timetable. For New York the public schedules say things like "every 7-12 minutes" or in Philly we have the classic "every X minutes or sooner". Yeah...thanks, real helpful there.

Maybe a way to get round this problem with the Chicago sim would be to mark stations on the loop itself as "stop to set down only" and only have a "real" arrival and departure time at the entry station.

Last edited: 15/01/2015 at 18:59 by KymriskaDraken
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Chicago L Timetable 16/01/2015 at 08:21 #67919
clive
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" said:
London Underground I think are well aware of the issues of bunching, especially because the Circle line used to be an actual circle so there was no chance to recover!
Actually, since nothing else used those platforms in normal service, you could (and they did) hold a train in platforms 1 and 4 at Aldgate; all the recovery time in the timetable was put there. (On the Outer Rail you could also use platform 2 at Gloucester Road, since the District only used it late evenings.)

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Chicago L Timetable 16/01/2015 at 10:53 #67923
Muzer
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True, but am I right in thinking that generally the timetables weren't laid out for trains to spend as much time at Aldgate as they would at normal termini, hence the issues?
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Chicago L Timetable 16/01/2015 at 13:28 #67930
Jersey_Mike
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Can late trains arrive out of order in this sim? For a headway service like Chicago I suspect that once the next headway rolls around they would just annul the delayed run if the problem is at the terminal or if the delay is en-route the trains would arrive bunched.

BTW this looks fun.

http://www.transitchicago.com/travel_information/alert_detail.aspx?AlertId=26612

Last edited: 16/01/2015 at 13:29 by Jersey_Mike
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