# GERMANY | High Speed Rail



## C-Beam (Apr 11, 2006)

*Not so fast, gentlemen!*

Let me translate this article from the German business daily Handelsblatt:

http://www.handelsblatt.com/News/Un.../bruessel-entmagnetisiert-stoibers-traum.html

...The European Commision said it does not see any chance that the maglev line will be sponsered with EU money. The EU sponsors only cross-border or research projects, neither of which the Transrapid line in Munich would resemble...

..The mayor of Munich announced that he opposes the project and plans to use all legal means to stop it. He furthermore added that the current cost calculation is misleading and that the real costs would be roughly €350 million higher. The mayor also pointed to the fact that the project needs to be approved by the Munich airport in which the city is a shareholder and will use its vote to block any approval. As reason for his opposition to the project the mayor cited environmental and noise concerns....


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## genius (May 24, 2006)

C-Beam said:


> *Not so fast, gentlemen!*
> As reason for his opposition to the project the mayor cited environmental and noise concerns....


that's a nonsense!


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## Justme (Sep 11, 2002)

Noise concerns? The Maglev will be limited to 50db at night and 60db in the daytime. 50db is equivilent to someone talking to you at 1m distance, and 60db is equivilent to the sound in an averge department store. This is the quietest form of public transport around (of any value and speed).

This Mayor is mad. I hope this standing destroy's his career.


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

actually and unfortunately, it even helps his career.

When it comes to pragmatic decisisions about future projects, he can be sure, that he has a majority backing him, as long as hes against it......

The reason is, that most supporters of the new stuff keep quiet and the nay-sayers should loud enough for two or three...


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## [email protected] (May 7, 2007)

Very good news.
it's a 300km/h?

>Since 2003 
It is 2004 that Shanghai TR let a general passenger take it. 
It is only trial driving for 2003 years. And it is 2006 that full-scale business driving began.


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## hkskyline (Sep 13, 2002)

Some more information and photos of the Transrapid exhibition from my Munich visit several years ago :

Transrapid Munich Airport Maglev Link
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=214714


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## Anekdote (Apr 11, 2005)

Can't wait it gets finished.


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## Revas (Aug 19, 2006)

I heard that Shanghai Maglev has been a commercial failure. How will Munich Airport manage to make its maglev commercially successfull, if it is ever built ?


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## [email protected] (May 7, 2007)

World's first maglev ran in the U.K. in 1884. 
The, being next is Germany of 1989. 
It is in use at an exhibition in Japan in 1985.

maglev running commerce is only Shanghai and Japanese Linimo now.


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## Songoten2554 (Oct 19, 2006)

yes its finally happening yes well i hope this sets an example of things


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## Momo1435 (Oct 3, 2005)

Let's just wait and see what Stoibers successor thinks about the project, it's Stoibers pet-project after all. And Hamburg - Berlin anyone, that didn't happen even though it had been approved.


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## Christianmx (Mar 9, 2003)

Great for Germany's capital! Can't wait to ride it! :banana:


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## Revas (Aug 19, 2006)

Err... As far as I remember, Berlin is the capital of Germany, and Munich the capital of Bavaria "only" ;-)


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## erbse (Nov 8, 2006)

^ You've forgotten that Bavaria doesn't belong to Germany.

Just listen to our dear Ede and u'll understand:


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## TRZ (Sep 18, 2004)

^^That was really funny. :lol: 
Despite my having forgotten most of my German, I can still tell when somebody can't figure out what they want to say in the language :nuts: Thanks for that :cheers:


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## Christianmx (Mar 9, 2003)

Revas said:


> Err... As far as I remember, Berlin is the capital of Germany, and Munich the capital of Bavaria "only" ;-)


Not as far as I'm concerned lol


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## erbse (Nov 8, 2006)

The Transrapid-Alarm rings!










Ede, how long will it take to go by the maglev and head for the airport?


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## M.Schwerdtner (May 14, 2006)

muhahaa funny vid .. ggg .. gonna miss ede hehe


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## erbse (Nov 8, 2006)

Erbse proudly presents: A fresh spicy render of ze new TR09, flying over ze rails:


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## erbse (Nov 8, 2006)

The other threads are ordinary and boring. REPLY RIGHT HERE, folks!


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

@Erbse. Ze whole world is speechless due to zat piece of german engineering.


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## Insane alex (Aug 24, 2004)

Haha! That's Peter Stormare, he is swedish btw!


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## Nephasto (Feb 6, 2004)

erbsenzaehler has the coolest avatar around!! :colgate:

Ok, not exactly on topic, but a reply nonetheless.


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## xXFallenXx (Jun 15, 2007)

haha!
those VW commercials were gold!


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

more German engineeeering in da house :


Today the Pro-Transrapid-Community in Bavaria was founded.

Its members are high representatives of the Industry, the IHK and more supporters...

And they made a nice Christmas Maglev rendering 





















http://www.bayern-pro-rapid.de/


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## TRZ (Sep 18, 2004)

pflo777 said:


> And they made a nice Christmas Maglev rendering


_That _is extremely slick! kay:


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

I support that first Transrapid track in Germany.

There are several reasons:
First of all, the Germans have to pay for it, and not we Austrians. 
But far more importantly, its fucking hilarious if not pathetic that you put a huge amount of effort and even more money into developing a technological gem like the Transrapid, which really comes up to the expectations, but then just dump all that globally leading top technology in the trash bin waiting that Japan who acts unlike Germany clever, catches up, and sees happily how it can take over the lead. 

The discussion in Munich absolutely lacks any look over the own fence. Its so extremely narrow minded you can't bear it.


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

more christmas renderings from the Transrapid guys...


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## erbse (Nov 8, 2006)

**wrooom**

^ Cool renders dude.

But Christmas is over, so let's turn to something summerly. Whoop!


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## ZZ-II (May 10, 2006)

i really hope this train gets build, though i've my doubts


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

good to bring back this thread.

Today, newspapers wrote, that the new geneartion TR09 will start test runs on the test track in Emsland in April.

Its really about time...the accident will be 1,5 years ago by then....

http://www1.ndr.de/nachrichten/niedersachsen/transrapid120.html


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## Brummyboy92 (Aug 2, 2007)

Just saw this and all I can say is congrats to Germany, this is great I wish the UK would build a Maglev system.


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

new video published....

maglev at night.....somehow a bit stupid, because you can hardly see it

http://www.bayern-pro-rapid.de/bayern-pro-rapid-ev/ueber-uns/imagefilm/


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## Tyron (Jan 9, 2008)

Great project, nice movie!!! Also love the soundtrack, which is kind of monumental. But it's a pity that the movie is not downloadable. Anyway I can hardly wait for the Transrapid to shuttle between MUC and Munich City.

Rrrrrrrrrrrh!!Look into my eyes, Baby!


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## Deadeye Reloaded (Apr 25, 2006)

Very nice, indeed! 

It is time to build a Transrapid track in Germany otherwise the world could start thinking that this is a Chinese invention because of the only existing track in Shanghai...:nuts:


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## staticmeltdown (May 28, 2006)

Brummyboy92 said:


> Just saw this and all I can say is congrats to Germany, this is great I wish the UK would build a Maglev system.


Or even keep the one they had in Birmingham!

Good to see Germany and Japan pushing forward with this technology, especially in a more practical way than Shanghai implemented it.


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## city_thing (May 25, 2006)

Deadeye Reloaded said:


> Very nice, indeed!
> 
> It is time to build a Transrapid track in Germany otherwise the world could start thinking that this is a Chinese invention because of the only existing track in Shanghai...:nuts:


Anyone who thinks this is a Chinese invention has to be incredibly stupid.

Everyone knows the sexiest things on Earth (including trains) come from Germany


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## TRZ (Sep 18, 2004)

city_thing said:


> Anyone who thinks this is a Chinese invention has to be incredibly stupid.
> 
> Everyone knows the sexiest things on Earth (including trains) come from Germany


Sorry, Germany does have sexy ladies and sexy music, but sexy trains, nonono, Japan has the monopoly on that one.

Fastech360 plus JRWest500 plus MLX-1 = Sexiest train fleet, das punkt!


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

You know that these japanese trains were designed by a german industrial designer?

Nemeister and Partner from Munich

http://neumeister-partner.com/pdf/neumeister+partner_de.pdf


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

pflo777 said:


> You know that these japanese trains were designed by a german industrial designer?
> 
> Nemeister and Partner from Munich
> 
> http://neumeister-partner.com/pdf/neumeister+partner_de.pdf


ROTFL


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## city_thing (May 25, 2006)

ha ha ha, I told you that Germans were sexy 

Especially Bavarians. Munich is 'da bomb'.


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## FM 2258 (Jan 24, 2004)

I think every large city (cough Austin) should have a maglev line from the city center to the airport.


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## mumbairail (Mar 30, 2007)

*Station Photos*

Where can I find more photos of this station? Is there a thread on this station in SSC ? Can someone post some detailed photos on this thread. Amazing station by the way.

Thank you


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## sarflonlad (May 13, 2005)

...


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

mumbairail said:


> Where can I find more photos of this station? Is there a thread on this station in SSC ? Can someone post some detailed photos on this thread. Amazing station by the way.


You find a few picture at Bahnbilder.de. And flickr is reliable source for station images too.


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## mumbairail (Mar 30, 2007)

Thanks Flierfy


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## Shezan (Jun 21, 2007)

wow...german stations are realy huuuuge!


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

pflo777 said:


> why is it so important that the station is a cross station?


That is basically not important. It just makes the station unique in a certain sense.
It was simply the cheapest way to create a main station in central Berlin that all long distance and regional trains pass through as no-one really wanted to re-erect the old termini that were in use until the 1940s.
The Stadtbahn-line alone doesn't provide enough capacity to carry all train through the central part of the city. So it either had to be widened or a new line had to be built. Widening would have been extremely expensive while the only extensive work for a new line was to bore a rather short tunnel under the Tiergarten to connect the still existing approaches of the defunct termini in the south (Potsdamer and Anhalter Bf) and in the north (Lehrter Bf).



pflo777 said:


> I mean, how many important trains are running on the stadtbahn viaducts?
> In the end, those few regional trains could also use the new tunnels, no?


Well, all trains are important. And those regional trains are the backbone of the rail traffic in Brandenburg and carry most of the passengers to and from Lehrter Bf.
These trains could all use the Tiergarten-line which they do in case of disruption on the Stadtbahn-line. However, the Stadtbahn-line is more popular as it passes Zoologischer Garten, Friedrichstrasse and Alexanderplatz. These three stations are way better connected to the underground and suburban rail network than Lehrter Bf will be in the next few decades. And the Stadtbahn-line is simply shorter for lines that passes the city from west to east and the reverse direction.


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## Deadeye Reloaded (Apr 25, 2006)

*PROJECT CANCELED!*

*Reason: Germany is too poor...* 


:goodbye:


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

*GERMANY SUX*


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## Coccodrillo (Sep 30, 2005)

Good decision!


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## MPOWER (Jun 12, 2007)

The price rose from 1,85 billion to 3,4 billion ...


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

guesss how the price for the alternative S-bahn will rise, now that it must be built...


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## rheintram (Mar 5, 2008)

Coccodrillo said:


> Good decision!


I totally agree. I'm glad the craziness is over.


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

the craziness is not over...it just started....


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## Tyron (Jan 9, 2008)

pflo777 said:


> *GERMANY SUX*


...exactly my opinion...



> Tiefensee said he sees a future for Transrapid technology. He said similar projects could work in other countries and praised industry's pledge to continue work on developing the technology.





> He also said the technology has particular promise in countries where the rail system is not as developed as in Germany and the rest of Europe.





> We see chances there that we'd like to pursue," said Tiefensee, noting that the government will continue to work with the Transrapid consortium to find customers in other parts of the world.





> I am happy that Siemens AG (SI) and ThyssenKrupp AG (XET) will maintain the consortium for this technology and pursue its development in China and beyond, he said.





> He noted that talks for Transrapid projects in China were proceeding well.


Tiefensee, you are such a motherfucking nerd!


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## rheintram (Mar 5, 2008)

Can you please watch your language and calm down, Tyron?

It wasn't canceled for fun. The project has become way to expensive (3.2 to 3.4 Billion Euros) and there was so much resistance against it. Even the city of Munich was against it, including 10 other municipalities along the way.


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## Isek (Feb 13, 2005)

^^ 
But actually Tyron is right. Mr. Tiefensee is one of Germany's biggest fools - a complete miscast!


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## Isek (Feb 13, 2005)

^^ 
But actually Tyron is right. Mr. Tiefensee is one of Germany's biggest fools - a complete miscast!

There are NO plans for any alternative airport link. It will take at least 7-8 years to get an adequate airport link. I completly agree with pflo: Any express s-bahn will be very costly.


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## M.Schwerdtner (May 14, 2006)

hno:hno:


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## Tyron (Jan 9, 2008)

*show is over*

....show is over...will finally leave this country...nothing doing...what a shame! 

bye bye germany


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## Svartmetall (Aug 5, 2007)

Tyron said:


> ....show is over...will finally leave this country...nothing doing...what a shame!
> 
> bye bye germany


Because one purely prestige project was cancelled? I agree that it's a shame, but at least you guys have a rail link to your airport in the form of the S-bahn - most other countries only have buses! Auckland (NZ) still doesn't have an airport link and has a city population of 1.4 million! It costs $90 to get a taxi from the airport to the city. Not only that but there is only one bus service and it is privately run costing you $15 to ride it and the journey takes up to 60 minutes when not in traffic - when in traffic it can take 15 minutes longer! 

Count your blessings that Munich has what it does.


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## Andrew (Sep 11, 2002)

This is just rediculous! Just sell the technology to the Chinese, I'm sick of waiting for the Germans to start showing confidence in their own technology. Now that it looks like they're not going to bother with this, at least let a country with some ambition acquire and develop the technology. Once it's in their hands the Shanghai extension and the Hangzhou line will quickly go ahead, they will get the operational expertise, costs will come down and who knows, Munich might get it's maglev after all in 20 years when the Chinese build it for them.


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## didu (Jun 13, 2005)

:lol: :lol: :lol:

This is just too funny. One of the richest countries in the world cannot afford to build a maglev line using the technologies of its own domestic company.

Really shows you how utterly commercially impractical maglev is at the moment.

Germans should really be thankful that the Chinese government was gullible enough to buy their overpriced technology.


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## C-Beam (Apr 11, 2006)

€3bn is peanuts considering that the German government has wasted €20bn and rising with its investments in US credit instruments. Bavaria alone has lost €4bn via the state owned BayernLB bank. Let's hope its a lesson for them. Instead of lending other countries money that you won't ever see again, better invest it in German infrastructure the next time.


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## goschio (Dec 2, 2002)

Good decision. 3 billion EUR for an airport link is just too much.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

So much for German engineering.


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## Xusein (Sep 27, 2005)

Oh, the irony. hno:


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## goschio (Dec 2, 2002)

Thyssen-Krupp wants to sell the maglev technology to China now.


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## Joop20 (Jun 29, 2004)

C-Beam said:


> €3bn is peanuts considering that the German government has wasted €20bn and rising with its investments in US credit instruments. Bavaria alone has lost €4bn via the state owned BayernLB bank. Let's hope its a lesson for them. Instead of lending other countries money that you won't ever see again, better invest it in German infrastructure the next time.


That is macroeconomics, and has nothing to do with an overpriced €3.4 billion investment in a 37 km Maglev line. Especially when you consider that there is an S-bahn link between the city and the airport already. Travel time would be reduced from 45 minutes to 10 minutes, what's the big deal. Upgrade the S-Bahn, and you can reduce the trip with 15 minutes probably.


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## pflo777 (Feb 27, 2003)

Andrew said:


> This is just rediculous! Just sell the technology to the Chinese, I'm sick of waiting for the Germans to start showing confidence in their own technology. Now that it looks like they're not going to bother with this, at least let a country with some ambition acquire and develop the technology. Once it's in their hands the Shanghai extension and the Hangzhou line will quickly go ahead, they will get the operational expertise, costs will come down and who knows, Munich might get it's maglev after all in 20 years when the Chinese build it for them.




:applause::applause::applause::applause::applause::applause:


I totally agree....


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## C-Beam (Apr 11, 2006)

http://www.wiesbadener-kurier.de/politik/objekt.php3?artikel_id=3218487

Translation:

Can Hesse save the Transrapid? Jörg-Uwe Hahn, head of the FDP Hesse, thinks so. Hahn demanded yesterday in the state's parliament in Wiesbaden that a study should be ordered about a link between the Frankfurt International airport and the Frankfurt-Hahn airport.

The Hesse ministry of transportartion was not available for a comment yesterday, but the idea to link the Frankfurt Intl and Frankfurt-Hahn airports is not new. Since many years there is a discussion about a high speed railway link. About 5 years ago minister president Roland Koch was supporting a plan to build a Transrapid line which was also broadly supported in parliament. Eventually the line could be extended up to Brussels and thereby link Frankfurt to the power center of the European Union....

...FDP politician Hahn urged to not abandon the plan for a German Transrapid line. Capacity restraints at the Frankfurt Intl airport could be solved by linking it to Frankfurt-Hahn he said.


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## elfabyanos (Jun 18, 2006)

didu said:


> :lol: :lol: :lol:
> 
> This is just too funny. One of the richest countries in the world cannot afford to build a maglev line using the technologies of its own domestic company.
> 
> Really shows you how utterly commercially impractical maglev is at the moment.


My thoughts exactly. It's been discussed over and over and over again on this website about how wonderful maglev is, and how it's actually cheaper or some such nonsense. Well, it's not. It's a great concept but the numbers don't add up, they never have, and slowly Siemens is beginning to realise it might not ever. Long live HSR.


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## C-Beam (Apr 11, 2006)

elfabyanos said:


> It's been discussed over and over and over again on this website about how wonderful maglev is, and how it's actually cheaper or some such nonsense. Well, it's not. It's a great concept but the numbers don't add up, they never have, and slowly Siemens is beginning to realise it might not ever. Long live HSR.


What a nonsense. The increase in price was not caused by the providers of the Transrapid technology (Siemens and Thyssen-Krupp stuck to their original price estimates) but by the company which was supposed to do the concrete works and drill the tunnels (Hochtief AG). Hochtief argued that worldwide increases in commodity prices made it necessary for them to increase the price tag by more than a billion.


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## C-Beam (Apr 11, 2006)

Hochtief AG has apparently major problems with its German construction unit. 

Looks like they either tried to squeeze some extra profit out of the public Transrapid project in the hope that the government wouldn't be to strict with the budget, or they just wanted to bail out and sometimes it is politically better to do that by claiming that external factors make it necessary to increase the price beyond acceptability instead of simply saying "we want to bail out for internal reasons" which might make you look as an unreliable partner and can lead to problems if you want to compete for future projects.

http://www.welt.de/welt_print/article1840997/Schwacher_Dollar_macht_Hochtief_zu_schaffen.html

Translation

Dusseldorf, March 27th...The European construction unit of Hochtief, which is fighting with high losses in Germany, is supposed to become profitable again in the medium term. Hochtief now wants to be as selective as Bilfinger Berger and decline projects which offer only low margins...


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## Joop20 (Jun 29, 2004)

C-Beam said:


> Hochtief AG has apparently major problems with its German construction unit.
> 
> Looks like they either tried to squeeze some extra profit out of the public Transrapid project in the hope that the government wouldn't be to strict with the budget, or they just wanted to bail out and sometimes it is politically better to do that by claiming that external factors make it necessary to increase the price beyond acceptability instead of simply saying "we want to bail out for internal reasons" which might make you look as an unreliable partner and can lead to problems if you want to compete for future projects.
> 
> ...


Pure speculation, the Munich maglev project is not even mentioned in the article you posted. If Hochtief could've made a profit on the project for the €1,5 billion that the project was quoted for, they would never have bailed out.


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## C-Beam (Apr 11, 2006)

Joop20 said:


> If Hochtief could've made a profit on the project for the €1,5 billion that the project was quoted for, they would never have bailed out.


Wrong reasoning. Hochtief apparently wants to restrict itself to HIGH MARGIN projects in the future. The Transrapid project might therefore very well have offered them a profit but apparently too low to compensate for the losses they are making elsewhere. And since they have limited ressources it is a rational decision to bail out of the Transrapid project and seek other ones where their limited ressources generate higher profits.


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## Joop20 (Jun 29, 2004)

_*30. März 2007 

Grüne warnen vor Kostenexplosion beim Bayern-Transrapid*

Von Sebastian Fischer, München

Eigentlich soll im Herbst Baubeginn sein. Doch noch immer ist nicht klar, wer den Transrapid zum Münchner Flughafen eigentlich bezahlt. Jetzt präsentieren die Grünen ein Gutachten: Der Schwebezug kostet demnach auch noch über eine Milliarde Euro mehr als behauptet.

München - Er ist der große Traum des bayerischen Ministerpräsidenten Edmund Stoiber (CSU): der Transrapid. Auf der knapp 40 Kilometer langen Strecke zwischen Münchner Hauptbahnhof und Flughafen soll er in naher Zukunft im Zehn-Minuten-Takt verkehren. Baubeginn: Herbst 2007. Eigentlich. Denn die Einwendungen der betroffenen Bürger gehen in die Zehntausende, die Finanzierung ist nach wie vor ungeklärt.

Und jetzt prognostiziert ein Experte auch noch eine Kostensteigerung in Milliardenhöhe. Ein von der bayerischen Grünen-Fraktion in Auftrag gegebenes Gutachten kommt zu dem Schluss: "Die Transrapid-Trecke erfordert nach aktuellem Planungsstand Investitionskosten von rund 2,8 Milliarden Euro." Inklusive zusätzlicher Vorkehrungen zur Sicherheit kommt Gutachter Karlheinz Rößler auf einen Gesamtbetrag von 3,36 Milliarden Euro._

http://www.spiegel.de/wirtschaft/0,1518,474917,00.html

Basically, this article from the *30th of March 2007 * (!) states that the costs are likely to be 3,36 billion Euro instead of the 1,85 billion euro that was projected. I guess die Grünen did something right after all... The article mentions that the projected 1,85 billion Euro is based on calculations made back in 2002. Reasons for the higher project costs that are mentioned in the article are more expensive construction material, two tunnels, and a 1 km addition to the track. I guess Stoiber and the CSU should've let go of this projects months ago.


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## C-Beam (Apr 11, 2006)

Joop20 said:


> Reasons for the higher project costs that are mentioned in the article are more expensive construction material, two tunnels, and a 1 km addition to the track.


^^Which proves that it is not the Transrapid technology which is causing the cost increase but other factors.


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## didu (Jun 13, 2005)

C-Beam said:


> What a nonsense. The increase in price was not caused by the providers of the Transrapid technology (Siemens and Thyssen-Krupp stuck to their original price estimates) but by the company which was supposed to do the concrete works and drill the tunnels (Hochtief AG). Hochtief argued that worldwide increases in commodity prices made it necessary for them to increase the price tag by more than a billion.


wait a sec, you are saying that the cost increase is partially due to the concrete works required by the maglev. so my question is, is the same concrete works necessary for a traditional rail that can run trains at 350KPH?


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

Nimbyism is certainly a major obstacle for many project. In the case of this rail line, however, it was the lack of fund and more so the lack of political commitment that delayed construction works.


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## Koen Acacia (Apr 17, 2007)

hans280 said:


> ^^As for France, I think you'll find that recent large projects (one example being the LGV-Est from Paris to the Voges) were rolled out in about 1/3 of that time. But, I suspect that the confusion stems from how much of the political preparations we count as part of the project time? *It's quite correct that politicians in most other countries (or DEMOCRATIC countries: the political planning is quite swift in China...) also bicker forever.* It can take literally decades to decide on a project in France as well.


France's democracy is a much more centralized one than Germany's. In Germany there are simply much more layers involved with each decision. Doesn't necessarily make one system better/worse than the other, but when you're talking about infrastructure, centralization speeds up decisions: the smaller the number of parties that are involved in a decision, the faster that decision will be taken.


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

^^Yes, Koen, the fact that one party normally has a majority in France's parliament is half of it. The other half is the top-down approvals procedure. The Declaration d'Utilité Publique which is necessary for a project to start, land to be expropriated, contracts to be signed, is granted by the Conseil d'Etat - the highest judicial authority in the country. I should add that the CdE does not pull its decision out of a top hat: years of consultation at the local level (organised by the regional Prefects) preceed it and citizens are free to challenge every step of these before Administrative Tribunals. (Equivalent to the Judicial Review in the US system.)

BUT... once the CdE has declared that a given project is definitely in the public interest then that's the last word. To whom would you appeal? The supreme court has already spoken.


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## JoKo65 (Feb 28, 2007)

flierfy said:


> Nimbyism is certainly a major obstacle for many project. In the case of this rail line, however, it was the lack of fund and more so the lack of political commitment that delayed construction works.


Right, the problem of that line is a lack of funding. The line Munich–Berlin isn't seen as important as the line Frankfurt–Cologne for example.


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

*I'm feeling nasty today, so...*

... I couldn't help myself. Please take a look at this link to the home page of Reseau de Fer Francais: http://www.lgvsudeuropeatlantique.org/default.asp. It describes the plans that are already hatched for a new LGV, ultimately connecting Paris with Bordeaux in 2h05. Apparently it should stand ready 10 years from now - but I personally attach a large question mark to this forecast: the project is modulised in to a phase 1 (Bordeaux-Angouleme) and a phase 2 (Angouleme-Tours), and there's a very real chance that the other western LGV in the pipeworks (Le Mans-Rennes) gets wedged in between the two phases. What, you may well ask, does this have to do with Nuremberg-Erfurt? Well...

...the distance Berlin-Munich is identically the same as the distance Paris-Bordeaux. :rant:


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

Paris Bordeaux is 3h09m...today

compare that to Berlin München


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

^^Actually, Gramercy, the fastest direct trains (two per day, I think) need 3h01m to do Paris-Bordeaux. In France, this is commonly considered as being too slow. That said...

...the RFF site I just linked is mixing pears and apples: the speak of 300 km/h and of a target travel time of 2h05m in one the same breath. However, they'll only ever get down to 2h05m once they've introduced trains with a Vmax of 350 km/h.


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

yea, but they will actually do that not just talk about it....

actually, i think they will build 360kph just like the lgv est is 360kph ready


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## mysunshine (Apr 30, 2009)

*Renfe-AVE-ICE 3-sketched by me*

Happy May day, I just draw one Renfe-AVE-ICE 3.


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

great


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## stevevance (Jul 4, 2007)

It looks really good.


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## slavonac (Oct 4, 2008)

*Dauers Spezial*

I need to know how I can get the minimum price by Dauer Spezial? Every time when I try to get it on egc. Berlin - Munich - Berlin at least 3 days before as it says in the conditions I get only Dauer Spezial for first class. It shows me that my return or onward trip arent available and then I try to find different return or onward trip and all of them cannot make Dauer Spezial.


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## RzgR Spijkenisse (May 16, 2007)

Try to book two single journey's 
the Outbound travel first , some later the Inbound travel

Bookings can be made, not 3 months in advance, but 90 days


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

Well, Dauer Spezial is a special offer to fill empty trains. DB, however, seem to have cut down services between Berlin and München by 50%. (edit: reason are works on the rail line between Bamberg and Nürnberg which will last from Aug 1 to Sept 14) The reduced capacities mean less or no need to promote spare seats as there probably won't be any.

So the €58 offers are empty promises. There are probably no such tickets for the next few weeks. The twats of DB won't tell you that. They leave you searching for phantom tickets. The cheapest return ticket I could find at a random search were €113.


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## Palatinus (Jul 26, 2009)

What are the REAL High Speed Rail Link in Germany? 

Why don't they build a direct connection between Berlin and Munich?

Except Stuttgart S 21, what are the other HSR (V250 +) in Germany? 

What about Maglev between Berlin and Munich? There are 550 km...it would be perfect...isn't it?


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## Alexriga (Nov 25, 2007)

Palatinus said:


> What about Maglev between Berlin and Munich? There are 550 km...it would be perfect...isn't it?


Yeah, maybe you are willing to invest in it?


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## KingNick (Sep 23, 2010)

Palatinus said:


> What about Maglev between Berlin and Munich? There are 550 km...it would be perfect...isn't it?


Why not from Munich to Hamburg? Even better!

And from Hamburg it should continue on a floating track to London!
:nuts:


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## Coccodrillo (Sep 30, 2005)

> Why don't they build a direct connection between Berlin and Munich?


It's partly under construction (look there, it's the grey line).



> Except Stuttgart S 21, what are the other HSR (V250 +) in Germany?


Look this page.


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## godetto (Aug 31, 2009)

What about the line between Mannheim and Basel? Last year most of the work (fourth track on the existing line) had been done between Mannheim and Baden Baden. What's the current situation?


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## Coccodrillo (Sep 30, 2005)

Some parts of this line have been built or are under cosntruction, but others are delayed because of NIMBYsm.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

The German HSL network:








blue = upgrated tracks, 200 to 230 kph, yellow = new tracks, 250/280 kph, red = new tracks, 300 kph, grey = conventional tracks used by ICEs (?) up to 160kph 
The lines planned/under constructions aren't shown. The combinated upgrated/new line from Karlsruhe to Basel and the new line (for 300kph) from Nuremberg to Leipzig are under construction. Stuttgart-Ulm will be 250kph.
A complete list of German "Schnellfahrstrecken" (existing, u/c, planned and projected) can be foundt here: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schnellfahrstrecke#Deutschland

The first two real HSLs were Mannheim - Stuttgart and Hannover - Würzburg, opened in 1991. At that point of time, there existed already about 1.000km of upgrated lines allowing speeds of 200kph.

A remarkable feature of the German HSLs is the high percentage of bridges and tunnels (up to 50% on the Ebersfelde-Erfurt line) due to the mountaineous terrain.
That is due to the fact that new lines were buildt where most can be gained (reduction of travel time or higher capacity for freight trains due to longer and heavier trains) - mainly in the mountaineous regions. That's why Mannheim-Stuttgart (cutting through the Northern Black Forest) was buildt as a new line whereas the flat section between Mannheim and Frankfurt was "only" updated - there wasn't much to gain out of it, the extra money which a new line would have costed was better invested elsewhere (as on a rather flat and straight conventional track, it is easy to get trains to top speeds of 200kph whereas it is impossible to do so on a hilly line with narrow curves - a completely new line is often the better alternative and the worth the money). That is up to today one feature of German planning: build the new line where its mountaineous, upgrate the existing tracks where it's flat (good examples are Munich-Nuremberg, Nuremberg-Berlin and Stuttgart-Augsburg). Therefore, more lines were speeded up with the same funds.
Critics might say that there is no real German HSL network up to today but it has several isolated stretches, but one has to understand that there actually is a logic behind the network planning which is applied for the whole high speed network.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

Th liar is lying again.



thun said:


> Once again. That sentence says exactly the same as I do. Stuttgart 21 is one element of the Stuttgart - Augsburg (-Munich) upgrate. The HSL from Wendlingen (where it connects to Stuttgart21) to Ulm is another element. The third is Neu-Ulm21, the fourth the upgrate of the line from Neu-Ullm to Augsburg.
> Your a liar (if we stick to your ken) if you claim something else. :bash:
> However, if you want to claim to have a serious opinion, you should know such basic facts.
> 
> And regarding everything else: Dream on!


I know someone else thinks his opinions are more than serious but actually authoritative facts. Here comes my opinions. There would be no Stuttgart 21 and the associated HSR tracks altogether if all these projects had not been conceived together from the beginning. 

Unfortunately, your "opinions" are down-right confused.



thun said:


> ...
> Wrong. In countries like Spain, *Italy,* and Japan, and even to some point France, you can build one or two lines and connect basically all the very important cities of a country. You can't do that in Germany. So if you want to improve service quality for all those cities, you have to find another feasible solution.
> ...





thun said:


> ...
> And for the last time, both the Swiss and the German network are polycentric (other examples are the Austrian, *the Italian,* the Portuguese and the Dutch network). Believe it or not. And learn to get irony for gods' sake. :bash:
> ...


Another fact I do not know very well is that your Swiss dream turns you on big time LOL


----------



## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> ...
> That's why Mannheim-Stuttgart (cutting through the Northern Black Forest) was buildt as a new line whereas the flat section between Mannheim and Frankfurt was "only" updated - *there wasn't much to gain out of it, the extra money which a new line would have costed was better invested elsewhere (as on a rather flat and straight conventional track, it is easy to get trains to top speeds of 200kph whereas it is impossible to do so on a hilly line with narrow curves - a completely new line is often the better alternative and the worth the money). *...


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankfurt–Mannheim_high-speed_railway



thun said:


> ... *That is up to today one feature of German planning: build the new line where its mountaineous, upgrate the existing tracks where it's flat (good examples are Munich-Nuremberg, Nuremberg-Berlin and Stuttgart-Augsburg). Therefore, more lines were speeded up with the same funds.*
> Critics might say that there is no real German HSL network up to today but it has several isolated stretches, but one has to understand that there actually is a logic behind the network planning which is applied for the whole high speed network.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg–Munich_high-speed_railway

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanover–Berlin_high-speed_railway

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg–Erfurt_high-speed_railway

"Stuttgart–Augsburg new and upgraded railway"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuttgart–Augsburg_new_and_upgraded_railway

The so-called logic is actually a series of political compromises. 



rheintram said:


> thun is among the few whose postings are both sensible and *fact-based*...


So many opinions built into the so-called facts presented. It is so obvious for everyone to see now that it is really about spreading opinions with tibits of facts peppered in.


----------



## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Proposed. The future is not the past. You should have learned that in the first grade.
I wrote about the past, of course the missing links can be added some day.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> Proposed. The future is not the past. You should have learned that in the first grade.
> I wrote about the past, of course the missing links can be added some day.


You "should have" improved your English.



thun said:


> ...*mountaineous* regions...





thun said:


> ...
> *buildt* where
> ...
> where its *mountaineous*, *upgrate*...





thun said:


> ... would have *costed* was better invested elsewhere...





thun said:


> ... *speeded up with the same funds.*...


???



thun said:


> ...
> *Your *a liar (if we stick to your *ken*) if you claim something else. :bash:
> ...


----------



## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

This map is deceiving. Lines appear faster on this map than they really are.



thun said:


> The German HSL network:
> blue = upgrated tracks, *up to* 200 to 230 kph, yellow = new tracks, *up to* 250/280 kph, red = new tracks, 300 kph, grey = conventional tracks used by ICEs (?) up to 160kph
> The lines planned/under constructions aren't shown. The combinated upgrated/new line from Karlsruhe to Basel and the new line (for 300kph) from Nuremberg to Leipzig are under construction. Stuttgart-Ulm will be 250kph.
> A complete list of German "Schnellfahrstrecken" (existing, u/c, planned and projected) can be foundt here: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schnellfahrstrecke#Deutschland


I marked a few important corrections. It is necessary to understand that even these high speed stretches don't provide one constant vmax throughout its entire length. At least not in all cases. Speed restriction were often build-in right from the beginning.

300 km/h from Nürnberg to Leipzig would be too good to be true. In fact it will contain two high speed stretches which will allow speeds of up to 300 km/h. But average travel speed will struggle to reach the 150 km/h mark.



thun said:


> The first two real HSLs were Mannheim - Stuttgart and Hannover - Würzburg, opened in 1991.


There is another misapprehension. In terms of high speed Hannover-Würzburg is not one but four separated lines. Connected only by slow passages through stations in built-up areas.



thun said:


> A remarkable feature of the German HSLs is the high percentage of bridges and tunnels (up to 50% on the Ebersfelde-Erfurt line) due to the mountaineous terrain.
> That is due to the fact that new lines were buildt where most can be gained (reduction of travel time or higher capacity for freight trains due to longer and heavier trains) - mainly in the mountaineous regions. That's why Mannheim-Stuttgart (cutting through the Northern Black Forest) was buildt as a new line whereas the flat section between Mannheim and Frankfurt was "only" updated - there wasn't much to gain out of it, the extra money which a new line would have costed was better invested elsewhere (as on a rather flat and straight conventional track, it is easy to get trains to top speeds of 200kph whereas it is impossible to do so on a hilly line with narrow curves - a completely new line is often the better alternative and the worth the money). That is up to today one feature of German planning: build the new line where its mountaineous, upgrate the existing tracks where it's flat (good examples are Munich-Nuremberg, Nuremberg-Berlin and Stuttgart-Augsburg). Therefore, more lines were speeded up with the same funds.


This concept, however, has some flaws. The lack of uncompromised high speed lines means track sharing of fast, medium and slow services. This constrains traffic volume and reduces reliability. And the network is nowhere really fast to tackle air travel.

Instead of a proper high speed network we get airport expansions.



thun said:


> Critics might say that there is no real German HSL network up to today but it has several isolated stretches, but one has to understand that there actually is a logic behind the network planning which is applied for the whole high speed network.


There is no logic behind it. This is the result of provincialism and short-sightedness.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

flierfy said:


> There is no logic behind it. This is the result of provincialism and short-sightedness.


One of the by-products of the supposedly all-perfect "Swiss Concept," which some claim that everyone else is supposedly to be so jealous about. Do not forget such concept comes with the "I will take this route down if you do not stop at my farm" side effect.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Well, there's a logic behind it and the network design follows general rules. Of course, one can agree with it or not.


@aab123: Proove my point wrong, not my grammar.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

fact is, the fastest trains hannover-würzburg still need slightly more then 2hours for a distance of 327km.. if the trains would not be forced to run with about 100kph through some smalltown trainstations (so that most trains even stop there, because the difference from such a slowdown to an additional stop isn`t that much..), trains could run the whole route in less then 75minutes.. 
so yes, the german "highspeed"-rail-approve sucks.. no wonder that most people only take the train if they have no other choices, and you are even faster with your own car..


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> ...
> @aab123: *Proove* my point wrong, not my grammar.





aab7772003 said:


> You "should have" improved your English.
> ...


It is truly someone who fails in the English language, logic, geography, reading skills. It is also someone who lies nonstop without realizing and admitting it.

In the meantime, refer to post nos. 45 and 49.

Here is one of the ever growing examples:



thun said:


> ...
> In terms of the rail network, Germany isn't too different from Switzerland. *Only a bit larger. *The difference between Germany and France, the UK and Spain where all the main lines are centred to the capital certainly is higher.
> ...


"*Only a bit larger. *" 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Germany
"As of 2005[update], Germany had a railway network of 41,315 km. 19,857 km are electrified. The total track length was 76,473 km. "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Switzerland
"Network size: 5,063 km"


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

If you like to refer to previous posts, you might allow me to refer to post 54 of this thread.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> If you like to refer to previous posts, you might allow me to refer to post 54 of this thread.


Post nos. 45 and 49 answer post no. 54.

These posts show that someone just loves to pass opinions as facts.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Well, not really. You didn't prove me wrong. Seriously, I don't mind if you do so. Don't be considerate of me.
The one who most loves to pass opinions as facts is you.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> Well, not really. You didn't prove me wrong. Seriously, I don't mind if you do so. Don't be considerate of me.
> The one who most loves to pass opinions as facts is you.


You are the master of such art. In fact, you do mind it very much and have consequently decided to pretend as if none of your shenanigans have been exposed.



thun said:


> ... *That is up to today one feature of German planning: build the new line where its mountaineous, upgrate the existing tracks where it's flat (good examples are Munich-Nuremberg, Nuremberg-Berlin and Stuttgart-Augsburg). Therefore, more lines were speeded up with the same funds.*
> Critics might say that there is no real German HSL network up to today but it has several isolated stretches, but one has to understand that there actually is a logic behind the network planning which is applied for the whole high speed network.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg–Munich_high-speed_railway

"The Nuremberg-Munich high-speed railway line is a German high-speed railway 171 km (106 mi) in length. It links the two largest cities in Bavaria, Nuremberg and Munich.

The northern section, between Nuremberg and Ingolstadt, is a new 300 km/h (186 mph) track built from scratch between 1998 and 2006. It is 90.1 km (56.0 mi) in length with nine tunnels (total length: 27 km/17 mi). In order to minimize damage to the environment, it runs for the most part right next to Bundesautobahn 9.
..."

The new tracks do not run through the "mountainous" areas.

The "mountainous" areas are south of Munich.

Such a masterpiece example is simply priceless:



thun said:


> ...
> In terms of the rail network, Germany isn't too different from Switzerland. *Only a bit larger. *The difference between Germany and France, the UK and Spain where all the main lines are centred to the capital certainly is higher.
> ...


"*Only a bit larger. *" 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Germany
"As of 2005[update], Germany had a railway network of 41,315 km. 19,857 km are electrified. The total track length was 76,473 km. "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Switzerland
"Network size: 5,063 km"


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Erm... did you ever look into a map of Europe?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mittelgebirge
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franconian_Jura The range between Nuremberg and Ingolstadt. Considered as a mountain range in Germany. So, where am I wrong exactly? The new line ("Neubaustrecke") cuts through exactly that range, the relatively flat part south of Ingolstadt is an upgrated line ("Ausbaustrecke"). Same is true for Stuttgart-Frankfurt and Nuremberg-Berlin.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

So, what's this thread about?


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Feeding trolls. 

Actually the posts #47 and 52 are topic-related among some others. For SSC, that's not too bad...


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> Erm... did you ever look into a map of Europe?
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mittelgebirge
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franconian_Jura The range between Nuremberg and Ingolstadt. Considered as a mountain range in Germany. So, where am I wrong exactly? The new line ("Neubaustrecke") cuts through exactly that range, the relatively flat part south of Ingolstadt is an upgrated line ("Ausbaustrecke"). Same is true for Stuttgart-Frankfurt and Nuremberg-Berlin.


I have in fact, I am very often in that part of the world and I travel on that HSR route very often. 

First of all, it is time to teach you some more English:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/mountainous
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hill

Then, it is time to teach you some real-life geography. 

Munich itself is about 519 m above sea level. Ingolstadt and Nürnberg are actually in relatively lower sea levels. This HSR route rather slides down from Munich to Nürnberg without passing through great mountain peaks.

It is very obvious someone automatically equates hills to the Scottish Highlands, the Swiss Alps and the Bavarian Alps.


----------



## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> Feeding trolls.
> 
> Actually the posts #47 and 52 are topic-related among some others. For SSC, that's not too bad...


Post nos. 45 and 49 respond to a particular troll who spreads false information by labeling opinions as facts.


----------



## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

I never used German railroads before, but you guys have it good to compared to US or many countries. Just saying.


----------



## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

K_ said:


> Well, DB is making money on the route, so why should they "leave it altogether".


The DB takes benefit from a piece of infrastructure it doesn't really pay for. Making money under these circumstances is not impressing.



K_ said:


> However, don't forget that an ICE-1 set is worth three flights, and don't forget that the train servers more place than just their endpoints. If you are going from Ingolstadt to Göttingen I doubt there'd be any quicker way to go than by train.


High speed lines haven't been built for Ingolstadt or Göttingen though. Towns like these, however, are the ones that benefit of it. And this is what is wrong with German high speed. I don't mind if they benefit. On the contrary. There can't be enough benefits to justify the enormous construction costs. I just mind that travel between the big conurbations shifts progressively in the air and not there where it was intended to be. This high speed line doesn't fully achieve what it was meant for and what it could do.

You don't have to run a a full 400 m train for every service. There are shorter trainsets for less demanded services.


----------



## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

flierfy said:


> High speed lines haven't been built for Ingolstadt or Göttingen though. Towns like these, however, are the ones that benefit of it. And this is what is wrong with German high speed. I don't mind if they benefit. On the contrary. There can't be enough benefits to justify the enormous construction costs. I just mind that travel between the big conurbations shifts progressively in the air and not there where it was intended to be. This high speed line doesn't fully achieve what it was meant for and what it could do.


That line was however, as I've already pointed out, build for a different country than the one it ended up in...


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

flierfy said:


> Or you are not aware which impression your posts leave.


Well, I do have a problem with arguing style of aab7772003. Always looking for the most extreme interpretation of a statement doesn't really help a discussion.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

K_ said:


> Well, I do have a problem with arguing style of aab7772003. Always looking for the most extreme interpretation of a statement doesn't really help a discussion.


But then I am not the "extreme" one who resorts to "extreme" and "dynamic" fact-twisting.



thun said:


> ...
> In terms of the rail network, Germany isn't too different from Switzerland. *Only a bit larger. *The difference between Germany and France, the UK and Spain where all the main lines are centred to the capital certainly is higher.
> ...


"*Only a bit larger. *" 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Germany
"As of 2005[update], Germany had a railway network of 41,315 km. 19,857 km are electrified. The total track length was 76,473 km. "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_transport_in_Switzerland
"Network size: 5,063 km"


----------



## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

aab7772003 said:


> But then I am not the "extreme" one who resorts to "extreme" and "dynamic" fact-twisting.


There's an old legal aphorism that goes, "If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither on your side, pound the table."

If this was a court you'd be pounding the table.


----------



## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

K_ said:


> There's an old legal aphorism that goes, "If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither on your side, pound the table."
> 
> If this was a court you'd be pounding the table.





K_ said:


> Then I'll just take note off the fact that you don't read very well.


If this was a court, you would tell the judge that he is wrong though you have no say in the verdict yourself. You and thun would fit right in with those abrasive and fast-talking class-action lawsuits lawyers. 



thun said:


> ...
> Wrong. In countries like Spain, *Italy,* and Japan, and even to some point France, you can build one or two lines and connect basically all the very important cities of a country. You can't do that in Germany. So if you want to improve service quality for all those cities, you have to find another feasible solution.
> ...





thun said:


> ...
> And for the last time, both the Swiss and the German network are polycentric (other examples are the Austrian, *the Italian,* the Portuguese and the Dutch network). Believe it or not. And learn to get irony for gods' sake. :bash:
> ...


The lastest interpretation of the opinions would then suggest that the railroad network of Japan is actually polycentric as well.

http://www.japanrailpass.net/images/map_en.pdf


----------



## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

If you don't look at the fat Shinkansen lines only, it looks to me rather polycentric indeed on a first glimpse. Cities like Osaka or Kyoto certainly are major hubs of the system.
Don't you get it that having a polycentric network and a monocentric HSR network (or the other way round) is NOT a contradiction?!? You''re comitting a huge fallacy here.




flierfy said:


> The DB takes benefit from a piece of infrastructure it doesn't really pay for. Making money under these circumstances is not impressing.


Neither has to pay SNCF for it or the Polish lorry owner you're queuing behind on the motorway...



> High speed lines haven't been built for Ingolstadt or Göttingen though.


I have to disagree. HSLs have to be build for the benefit of the whole network to realize the profit-making potential (on both the microeconomic and the macroeconomic level). And that means that it shouldn't only connect the largest few cities. Germany has a rather evenly spread population, so of course the network itself has to follow that circumstance. The most benefit of HSR is gained by improving services (travel times, connections, etc.) in the whole network (regional and inter city services included). I believe that in a country which has an area-wide rail coverage regarding HSR as an independent system in competition first and foremost to air travellers is a point of view that can't nearly use (also in terms of profit-making) the potential of HSR. On the other hand by integrating the HSR network into the existing network with more hubs, you can improve utility of the whole network (and therefore the willingness to) for much more people - also resulting in a larger customer base.
There are a lot of people travelling between Kassel and Ingolstadt (unlike like e. g. between Lleida and Guadalajara) on the HSR line as that's the fastest way to go from their actual start to their destination (faster than going e. g. from Schrobenhausen to Munich to catch the ICE, leaving at Hannover only to get back to the Harz). If they wouldn't have good connections, they would very soon switch to the car.
Probably a system with both Sprinter-ICE bypassing the smaller cities and normal ICEs stopping there (both at decent intervalls) would be best. But applied to the whole country that's very unrealistic to happen in the forseeable future.



> There can't be enough benefits to justify the enormous construction costs.


That's exactly why letting ICEs stop at smaller stations (you always have to keep in mind that these stops don't serve only the city itself but creates more hubs to integrate the conventional services into the high-class ICE system!) is justifiyable.



> I just mind that travel between the big conurbations shifts progressively in the air (...)


I doubt that. Do you have any data available?
Of course, you're right: That's not what should happen in a modern and ecological aware country.



> This high speed line doesn't fully achieve what it was meant for and what it could do.


As always with big investments, the outcome is the result of political decisions and narrow funds. That is not only true for HSR.


----------



## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> If you don't look at the fat Shinkansen lines only, it looks to me rather polycentric indeed on a first glimpse. Cities like Osaka or Kyoto certainly are major hubs of the system.
> Don't you get it that having a polycentric network and a monocentric HSR network (or the other way round) is NOT a contradiction?!? You''re comitting a huge fallacy here.
> ...


I get that whatever you think you say is absolutely fact-based, accurate and logical; you find whatever you feel like for a particular moment to make comments that contradict the later ones you make.



thun said:


> ...
> Wrong. In countries like Spain, Italy, and Japan, and even to some point France,_ you can build one or two lines and connect basically all the very important cities of a country._ You can't do that in Germany. So if you want to improve service quality for all those cities, you have to find another feasible solution.
> ...


In fact, it is possible to build "one or two lines and connect basically all the very important cities of" Germany. The German rail network is obviously polycentric, but it is possible to build only a couple of HSR routes to serve Germany.



aab7772003 said:


> ...
> One "single corridor" without Berlin for Hamburg - Hannover - Düsseldorf - Cologne - Frankfurt - Mannheim - Stuttgart - Ulm - Augsburg - Munich just starts looking like the most heavily traveled stretch of the Japanese Shinkansen network, Voila!
> ...


The really "very important" cities in Germany are just Hamburg, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Berlin, Düsseldorf and Cologne. Hannover, Ulm and August are not really "very important" cities by most definitions, but they just happen to be on the hypothetical "German Shinkansen" route. It is one thing to know that Germany is a federal country; it is another thing to pretend that so many cities in Germany are "very important" because of the federal political structure. It is human nature to think the list of "very important" cities in your own country simply keeps growing and growing just because you are from that country; so many people from so many British cities in different threads all over the internet come up with the the idea of "London and Britain" to make their cities one of the many "very important" British cities. I am sure that Japanese themselves find Sapporo, Hiroshima, Nagaski, etc. "very important" too.


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## makita09 (Sep 8, 2009)

aab7772003 said:


> I get that whatever you think you say is absolutely fact-based, accurate and logical; you find whatever you feel like for a particular moment to make comments that contradict the later ones you make.


Thun's point is logical. The thing about logic is that opinion is irrelevant, and so is your interpretation of logic.

You have stated something is a contradiction, when it isn't. This is probably due to you misunderstanding the premises, either that or your a dimwit.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

aab7772003 said:


> Hannover, Ulm and August are not really "very important" cities by most definitions,


I think most people would disagree with you about Hannover. Hannover is one of the most important exchibition and congress cities in Europe. Ever heard of CEBIT?


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

K_ said:


> I think most people would disagree with you about Hannover. Hannover is one of the most important exchibition and congress cities in Europe. Ever heard of CEBIT?


"Most people" you imagine to be on your side would "disagree" with me. Even the SINGLE global headliner CEBIT show has been declining in importance in the recent years. Even Nürnberg has one single global headliner show called the Nürnberg Toy Fair. 

CEBIT is the spin-off of the Hannover Fair, which was the fair of all fairs for Germany for maximum a couple of decades after WWII.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanover_Fair

The Hannover Fair gradually and finally lost its original relevance as Germany rebuilt itself from the ashes of WWII, with textile/fashion, heavy metal, and many other fairs re-established and greatly expanded themselves in Düsseldorf, Cologne, Frankfurt and Munich. Now even Berlin has jumped into the pool to aggressively compete in the global trade fair/MICE businesses.

Ever personally experienced the truly global presence of Köln/München/Frankfurt with their offices spanning all over the globe?

One of the reasons EXPO 2000 was held in Hannover was to revitalize the trade fair business in Hannover.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

makita09 said:


> Thun's point is logical. The thing about logic is that opinion is irrelevant, and so is your interpretation of logic.
> 
> You have stated something is a contradiction, when it isn't. This is probably due to you misunderstanding the premises, either that or your a *dimwit*.


*You think* he has a point. You think every single opinion of his is logic.

Something for your reference from a friend of yours.


K_ said:


> Ad Hominem.
> .


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Would you mind if I would correct your English? 

For your knowledge: The Hannover Messe is still the most important industrial fair in the world. The fairground of Hanover is the largest in the world. The Deutsche Messe AG (its owner) the largest fair company in the most important country for fairs in the world.

And regarding your suggested corridor: Unfortunately you don't connect other mayor industrial and commercial agglomerations of Germany such as Berlin, Leipzig and Nuremberg. Besides that, the most logical route from Munich to Hamburg is not via Cologne. All that leads to the conclusion that - if you want to provide a decent HSR coverage for all those - you need a more complex network like e. g. Italy. And that includes a number of hubs, too.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> Would you mind if I would correct your English?
> ...





thun said:


> ... connect other *mayor* industrial...


This is pathetic because only you still need help with your English. 



thun said:


> ...
> For your knowledge: The Hannover Messe is still the most important industrial fair in the world. The fairground of Hanover is the largest in the world. The Deutsche Messe AG (its owner) the largest fair company in the most important country for fairs in the world.
> ...


Being "the largest fair company in the most important country for fairs in the world" simply for having the most exhibition floor space in one location? By that definition, I know that. Messe Frankfurt/München/Köln stage so many fairs all over EU and Asia Pacific; That means these convention/exhibition organizations actually have more exhibition floor space than you imagine. I have yet seen Messe Hannover doing anything similar. I also know that so many countries around the world are building larger and larger fair grounds at really rapid speed. I was saying that the Hannover Messe has lost its original relevance, by the way. 



thun said:


> ...
> And regarding your suggested corridor: Unfortunately you don't connect other mayor industrial and commercial agglomerations of Germany such as Berlin, Leipzig and Nuremberg. Besides that, the most logical route from Munich to Hamburg is not via Cologne. All that leads to the conclusion that - if you want to provide a decent HSR coverage for all those - you need a more complex network like e. g. Italy. And that includes a number of hubs, too.


My proposed corridor is something has yet to be realized.

Meanwhile...



Palatinus said:


> ...
> 
> Why don't they build a direct connection between Berlin and Munich?
> 
> ...


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anhalt_Railway

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erfurt–Leipzig/Halle_high-speed_railway

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg–Erfurt_high-speed_railway

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg–Munich_high-speed_railway

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin–Palermo_railway_axis

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:TEN-1_Berlin-Palermo.gif

There are already Berlin - Hamburg, Berlin - Hannover "quasi HSR" tracks in place.

Also, I mentioned the following previously:



aab7772003 said:


> ...
> 
> Frankfurt - Munich via Nürnberg
> Frankfurt - Munich via Stuttgart
> ...


Something "more complex" is almost here in Germany rather than missing. Meanwhile, France and Spain are building something "more complex" for their HSR networks. By the way, do not bother repeating that France is implementing the uniquely Swiss-style system timetables as Germany is also all about system timetables.


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## makita09 (Sep 8, 2009)

aab7772003 said:


> *You think every single opinion of his is logic.*


*

!? Me logic his think opinion every single you.*


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## pietje01 (Mar 18, 2008)

Now that this thread is effectively killed because most of the posts were more trolling than useful contributions, I'd like to know what the status is and what the plans are regarding HS rail in Germany.

Please no posts calling eachother liar etc. That doesn't interest me.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Status: Look at the map on page two or so. It's rather current. In the same post I linked a list with all lines, buildt, under construction, planned and proposed. Both can be foundt here: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schnellfahrstrecke#Deutschland 

There's a HSL (300 kph) between (Nuremberg-)Ebensfeld and Leipzig (via Erfurt) under construction. So is the HSL Karlsruhe - Basel (250 kph). Stuttgart 21 (has its own thread here) is the reconstruction of Stuttgart main station. The new HSL Wendlingen-Ulm (an independent project, 250 kph) should be opened together with Stuttgart 21 (planned for 2019).
The other two "real" HSL planned are the Frankfurt-Mannheim line closing the most important gap on the Western North-South high speed route and the Hanover-Hamburg/Bremen line (both 300kph).
And there are of course several projects to upgrate existing lines to allow higher speeds (200 or 230 kph) under construction, planned and proposed. Please look at the link for that.


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## pebe (Nov 30, 2010)

well, according to the last reports from the transport ministery they have a planned budget of 8bln € for railway projects until 2020.
If we're lucky thats enough to finish the HSL line Nürnberg-Erfurt and Karlsruhe-Basel and maybe some upgrading/updating of existing lines.
But I wouldn't expect any new HSL work to begin in the near future.
I'm also still skeptical if we will actually see work starting on the HSL Stuttgart-Ulm.
But thats Germany: car > rail


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Well, Nürnberg-Leipzig and Karlsruhe-Basel are both under construction. I don't know, how that affects the budget, i. e. whether their funds are in the future budgets of the ones of the last years.
Most of these 8bln will go to Stuttgart21 and Wendlingen-Ulm I suppose. But that's the point: It certainly lacks somewhere else, namely the numerous bottlenecks in the existing network.


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## pebe (Nov 30, 2010)

afaik(and im no expert here), each years budget has to allocate the necessary funds to finance the work done in that year.

but my point was more to show that the budget for railway projects is way too low. Expensive HS railway constructions doesn't have much chance at the moment.so to answer @pietje01's question: HS railway will remain a patchwork for a long time.


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

im not particularly bothered by the relatively slow pace of german progress, nor by the relatively lower speeds

but i wish they had the foresight to at least align new lines so that after the first upgrade they would be able to support higher speeds to connect the whole of europe

im fine with a 250 connection between Stuttgart-Munchen, Munchen-Wien, but at least make the alignment, the tunnels and bridges good for 300-360 so it will be cheaper to upgrade when we have EU citizens coming from, say, Istanbul...


i hate the shortsightedness of most EU states (germany, austria in particular) when it comes to HS lines, the 'latins' seem to have a broader vision


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

You can't really compare lets say Barcelona-Madrid with Stuttgart-Munich.
The first is one of the most congested air travel routes, so building a very fast HSL means that you can attract quite a lot of the people for the train hence achieving ecological objectives. The latter is a medium distance route where it doesn't make much difference whether the train runs at 250 or 300kph in terms of travel time whereas it certainly makes a huge difference in terms of costs. Another point is that the HSL Wendlingen-Ulm is planned for mixed use (it will be used by light freight trains as well), so increasing the speed up to 300kph means sacrificing slots and hence freight capacity on one of the most important European East-West connections. In fact, 300kph are only reached on solely HSR lines in Germany.
Another issue is of course that Madrid-Barcelona is a 600 or 700km long route in one single country while a 700km route from Stuttgart eastwards crosses at least 3 countries. Its normal that the total number of travellers on such routes are way lower than in the first case. Hence massive investments in a 360kph (or so) HSL are far less justified by demand. The same is true for a comparision with Paris-Marseille.
And to mention a third aspect: Germany's population density is far higher than the one of France (about 200%) or Spain (about 300%) and is more equally spread across the territory. Therefore, building such a line of course can be a lot more complicated as more people are affected. And you'll need more stops to provide attractive services for the same amount of clients. Of course, with more stops, higher speeds make even less sense as you'd loose more time in acceleration and decceleration.

And lets face it, for someone from Istanbul, a high speed train will never be an alternative to travel to Central Europe.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

pebe said:


> but my point was more to show that the budget for railway projects is way too low. Expensive HS railway constructions doesn't have much chance at the moment.so to answer @pietje01's question: HS railway will remain a patchwork for a long time.


Well, there's no point in arguing with you on that.


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

i wasnt complaining about the speed, however in 30-40 years time when europe will be more integrated the alignment should allow for a higher speed

thats all


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

thun said:


> You can't really compare lets say Barcelona-Madrid with Stuttgart-Munich.


No, you cannot. But that is, to some extent, the fault of the German authorities isn't it? I agree with all the arguments about density of population, network considerations, difficult topography in most of the country, etc. etc. etc. that our German friends always throw up as a reason why concepts that are possible in France (and, such thinly populated countries as Japan... and such flat countries as Spain...) cannot possibly be implemented in Germany. 

However, I put it to you that these are sometimes just lame excuses for not making an effort. Think about Berlin-Hamburg. Here we have two of the biggest cities in northern Europe, separated by flat, thinly populated land. NOT ONE of the above excuses could apply. But... instead of a 300+ km/h line we got a track renovation - that is already under major repair. So... no you cannot compare. Because making a truly highspeed track between Berlin and Hamburg would have been so much easier than making one between Madrid and Barcelona or, say, Tokyo and Osaka. 

Oh, and... one final parting shot: I cannot be the only person on this site who possesses a map of Europe? The distance Paris-Strasbourg is identically the same as the distance Strasbourg-Salzburg. Well, Paris-Strasbourg takes 2h20. The French see this as unacceptably slow. So, it's subject to major new investment to lower the travel time to 1h50.


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## pietje01 (Mar 18, 2008)

hans280 said:


> Oh, and... one final parting shot: I cannot be the only person on this site who possesses a map of Europe? The distance Paris-Strasbourg is identically the same as the distance Strasbourg-Salzburg. Well, Paris-Strasbourg takes 2h20. The French see this as unacceptably slow. So, it's subject to major new investment to lower the travel time to 1h50.


But that has also to do with the fact that the French are only interested in low travel times to/from Paris. if you want to travel between cities that don't happen to have Paris in the middle of them, you have the choice between a slow, irregular train or a detour via Paris. In Germany the investments are more evenly spread.

But I think I'm kicking an open door...


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

pietje01 said:


> But that has also to do with the fact that the French are only interested in low travel times to/from Paris. if you want to travel between cities that don't happen to have Paris in the middle of them, you have the choice between a slow, irregular train or a detour via Paris. In Germany the investments are more evenly spread.
> 
> But I think I'm kicking an open door...


Berlin-Munchen: 5:52

Bordeaux-Marseille: 5:43

door closed


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## Motorways (Jul 1, 2009)

hans280 said:


> and such flat countries as Spain...)
> .


I don´t really think that Spain could be considered as flat.










and even less when compared to Germany or France. Span´s geography it´s really hard and this has really complicated the country transportation since ever.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

hans280 said:


> No, you cannot. But that is, to some extent, the fault of the German authorities isn't it? I agree with all the arguments about density of population, network considerations, difficult topography in most of the country, etc. etc. etc. that our German friends always throw up as a reason why concepts that are possible in France (and, such thinly populated countries as Japan... and such flat countries as Spain...) cannot possibly be implemented in Germany.
> 
> However, I put it to you that these are sometimes just lame excuses for not making an effort. Think about Berlin-Hamburg. Here we have two of the biggest cities in northern Europe, separated by flat, thinly populated land. NOT ONE of the above excuses could apply. But... instead of a 300+ km/h line we got a track renovation - that is already under major repair. So... no you cannot compare. Because making a truly highspeed track between Berlin and Hamburg would have been so much easier than making one between Madrid and Barcelona or, say, Tokyo and Osaka.
> 
> Oh, and... one final parting shot: I cannot be the only person on this site who possesses a map of Europe? The distance Paris-Strasbourg is identically the same as the distance Strasbourg-Salzburg. Well, Paris-Strasbourg takes 2h20. The French see this as unacceptably slow. So, it's subject to major new investment to lower the travel time to 1h50.


+1

Stuttgart is a stop between Munich and Paris; the importance of this route will keep growing in the years to come. Within a decade, the travel time between Munich and Berlin will come down to around 3 hours.


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## AdamChobits (Jun 7, 2006)

Motorways said:


> I don´t really think that Spain could be considered as flat.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


:lol: If you read all his post you'll notice he was being sarcastic, like mocking at the "excuses" given by the germans about certain concepts that are actually working in other countries with far more mountains (Spain) or density (Japan).

Notice he also said Japan had a thinly population while Japan has 192 million people in a land smaller than Spain or France.


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## dumbfword (Apr 27, 2010)

AdamChobits said:


> :lol: If you read all his post you'll notice he was being sarcastic, like mocking at the "excuses" given by the germans about certain concepts that are actually working in other countries with far more mountains (Spain) or density (Japan).
> 
> Notice he also said Japan had a thinly population while Japan has *192 million* people in a land smaller than Spain or France.


127 million


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

gramercy said:


> Berlin-Munchen: 5:52
> 
> Bordeaux-Marseille: 5:43
> 
> door closed


Not quite. It is true that the French tend to think that their capital should, automatically and necessarily, enjoy higher priority than any other part of the country ("nos provinces", as they're called....) - an idea that makes Germans and Italians scoff. However, when it comes to railway planning this actually makes sense. Almost two thirds of all middle and long distance travels within France have Paris as either their starting point or their end point. This reflects the fact that, whereas only one fifth of the population lives in Paris, almost half of the "commercial economy" (by which I mean, companies that actually do business - as opposed to the economic activities by farmers, grocers, accountants, hotels... across the country) is located here. The rest of the commercial economy depends largely on business with, and frequent travels to, Paris. 

Hence, the fact that the French have not invested in point-to-point highspeed lines between southern provincial towns is irrelevant to my argument. They'd be mad to do so.


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## AdamChobits (Jun 7, 2006)

dumbfword said:


> 127 million


Ooops, you're right, sorry :bash:


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

hans280 said:


> Almost two thirds of all middle and long distance travels within France have Paris as either their starting point or their end point. This reflects the fact that, whereas only one fifth of the population lives in Paris, almost half of the "commercial economy" (by which I mean, companies that actually do business - as opposed to the economic activities by farmers, grocers, accountants, hotels... across the country) is located here. The rest of the commercial economy depends largely on business with, and frequent travels to, Paris.


That is because France is a centralized country. Germany is a federal country. The biggest air route is, if I'm not mistaken, München to Hamburg. In France Paris is where everything happens. In Germany "where everything happens" depends what sector of the economy you are active in.

Don't overlook another important thing: When Germany started building high speed lines the country was a lot smaller than it is now, and the capital was somewhere else...


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

gramercy said:


> Berlin-Munchen: 5:52
> 
> Bordeaux-Marseille: 5:43


There are only five direct daytime trains from Bordeaux to Marseille, and only two do it in 5 1/2 hours. DB does a far better job than SNCF.

Ofcourse Berlin and München have only been in the same country for about 20 years now...


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## pietje01 (Mar 18, 2008)

hans280 said:


> Not quite. It is true that the French tend to think that their capital should, automatically and necessarily, enjoy higher priority than any other part of the country ("nos provinces", as they're called....) - an idea that makes Germans and Italians scoff. However, when it comes to railway planning this actually makes sense. Almost two thirds of all middle and long distance travels within France have Paris as either their starting point or their end point. This reflects the fact that, whereas only one fifth of the population lives in Paris, almost half of the "commercial economy" (by which I mean, companies that actually do business - as opposed to the economic activities by farmers, grocers, accountants, hotels... across the country) is located here. The rest of the commercial economy depends largely on business with, and frequent travels to, Paris.
> 
> Hence, the fact that the French have not invested in point-to-point highspeed lines between southern provincial towns is irrelevant to my argument. They'd be mad to do so.


But that same argument justifies the German approach since there the "commercial economy" is more evenly spread around the country.
I agree that it would be better if there were more dedicated HS lines, but they probably did their calculations and concluded that it wasn't the right time (yet)


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

hans280 said:


> However, I put it to you that these are sometimes just lame excuses for not making an effort. Think about Berlin-Hamburg. Here we have two of the biggest cities in northern Europe, separated by flat, thinly populated land. NOT ONE of the above excuses could apply. But... instead of a 300+ km/h line we got a track renovation - that is already under major repair.
> So... no you cannot compare. Because making a truly highspeed track between Berlin and Hamburg would have been so much easier than making one between Madrid and Barcelona or, say, Tokyo and Osaka.


Exactly because the area is flat the existing line could be reused. The line speed is 230kph, which is quite high. The fastest trains do the trip in 1h36 minutes. I don't think that building a completely new 300kph line would have made a big difference.

There is one important aspect in which the city pair of Berlin - Hamburg differs from Tokyo - Osaka and Madrid - Barcelone.

Berlin and Hamburg have only been in the same county since 1990. After the reunification of Germany the priority was rebuilding all the connections that 45 years of separation had severed. In the context of this project upgrading the existing line was a good investment. Now that the line allows for 90 minute travel times between Berlin and Hamburg one can really ask if a new line allowing 300kph would really add enough extra value to justify the cost.





> Oh, and... one final parting shot: I cannot be the only person on this site who possesses a map of Europe? The distance Paris-Strasbourg is identically the same as the distance Strasbourg-Salzburg. Well, Paris-Strasbourg takes 2h20. The French see this as unacceptably slow. So, it's subject to major new investment to lower the travel time to 1h50.


Strassbourg and Salzburg are not in the same country. Something you should know, having a map of Europe. There are even two borders between them. And borders still matter. More to the French than to other countries though. Have a look at the number of international trains leaving Salzburg and compare that with Strassbourg...


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

K_ said:


> There are only five direct daytime trains from Bordeaux to Marseille, and only two do it in 5 1/2 hours.


your point being? even if it was a single train it would only prove that they can do it at that kind of speed and they only need so much capacity, if they needed more theyd run more trains




> DB does a far better job than SNCF.


yea yea yea




> Ofcourse Berlin and München have only been in the same country for about 20 years now...


aha,

so why isnt there a direct link from Stuttgart to Koln, from Stuttgart to Munchen or from Koln to Hamburg or from Munchen to Hamburg?

let alone the blatantly obvious: Hamburg-Berlin


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

not to mention rhin-rhone lgv which will not serve paris but serve more switzerland/germany than france


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

gramercy said:


> so why isnt there a direct link from Stuttgart to Koln, from Stuttgart to Munchen or from Koln to Hamburg or from Munchen to Hamburg?


What? Are you seriously claiming that there are no trains from Köln to München?
Oh, je probably intend to imply that there is no contiguous high speed line from Köln to München. But that is a different discussion. Most TGVs run on conventional lines too. There is no contiguous line from Bordeaux to Paris either...


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

gramercy said:


> not to mention rhin-rhone lgv which will not serve paris but serve more switzerland/germany than france


And which also serves to illustrate the RFF/SNCF have started to think a little bit more like DB and SBB...


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

K_ said:


> Oh, je probably intend to imply that there is no contiguous high speed line from Köln to München. But that is a different discussion.


no, thats exactly the discussion we are having



> Most TGVs run on conventional lines too. There is no contiguous line from Bordeaux to Paris either...


nice, you picked one thats already been tendered an soon under construction

meanwhile Paris, Lyon, Valence, Avignon, Marseille, Nimes, Le Mans, Tours, Lille, Bruxelles, Calais, London, Reims, Metz/Nancy and soon Strasbourg are all connected with a contiguous network

(+Dijon, Liege, Antwerp, Rotterdam and Amsterdam only lack short sections)


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

gramercy said:


> no, thats exactly the discussion we are having


+1

Because of reunification and the sorry state of the original stretch of the Berlin - Hamburg line, Germany could have built a brand-new Berlin - Hamburg HSR line to make the the ICE trips between Berlin and Hamburg clock in just under an hour. Such line will make Berlin and Hamburg twin cities; economic synergy can be captured and wealth can be even more evenly distributed with the increased passenger traffic as 5 million plus people will have an enormous commuter zone to find employments and do business.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

You totally forget that by building a completely new line, you would still would have needed to basically rebuild the existing one (which was very crappy in the early ninties). So you have the choice between investing a certain amount of money in a upgrated line or about 150% of it into a dedicated 300kph line which brings shorter travel times of some minutes plus investing a lot of money (I think we talk about more than a billion marks) into the existing line. Travel time isn't the only argument, an investment still has to be justified by its effects. And wasting double the funds for some gained minutes (and these only for those travelling exactly between those two cities) hardly seems to be justified. Especially if you don't have to finance massive investments only on that single line but on every main corridor (rail, canal and motorway) between the formerly separated countries. The money certainly was better invested elsewhere in those days.

Another reason why Germany is investing less money than e. g. France or Spain into HSR: Germany still is a country in which a high percentage of economic power comes from manufacturing, therefore rail freight transport is more vital for the German economy than it is for the French - hence you need to invest a lot of money there, too. That also explains why the early German HSLs (especially Hannover-Würzburg) ar mixed used and ply an important role for both passenger and freight transport.

Finally the point is that it is not that easy to compare different rail networks as the preconditions and the objectives differ from country to country.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

gramercy said:


> meanwhile Paris, Lyon, Valence, Avignon, Marseille, Nimes, Le Mans, Tours, Lille, Bruxelles, Calais, London, Reims, Metz/Nancy and soon Strasbourg are all connected with a contiguous network


Actually they're not, as the LGV Atlantique is not connected to the rest of the network by a high speed line. And the line to Brussel ends in Halle...
Metz, Nancy and Reims are not on any LGV either. They are served by TGVs alright, but these leave the LGV quite a bit before reaching their destinations.

But what is actually the point you are arguing here?


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

thun said:


> Another reason why Germany is investing less money than e. g. France or Spain into HSR: Germany still is a country in which a high percentage of economic power comes from manufacturing, therefore rail freight transport is more vital for the German economy than it is for the French - hence you need to invest a lot of money there, too. That also explains why the early German HSLs (especially Hannover-Würzburg) ar mixed used and ply an important role for both passenger and freight transport.


Another big difference between Germany and Spain is that Germany is not bankrupt. The way things are evolving right now Germany might actually end up paying for the Spanish HSLs...


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

K_ said:


> Actually they're not, as the LGV Atlantique is not connected to the rest of the network by a high speed line. And the line to Brussel ends in Halle...
> Metz, Nancy and Reims are not on any LGV either. They are served by TGVs alright, but these leave the LGV quite a bit before reaching their destinations.


grasping at straws huh?

by that logic neither koln nor frankfurt is "connected"


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

K_ said:


> Another big difference between Germany and Spain is that Germany is not bankrupt. The way things are evolving right now Germany might actually end up paying for the Spanish HSLs...


what about france? 

and the financial problems dont stem from the budget deficits they stem from bankers shorting
but that _is_ another discussion


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

gramercy said:


> grasping at straws huh?
> 
> by that logic neither koln nor frankfurt is "connected"


+1

It is funny how someone claims that a dedicated Berlin - Hamburg HSR line will only " save some minutes" when actual time savings generated by such HSR line will be as much as 45 minutes in comparision with the travel time of the current ICE services.

Now, these folks now come up with the new spin by saying that different HSR systems should not be compared when they actually compare these systems to death, with claim such as the world should kill themselves for the "flawless Swiss system" because the Swiss apparently put the Germans to shame in this area.

It is all about whatever they want.


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

thun said:


> ....


as far as freight is concerned, the french are actually putting their money there as well:
http://www.railwaygazette.com/nc/news/single-view/view/snit-makes-rail-a-priority.html


for example the new Nimes-Montpelier HSL will be mixed with freight


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

aab7772003 said:


> +1
> 
> Because of reunification and the sorry state of the original stretch of the Berlin - Hamburg line, Germany could have built a brand-new Berlin - Hamburg HSR line to make the the ICE trips between Berlin and Hamburg clock in just under an hour. Such line will make Berlin and Hamburg twin cities; economic synergy can be captured and wealth can be even more evenly distributed with the increased passenger traffic as 5 million plus people will have an enormous commuter zone to find employments and do business.


That line would never have been planned and build in the time it took to upgrade the existing line. Also that line would have diverted funds from other projects that were also needed. A new line would have cost upwards of 4 billion euros, whereas the speed increase only costed 500 million.
In the end what matters is not train speed but passenger speed. What matters for commuters and businessmen alike is not how fast trains go from Berlin Hbf to Hamburg Altona. What matters is door to door times from somewhere in Berlin to somewhere in Hamburg. The tight integration of local and long distance services in Berlin Südkreuz probably saves more minutes to more people than an upgrade of the line to Hamburg from 230 to 300 kph ever could. 
Currently about 10000 people travel from Berlin to Frankfurt Hamburg daily. There are no direct flights anymore between the two cities. So increasing the speed between the two places would maybe grow the market a bit, but would not lead to a higher market share for rail, as everyone who doesn't drive already takes the train.

No building an entire new line between Hamburg and Berlin would have been a waste of money.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

gramercy said:


> what about france?
> 
> and the financial problems dont stem from the budget deficits they stem from bankers shorting
> but that _is_ another discussion


Saying that the problems stem from bankers shorting is saying that fever is the cause of flu.
Unfortunately I indeed cannot repair your failure to understand basic economics in a few messages...


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## gramercy (Dec 25, 2008)

K_ said:


> Saying that the problems stem from bankers shorting is saying that fever is the cause of flu.
> Unfortunately I indeed cannot repair your failure to understand basic economics in a few messages...


im an economist, but sure you must be right and krugman etc. are just idiots


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

aab7772003 said:


> +1
> 
> It is funny how someone claims that a dedicated Berlin - Hamburg HSR line will only " save some minutes" when actual time savings generated by such HSR line will be as much as 45 minutes in comparision with the travel time of the current ICE services.


That is not true. A dedicated high speed line was investigated, and would have lead to travel times around 65 minutes. That's about 30 minutes faster than now. 
It would have also been very expensive, which would have lead to other projects being starved of money, and less people seing their travel times reduced. 
Also the point I'm making is not that the solution chosen by DB for Hamburg - Berlin was the technically best solution, of the fastest solution. The point I and others are making is that it was the best value for money solution. You do not refute that point by pointing out that a hypothetical dedicate line would have been faster. Of course it would have been faster. Originally there was even a plan for a Maglev on the route. It got cancelled because it would never have paid itself back.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

gramercy said:


> grasping at straws huh?


No. Why should I have to?



> by that logic neither koln nor frankfurt is "connected"


But I'm not employing that kind of logic. 

The point I'm making is that it doesn't matter how fast the trains run. Yes, the French are better at making large metal objects move fast at ground level than the Germans are. They're better at building dedicated HSL that almost go where people want to go.
When it comes to actually moving people from A to B the Germany do a better job. I can actually go to www.bahn.de and put in two street adresses, and get a detailed description of how to get from one place to another by public transport. I can do that also in Switzerland, the UK, the Netherlands of Belgium. I can't do that in France. SNCF will even flatly deny that it is possible to travel between some of it's stations when in fact they are all connected.
And what use has cutting 30 minutes of in-train time when the result is 30 minutes extra in-station time? The LGV Est is a nice piece of engineering, but time could also have been saved for the people travelling on the line by choosing a better terminal in Paris (Gare du Nord, for example). 

And did I mention that the food on German trains is way better than on French trains. What an irony...


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

With all the understanding we can have for Germany's population situation, cold war history, the niceties of its ÖPNV systems and the fact that at least some regional trains are preserved, the fact remains that many main lines are quite pathetic. Are we really supposed to celebrate the fact that Berlin - Hamburg speedy in the 2010s have risen to the level of the 1930s? Much worse, look at the Berlin-Dresden line. 300 kmh was never an issue here, but despite the flat terrain, the line remains to large parts a medium speed line. 200 kmh, i.e. modernization so the line could reach the speeds of the 1930s, has not happened, and still the Bahn, the Bund and Saxony are bickering over who should pay and what to do. 
Having one of the foremost legacies in rail infrastructure in Europe, Germany because of its provincialism, its Arschkrieschen to the automobile lobby, and the tendency to save money in the wrong places, is starving the country's largest employer to death. They do not see what is going on elsewhere in Europe, while they still dream of their pathetic Autobahns.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

gramercy said:


> im an economist, but sure you must be right and krugman etc. are just idiots


Can you show me where Krugman tells that bankers shorting is the reason why Greece is in trouble? Krugman is an very intelligent man, that is why he is not making claims that all the problems we are seeing in Europe are all the fault of evil bankers.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

K_ said:


> That is not true. A dedicated high speed line was investigated, and would have lead to travel times around 65 minutes. That's about 30 minutes faster than now.
> It would have also been very expensive, which would have lead to other projects being starved of money, and less people seing their travel times reduced.
> Also the point I'm making is not that the solution chosen by DB for Hamburg - Berlin was the technically best solution, of the fastest solution. The point I and others are making is that it was the best value for money solution. You do not refute that point by pointing out that a hypothetical dedicate line would have been faster. Of course it would have been faster. Originally there was even a plan for a Maglev on the route. It got cancelled because it would never have paid itself back.


Many of the current Berlin - Hamburg ICE services last longer than 1 hour 40 minutes. Gradual technical improvements would eventually bring ICE services on the dedicated Berlin - Hamburg HSR tracks a little bit under an hour.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Are we really supposed to celebrate the fact that Berlin - Hamburg speedy in the 2010s have risen to the level of the 1930s?


Speeds have risen way above the level of the 1930s. The "Fliegende Hamburger" needed 138 minutes. The ICE currently needs 91. That is quite a bit faster.
So what is your point exactly?


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

aab7772003 said:


> Many of the current Berlin - Hamburg ICE services last longer than 1 hour 40 minutes. Gradual technical improvements would eventually bring ICE services on the dedicated Berlin - Hamburg HSR tracks a little bit under an hour.


Most are actually either 1h31, 1h36 of 1h40, depending on the stopping pattern. Stopping in Spandau adds some minutes to the train's time, but saves a lot of time for people who's final destination is in the West of Berlin.

And yes, again, I agree that a dedicated line would have been faster. I however disagree with your opinion that the highest possible speed should be targeted regardless of the cost.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

K_ said:


> And yes, again, I agree that a dedicated line would have been faster. I however disagree with your opinion that the highest possible speed should be targeted regardless of the cost.


+1, for that matter. :banana:


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

K_ said:


> Another big difference between Germany and Spain is that Germany is not bankrupt. The way things are evolving right now Germany might actually end up paying for the Spanish HSLs...


I don't think Spain is bankrupt either.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

K_ said:


> Currently about 10000 people travel from Berlin to Frankfurt daily. There are no direct flights anymore between the two cities. So increasing the speed between the two places would maybe grow the market a bit, but would not lead to a higher market share for rail, as everyone who doesn't drive already takes the train.


Which Frankfurt is meant by this. Because there are still more than 150 flight per week from Berlin to Frankfurt/Main. There seem to be a lot of travellers that could be gained by DB if they just could slash travel time on tracks by at least an hour.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

flierfy said:


> Which Frankfurt is meant by this. Because there are still more than 150 flight per week from Berlin to Frankfurt/Main. There seem to be a lot of travellers that could be gained by DB if they just could slash travel time on tracks by at least an hour.


I have mistyped. I meant Hamburg. (We were discussing the Berlin - Hamburg line and wether it should be upgraded to a full HSL).


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

K_ said:


> That line would never have been planned and build in the time it took to upgrade the existing line.


That doesn't reflect positively on the Germans, does it? (I shall gladly broaden the scorn to most other European countries - including France...) Most of the HSLs now being built in emerging countries - not only in autocratic China, but also in fast-growing Asian democracies and, shortly, in Brazil - are planned, projected and built in a span of 5-7 years. The fact that the German "Planungsverfahren" makes everything last 15+ years is hardly something to be proud of?



K_ said:


> In the end what matters is not train speed but passenger speed. What matters for commuters and businessmen alike is not how fast trains go from Berlin Hbf to Hamburg Altona. What matters is door to door times from somewhere in Berlin to somewhere in Hamburg.


I couldn't agree more. The prime example of a "bastard HSL" is the Amtrak Acela Express, which prides itself of its 240 km/h top speed, but which has apallingly low average travel speeds. I would argue that an average speed of at least 200 km/h should be expected from a high-speed line, regardless of top speeds.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

hans280 said:


> That doesn't reflect positively on the Germans, does it? (I shall gladly broaden the scorn to most other European countries - including France...) Most of the HSLs now being built in emerging countries - not only in autocratic China, but also in fast-growing Asian democracies and, shortly, in Brazil - are planned, projected and built in a span of 5-7 years. The fact that the German "Planungsverfahren" makes everything last 15+ years is hardly something to be proud of?


That China can build infrastructure so fast is largely due to certain features of the Chinese political system that I'd rather not see European countries emulate. There are things I value more than having the fastest trains.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Indeed. Although the German regulation is probably too extensive. The planning process certainly could be streamlined a lot without loosing democratic participation (or by even increasing it, see the discussion about the outcome of the Stuttgart21 talks and Geissler's opinion).

Nevertheless, you don't have to forget that emerging countries like China or Brazil are in a process of building the infrastructure needed for economic development whereas a country like Germany begun 175 years ago doing that and had a more or less complete infrastructure about 110 years ago (if we talk about railroads). Of course China is building a lot of HSLs - they would be stupid if they wouldn' apply latest technology. It's comparing apples with oranges.


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

K_ said:


> That China can build infrastructure so fast is largely due to certain features of the Chinese political system that I'd rather not see European countries emulate. There are things I value more than having the fastest trains.


You ARE being silly - or else you're deliberately misquoting me. It was precisely to avoid the China invection that I said "... NOT ONLY in autocratic China, but also in fast-growing Asian DEMOCRACIES". I don't see how any person in honest faith can claim that I tried do make China the hero of my story!?


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

hans280 said:


> You ARE being silly - or else you're deliberately misquoting me. It was precisely to avoid the China invection that I said "... NOT ONLY in autocratic China, but also in fast-growing Asian DEMOCRACIES". I don't see how any person in honest faith can claim that I tried do make China the hero of my story!?


+1



thun said:


> Indeed. Although the German regulation is probably too extensive. The planning process certainly could be streamlined a lot without loosing democratic participation (or by even increasing it, see the discussion about the outcome of the Stuttgart21 talks and Geissler's opinion).
> 
> Nevertheless, you don't have to forget that emerging countries like China or Brazil are in a process of building the infrastructure needed for economic development whereas a country like Germany begun 175 years ago doing that and had a more or less complete infrastructure about 110 years ago (if we talk about railroads). Of course China is building a lot of HSLs - they would be stupid if they wouldn' apply latest technology. It's comparing apples with oranges.


What is so wonderful about the "democracy" that is actually civil obedience masterminded by a hypocritical political party with those people on welfare popping out bloody eye balls?

One of those infamous incidents that involve "ecologically conscious" Green Party:
http://www.airliners.net/aviation-forums/general_aviation/read.main/1871974/

Sure, Europe had autobahns, airports, real HSR, container ports, skyscrapers, nuclear power plants, wind farms, etc. 110 years ago, NOT!

Moving the capital back to Berlin, with the dream of turning the "kaputt" city as the new economic engine of eastern Germany and even the entire Germany is much more a money-gobbling vanity/wet-dream project than building a dedicated HSR line connecting Berlin and Hamburg. Relationship between two big metropolitan cities goes through a metamorphosis when travel time between them is unquestionably reduced to under an hour. Since so much money has been spent on the white-elephant project of transforming Berlin into something which it will unlikely become again, we might just as well build the dedicated HSR line to connect the "welfare" capital with one of the most prosperous cities in Germany to finish everything off, in order to reignite the economic synergy between the two biggest cities in Germany that were very interconnected for a long time before WWII.

By the way, take sometime to study how the failure of Narita to turn into the meaningful global gateway of Japan has benefited the latter Seoul Incheon. Japan and Germany share rather similar stages of economic development. Japan was just as developed as West Germany in the 1960s and 1970s; OMG rice farmers at Narita need to maintain their time-honored way of life.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Well, like it or not, we're certainly better off in a country where every opinion on something is heard, is treated equally and has a chance to influence outcomes. There's nothing I want to trade that for. Certainly not travel speed.
And for your knowledge, I wasn't specifically referring to the Greens (which - although I'm not a supporter - play an important role in how German politics look like today).


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> Well, like it or not, we're certainly better off in a country where every opinion on something is heard, is treated equally and has a chance to influence outcomes. There's nothing I want to trade that for. Certainly not travel speed.
> And for your knowledge, I wasn't specifically referring to the Greens (which - although I'm not a supporter - play an important role in how German politics look like today).


I DO NOT need *your* knowledge, aka opinions. One piece of your infamous "knowledge" is your complete ignorance of the global development of the German trade fair industry.

Yes, better off for everyone when those on welfare drag down the welfare of everyone, including those on welfare themselves, in Germany, NOT!

Democracy is not the excuse for civil disobedience. Poverty and ignorance making things worse for everyone is not really what democracy is about.

It is one thing that the underprivileged fight for more social benefits for themselves. It is another thing that their poverty and often ignorance/incompetence/narrow-mindedness/worse that eventually make Germany decline and consequently make themselves go deeper into even further degradation. 

Social justice and economic developments are not always two conflicting and interlocking issues, in the case of Stuttgart 21 and the dedicated Berlin - Hamburg HSR lines.

Once again, it is really about coming up with new excuses, from total journey time, the wonderful Swiss concept and now the enviable functioning democracy. What is next? OMG.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

Which fast growing Asian democracies are you talking about? South Korea and Japan, democratic countries with HSR, are losing population.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

Well, no-one here needs your biased ******* opinion on that topic either. :banana:


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

LtBk said:


> Which fast growing Asian democracies are you talking about? South Korea and Japan, democratic countries with HSR, are losing population.


South Korea would be one. I haven't checked their demographic statistics (maybe their population IS shrinking?), but they have made the transition from third world to industrialised country within the last generation. Chapeau! Taiwan would be a second example. A couple of other countries in SE Asia appear close to making the "leap of faith". 

On the broader issue of divergent systems of public governance: I did not mean to spark a debate about the virtues of civic involvement versus "firm hand" government. If anything, I was alluding to my own Danish roots. I dislike autoritarianism. But, I also dislike confederalism. Surely at the end of the day, one has to agree on one "national interest"? What constitutes the national interest must be democratically decided - certainly! But railway projects of national interest cannot be materially influenced by politicians at the sub-national level, nor by mayors who resent seeing their town bypassed. 

A highspeed train stops at most once per 200 km. If local interests force it to stop more often than that, then this - in my strictly personal view - is indicative of a sick political system.


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## pietje01 (Mar 18, 2008)

hans280 said:


> South Korea would be one. I haven't checked their demographic statistics (maybe their population IS shrinking?), but they have made the transition from third world to industrialised country within the last generation. Chapeau! Taiwan would be a second example. A couple of other countries in SE Asia appear close to making the "leap of faith".


Are you really comparing the West-European democracy comparing with the ones in those countrys.
It's not because a country says it's free and democratic, that individual rights are valued as much as in Germany or most EU countrys. And I also don't want to trade that for slightly faster trains or such.


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## Rohne (Feb 20, 2007)

Germany needs more funds for its traffic infrastructure in general. Both, the Autobahn and rail networks are totally underfinanced.

Existing HS lines are Hannover - Göttingen - Kassel - Fulda - Würzburg (without any bypasses), Mannheim - Stuttgart, Köln - Frankfurt Airport, Hannover - Berlin and Nürnberg - Ingolstadt.

The HSR network should be extended as follows.
- general: contiguous lines of v_max 250-300km/h; usage of existing main stations ("Hbf"s) only in those cities that in the following are mentioned as intermediate points of the lines; most other cities should be bypassed, eventually with a dedicated ICE station for some (not all!) of the trains along the new tracks
- 2 lines of highest priority:

*Köln (Deutz and Hbf) - Frankfurt (Airport and Hbf) - Stuttgart Hbf (underground) - München Hbf*; with further extensions Köln Hbf - Brussels, Köln Deutz - Düsseldorf Hbf - Amsterdam and München Hbf - Salzburg
(Kopenhagen-) *Hamburg Hbf - Hannover Hbf - Frankfurt Hbf - Basel* (- Milan)
- additionally we need the corridors Hamburg - Berlin - Halle/Leipzig - Erfurt - Nürnberg - München, Frankfurt - Erfurt, Frankfurt - Würzburg - Nürnberg (- Regensburg - Linz) and Köln - Dortmund - Hannover - Berlin.

The planned/completed 230km/h stretches München - Augsburg, Hamburg - Berlin and Nürnberg - Ebensfeld are ok for the next years, since closing of the first two lines' gaps are much more important.
Thus, that's what's missing:
- _Frankfurt - Mannheim_ 300km/h with Mannheim bypass (planned, thanks to Kirchturm-politicians with a useless stop at Darmstadt and without the Mannheim bypass) for Frankfurt - Stuttgart in less than 1 hour
- _Stuttgart - Augsburg_ 250km/h with Ulm bypass and underground station at least for high speed trains in Stuttgart (currently only Stuttgart 21, Stuttgart - Ulm and a few 200km/h-kilometers between Ulm and Augsburg are planned, Ulm bypass and 250km/h line Ulm - Augsburg are completely missing) for Stuttgart - München in less than 1.5 hours
- completion of _Karlsruhe - Basel_ 250km/h, best with a new Freiburg bypass (partly planned, partly u/c, Freiburg bypass missing) for Frankfurt - Basel in 2 hours
- _Hamburg - Hannover_ 300km/h (planned) for a travel time of less than 1 hour
- _Frankfurt - Fulda - Erfurt_ 250-300km/h (planned, but Fulda - Erfurt only for 160-200km/h which is way too slow, also a further accelaration of the Frankfurt Süd - Gelnhausen sector is needed) for Frankfurt - Hannover in 2 hours and Frankfurt - Erfurt in 1.5 hours
- _Berlin - Halle/Leipzig - Erfurt - Nürnberg - München_ 300km/h (finished in the foreseeable future, only Ingolstadt - München will still be way too slow) for a travel time of 3.5 hours
- _Frankfurt - Würzburg - Nürnberg_ 250km/h (nothing planned, there's only a small 200km/h stretch between Iphofen and Neustadt, Frankfurt - Würzburg could be accelerated if Frankfurt - Fulda is realized as 'Mottgers-Spange' but would mean a significant detour for both Frankfurt - Fulda and Frankfurt- Würzburg) for a travel time of 1.5 hours (and Hannover - Nürnberg in 2.5 hours)
- _Köln - Dortmund - Hannover_ 250km/h (only short 200 or 230km/h stretches planned, but might be ok since it's not high priority) for a travel time of 2 hours
- 250km/h bypasses of Göttingen, Fulda and maybe Kassel (nothing planned)
- 200-250km/h international segments Amsterdam - Köln, Brussels - Köln, Nürnberg - Regensburg - Linz and Hamburg - Copenhagen (only a short 250km/h section between Köln and Aachen is finished, the rest and current plans are a joke).

Germany's population is more spread throughout the country than in France, sure, but still the vast majority lives in or near the mentioned cities and their urban/metropolitan areas. So this would be a quite good high speed coverage for most of the country's population and all its main traffic flows.

In the future, one might think about high speed lines Berlin - Warsaw, Berlin - Dresden - Prague, (München-) Regensburg - Prague and München - Innsbruck, as well as an additional acceleration of Berlin - Halle/Leipzig (currently 200km/h only, travel time of 1 hour between Berlin and the two cities might be possible then).


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

thun said:


> Well, no-one here needs your *biased ******** opinion on that topic either. :banana:


Again, your opinions disguised as "facts." 

Those Stuttgart 21 rioters are indeed biased ********.


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

Rohne said:


> _Berlin - Halle/Leipzig - Erfurt - Nürnberg - München_ 300km/h (finished in the foreseeable future, only Ingolstadt - München will still be way too slow) for a travel time of 3.5 hours


This line is, I think, typical of my earlier point about a planning process that purports to aim at the national interest being hijacked by local interests. Erfurt is NOT on a straight line from Nuremberg to Berlin. Such a line would pass via Hof next to the Czech border. And, given that Hof may be too small, and the landscape too hilly, a line Nuremberg-Leipzig-Berlin would have been closer to optimal. However, the line Nuremberg-Erfurt that is now being built swerves in a slightly westernly direction, and represents a major detour, slowing down the point-to-point traffic between Munich and the Nation's Capital significantly. Having said that... 

... given that the line apparently has to go via Erfurt (strong local pressures were, I think applied to the planning process?), then the second-best option would be continuation toward Berlin via a straight HS-line through Halle. However, here local interests enter the fray again, and we have now for a decade heard waffle about "Halle/Leipzig". Pardon me, but a train that has to service Nuremberg/Erfurt/Leipzig on the way between Munich and Berlin cannot be characterised as a highspeed train - regardless of how fast it runs.


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## rheintram (Mar 5, 2008)

What I don't get is why Germany is so reluctant to upgrade the (or even build a new) Munich - Rosenheim - Kufstein line. After all this is part of TEN corridor 1. In Austria the Neue Unterinntalbahn which allows for up to 250km/h will be opened in 2012 (four tracks). On the German side we still have a twin-tracked line with a maxspeed of 140 km/h.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

hans280 said:


> This line is, I think, typical of my earlier point about a planning process that purports to aim at the national interest being hijacked by local interests. Erfurt is NOT on a straight line from Nuremberg to Berlin. Such a line would pass via Hof next to the Czech border. And, given that Hof may be too small, and the landscape too hilly, a line Nuremberg-Leipzig-Berlin would have been closer to optimal. However, the line Nuremberg-Erfurt that is now being built swerves in a slightly westernly direction, and represents a major detour, slowing down the point-to-point traffic between Munich and the Nation's Capital significantly. Having said that...
> 
> ... given that the line apparently has to go via Erfurt (strong local pressures were, I think applied to the planning process?), then the second-best option would be continuation toward Berlin via a straight HS-line through Halle. However, here local interests enter the fray again, and we have now for a decade heard waffle about "Halle/Leipzig". Pardon me, but a train that has to service Nuremberg/Erfurt/Leipzig on the way between Munich and Berlin cannot be characterised as a highspeed train - regardless of how fast it runs.


Thanks, Rohne, for turning the subject back to railways and ending the discussions about taking away civic rights from people on welfare or the advantages of Chinese democracy and German Planfeststellungsverfahren.

Hans, what you do not see: Leipzig/Halle - Erfurt is not only part of Berlin - Munich, but also of Dresden - Frankfurt evolving HSR (if they would ever get around to completing that, see Rohne's post). Therefore the swerve to the West of Leipzig/Halle - Nuremberg is justifiable. Thuringia is one of those cases of a typical German population pattern: no city is particularly big, but overall the population is too large for a train not to stop at all in the state, like the HSR through Sachsen-Anhalt usually does. When having to choose one city, Erfurt is probably the better choice, both because it can accomodate both HSR routes and because it at least beats other cities like Jena in importance.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

hans280 said:


> This line is, I think, typical of my earlier point about a planning process that purports to aim at the national interest being hijacked by local interests. Erfurt is NOT on a straight line from Nuremberg to Berlin. Such a line would pass via Hof next to the Czech border. And, given that Hof may be too small, and the landscape too hilly, a line Nuremberg-Leipzig-Berlin would have been closer to optimal. However, the line Nuremberg-Erfurt that is now being built swerves in a slightly westernly direction, and represents a major detour, slowing down the point-to-point traffic between Munich and the Nation's Capital significantly.


Routing this rail line via Erfurt serves more than local interests. This alignment allows to pick up the Frankfurt/M-Dresden services and accelerate these as well. One stone, two birds.

The detour it takes make up just a few minutes added time. There is much more time lost elsewhere between Berlin and München. The slow passage through Erfurt and the delayed upgrade of the Ebensfeld-Nürnberg line just to name a few.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Thanks, Rohne, for turning the subject back to railways and ending the discussions about taking away civic rights from people on welfare or the advantages of Chinese democracy and German Planfeststellungsverfahren.
> 
> ...


I also wish that in real world building HSR would be all about mobility and economic development rather than an easy target for the power hungry political party and the underprivileged citizens who do not travel but instead see mobility as some kind of get-rich-quick scheme for the big corporations.


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Thuringia is one of those cases of a typical German population pattern: no city is particularly big, but overall the population is too large for a train not to stop at all in the state, like the HSR through Sachsen-Anhalt usually does.


Yes, but... my problem is the following: couldn't you say the same thing about, for example, Dijon as representative of Burgundy and Franche Comte? The old express, before the 1980s, between Paris and Lyon had a compulsory stop ("Pflichthalt") in Dijon. The new LGV does not even get near Dijon. Highspeed trains are not a replacement for incumbent train services; they are a replacement for domestic airlines. Consequently, just like the plane from Munich to Berlin does not have an intermediate landing in Erfurt, neither should the ICE from Munich to Berlin stop in Erfurt.

I guess at the end of the day I have a much bigger question: do our German friends really want highspeed train services? Don't get me wrong - I'm sure they WANT them, but only (this would be my assertion) if they can have them on the cheap. When I say "cheap" I don't necessarily mean financial cost. Financial cost is clearly a part of the picture - real HSLs cost billions and billions of Euros, and often decades of subsidy, and it must be said that the public opinion in Germany is usually quite "thrifty". More importantly, however, is the sociatal costs. True HS concepts involve sacrificing the interests of millions and millions of citizens, who may get sharply reduced access to railway services, because this is in the interest of the majority of the population. Madrid-Barcelona reduced a number of medium-sized towns in Spain to a subsidiary status. The elevated bypass through eastern Naples has given some 30,000 people a railway line next to their bedroom windows. Little has been invested in regional rail transport in France (even in Paris!!!) since the 1980s, becaus the TGVs should receive most of the money "pour la gloire de la nation". 

I have a sneaky feeling that most Germans would find that if THAT is the price of highspeed rail then... no thanks.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

hans280 said:


> You ARE being silly - or else you're deliberately misquoting me. It was precisely to avoid the China invection that I said "... NOT ONLY in autocratic China, but also in fast-growing Asian DEMOCRACIES". I don't see how any person in honest faith can claim that I tried do make China the hero of my story!?


I am not claiming you tried to make China the hero of your story. 
However, currently nobody is building HSLs as fast as China. Not even other fast growing Asian Democracies...


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

hans280 said:


> On the broader issue of divergent systems of public governance: I did not mean to spark a debate about the virtues of civic involvement versus "firm hand" government. If anything, I was alluding to my own Danish roots. I dislike autoritarianism. But, I also dislike confederalism. Surely at the end of the day, one has to agree on one "national interest"? What constitutes the national interest must be democratically decided - certainly! But railway projects of national interest cannot be materially influenced by politicians at the sub-national level, nor by mayors who resent seeing their town bypassed.


Who decides what is "national interest". You think that certain practices in the construction and operation of high speeds railways are more optimal to others. And you might be even right on that point.
However, the question here is not about "how to we get the most efficient infrastructure", but "how to we get all the stakeholders on board". 
In the end there is a lot to be said for allowing some inefficiencies exist in exchange for not excluding large parts of the population...



> A highspeed train stops at most once per 200 km. If local interests force it to stop more often than that, then this - in my strictly personal view - is indicative of a sick political system.


In Japan some high speed trains stop every 20 to 40 km or so.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

hans280 said:


> I guess at the end of the day I have a much bigger question: do our German friends really want highspeed train services? Don't get me wrong - I'm sure they WANT them, but only (this would be my assertion) if they can have them on the cheap. When I say "cheap" I don't necessarily mean financial cost. Financial cost is clearly a part of the picture - real HSLs cost billions and billions of Euros, and often decades of subsidy, and it must be said that the public opinion in Germany is usually quite "thrifty". More importantly, however, is the sociatal costs. True HS concepts involve sacrificing the interests of millions and millions of citizens, who may get sharply reduced access to railway services, because this is in the interest of the majority of the population. Madrid-Barcelona reduced a number of medium-sized towns in Spain to a subsidiary status. The elevated bypass through eastern Naples has given some 30,000 people a railway line next to their bedroom windows. Little has been invested in regional rail transport in France (even in Paris!!!) since the 1980s, becaus the TGVs should receive most of the money "pour la gloire de la nation".
> 
> I have a sneaky feeling that most Germans would find that if THAT is the price of highspeed rail then... no thanks.


And shouldn't they be entitled to thinking that?

One big difference between Germany and Spain and France becomes immediately clear if you look at a map of population densities. Spain is basically Madrid and the coastal areas, with hardly much of importance in between. So building a HSL - Madrid - Barcelona that bypasses a lot of towns in between does inconvenience some people, but not as many as say bypassing Mannheim on the way from Frankfurt to Stuttgart would.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

hans280 said:


> The new LGV does not even get near Dijon. Highspeed trains are not a replacement for incumbent train services; they are a replacement for domestic airlines.


In Germany High speed trains are a way of improving the network firstly. DB started an IC network in the 70ies that aimed at having convenient connections between all major hubs in Germany. What they did since then was mostly gradually improving it by just speeding up parts of it. So yes, in Germany its mostly about replacing imcumbent services with faster ones. And what is wrong with that?

It's an approach that I think suits Germany well.

The French approach has always been to improve relations with Paris. The LGV does indeed not pass by, or stop in Dijon, with the consequence that, although trip times from Dijon to Paris decreased substantially, those from Dijon to the south didn't improve that much. That is going to change however, as France is building the LGV Rhin - Rhone, which will put Dijon in the middle of star of lines going in all directions. SNCF has realized that they dominate the to/from Paris market, and that if they want to continue to grow they need to server the "province - province" market better. DB has on the other hand has always served the local and medium distance market better, because Germany never had an equivalent of Paris.




> Consequently, just like the plane from Munich to Berlin does not have an intermediate landing in Erfurt, neither should the ICE from Munich to Berlin stop in Erfurt.


That planes don't (usually) have intermediate stops is one of their biggest disadvantages. It's one high speed rail should not copy. By stopping in Erfurt the ICE also serves the München - Erfurt and Erfurt - Berlin markets. And by stopping at major nodal points in your network you offer even more value. Railways are not a collection of services, they are a network, and the value of a network is proportional to the square of the number of points it connects. 

Of course, if there is enough demand to have both a non stop ICE München - Berlin, and one that stops in Erfurt, than it makes sense to offer both.


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## Rohne (Feb 20, 2007)

hans, passenger demand on the Berlin - München (with intermediate stops in Nürnberg, Erfurt and Halle or Leipzig) line justifies not more than an hourly train per direction. So building a straight line via Hof with even less intermediate stops would be a waste of money. By routing the trains via Erfurt, the utilisation of most parts of this line drastically increases to more economical levels since it will also be used by Frankfurt - Berlin (will be hourly via Erfurt, since this routing is faster than the current one via Braunschweig) and the even so hourly Frankfurt - Dresden ICEs.
That's just consequent. You could also demand a direct Frankfurt - München (in opposite to existing lines via Nürnberg or Stuttgart respectively) or Paris - Calais direct and not via Lille... But you would hardly be able to make such routings economically viable.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

K_ said:


> ...
> That planes don't (usually) have intermediate stops is one of their *biggest disadvantages*. It's one high speed rail should not copy.
> ...


Modern jetliners with their ever-improving fuel economy are designed to fly as long as possible without stopping. The increased range with increased payload is actually their *biggest advantage*. Airline network planning achieves the biggest operational efficiency for airlines and maximum network connectivity with shortest travel time for the maximum amount of passengers through a hub-and-spoke system. 

HSR is fundamentally designed to make as few stops as possible. The discussion on making fewer stops or not is not relevant for HSR simply becuase there should NOT be any discussion about it. IC stands for InterCity and ICE stands for InterCity Express, *not* complete network express. First and foremost, ICE with true high speed travel time is really designed to serve the first-tier cities within Germany and major cities in the rest of Europe.

Germany might not have Paris, but many people had wet dreams of turning Berlin into the German Paris and London once again at the time of reunification through the subsequent very expensive but very cost ineffective capital relocation vanity project. Also, the fact that Germany does not have its own equivalent of Paris and London does not change the fact that there are first-tier cities within the country where the majority of population and economic activities concentrate.

Thinking should evolve with the evolving reality. People thought the world was flat before Galileo came around and they persecuted him consequently so as to keep their thinking alive.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

aab7772003 said:


> HSR is fundamentally designed to make as few stops as possible.


Since when? Have a look at JR's Kodama services if you will...



> The discussion on making fewer stops or not is not relevant for HSR simply becuase there should NOT be any discussion about it.


You declaring something not subject to discussion does not mean a lot though.



> IC stands for InterCity and ICE stands for InterCity Express, *not* complete network express. First and foremost, ICE with true high speed travel time is really designed to serve the first-tier cities within Germany and major cities in the rest of Europe.


It's "Inter City Express" because it was conceived to improve an already existing IC network by speeding up parts of it. 
Anyway, stopping in 2nd tier city can speed up connections between 1st tier cities. For example: that all trains from Frankfurt to Stuttgart and Basel stop in Mannheim has as an effect that the number of options to get from Frankfurt to Stuttgart or Basel doubles.



> Also, the fact that Germany does not have its own equivalent of Paris and London does not change the fact that there are first-tier cities within the country where the majority of population and economic activities concentrate.


The difference is that in France the "1st tier city" is Paris for everyone. In Germany it's Frankfurt, to München, or Köln, or Hamburg or...
For someone living within 150 km of München fast connections with that city are of more importance than fast connections with Berlin.

The other thing is that minor cities deserve rail connections too. If there is a market for a non stop München - Berlin train next to a train that does München - Nürnberg - Erfurt - Halle - Berlin than by all means run both. If however the market isn't there to run both trains the smart choice is to run the one with more stops.



> Thinking should evolve with the evolving reality. People thought the world was flat before Galileo came around and they persecuted him consequently so as to keep their thinking alive.


Which is why thinking evolved in France should not be forced on the reality of Germany.


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## Rev Stickleback (Jun 23, 2009)

hans280 said:


> A highspeed train stops at most once per 200 km. If local interests force it to stop more often than that, then this - in my strictly personal view - is indicative of a sick political system.


...or it may just be indicative of the location of that country's major cities.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

K_ said:


> Since when? Have a look at JR's Kodama services if you will...


You know better, not. Shinkansen features different services, from Superexpress to Kodama services. It is one thing to use ICE/Shinkansen carriages for regular services; it is another thing to build dedicated Berlin - Hamburg HSR lines. You could run multiple-stop services when you have 300 km/h tracks, but you can never run 300 km/h services on 200 km/h tracks. Operationally, you can provide short-haul services with ultra-long-haul planes, but not the other way around. 



K_ said:


> ...
> It's "Inter City Express" because it was conceived to improve an already existing IC network by speeding up parts of it.
> Anyway, stopping in 2nd tier city can speed up connections between 1st tier cities. For example: that all trains from Frankfurt to Stuttgart and Basel stop in Mannheim has as an effect that the number of options to get from Frankfurt to Stuttgart or Basel doubles.
> ...


Cities such as Darmstadt should not receive ICE services at all.



K_ said:


> ...
> The other thing is that minor cities deserve rail connections too. If there is a market for a non stop München - Berlin train next to a train that does München - Nürnberg - Erfurt - Halle - Berlin than by all means run both. If however the market isn't there to run both trains the smart choice is to run the one with more stops.
> ...


They do indeed, but they do NOT deserve ALL rail connections. As I said earlier, superior transportation connections is one of the major reasons why the cost of living in global and first-tier cities is much higher. If you living in a provincial town want to live like the big boys in the global cities, then pay the price for it or better yet move. By the way, I am not the one who promotes Berlin - Munich nonstop services.



K_ said:


> ...
> Which is why thinking evolved in France should not be forced on the reality of Germany.


Which is why what is good for Switzerland should not be forced sale as one-of-its-kind that is also the envy of the world.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

K_ said:


> I am not claiming you tried to make China the hero of your story.
> However, currently nobody is building HSLs as fast as China. Not even other fast growing Asian Democracies...


Should we not take a really close look at the development of HSR in China when you previously could not emphasize Switzerland enough? Apparently many Asian countries, the democratic ones or else, examine the HSR development in China rather closely.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

K_ said:


> Who decides what is "national interest". You think that certain practices in the construction and operation of high speeds railways are more optimal to others. And you might be even right on that point.
> However, the question here is not about "how to we get the most efficient infrastructure", but "how to we get all the stakeholders on board".
> In the end there is a lot to be said for allowing some inefficiencies exist in exchange for not excluding large parts of the population...
> ...


Not everyone should define "national interest." Let´s say some wacko wants to engage in industrial-scale orange growing in Germany, he does not travel a lot and naturally thinks that the German government should subsidize his crazy idea instead of financing the 21st-century-standard railway infrastructure. In short, some illegitimate stakeholders should simply be left behind.


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## aab7772003 (Apr 10, 2007)

Rev Stickleback said:


> ...or it may just be indicative of the location of that country's major cities.


Often many major cities in Germany are not only 50, 60 kilometers apart.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

K_ said:


> So building a HSL - Madrid - Barcelona that bypasses a lot of towns in between does inconvenience some people, but not as many as say bypassing Mannheim on the way from Frankfurt to Stuttgart would.


For whom exactly is a Mannheim bypass inconvenient?



K_ said:


> The other thing is that minor cities deserve rail connections too. If there is a market for a non stop München - Berlin train next to a train that does München - Nürnberg - Erfurt - Halle - Berlin than by all means run both. If however the market isn't there to run both trains the smart choice is to run the one with more stops.


The market is there as flight stats show. Without bypasses, however, such through services are hardly faster than a regular ICE service. Which means that rail doesn't gain any mode share.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

flierfy said:


> For whom exactly is a Mannheim bypass inconvenient?


Currently the trains from Frankfurt via Mannheim alternate to Basel and München, and so do trains from Köln. In Mannheim connections between the services exists, thus creating hourly connections between Basel and Köln, between Frankfurt and Basel etc..., even though direct trains only go once every two hours These trains cannot be discontinued without inconveniencing (and thus losing) a lot of passengers. So a Mannheim bypass would only be used by new non stop services. The question remains if the benefits justify the cost.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

flierfy said:


> The market is there as flight stats show. Without bypasses, however, such through services are hardly faster than a regular ICE service. Which means that rail doesn't gain any mode share.


If they get travel time under 4 hours they'll get a significant share of the market. And a travel time under 4 hours is what is currently aimed for with the on going projects. And with the route via Erfurt...


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## Coccodrillo (Sep 30, 2005)

K_ said:


> In Japan some high speed trains stop every 20 to 40 km or so.


But there are also no-stop trains.

I don't understand why there can't be both types of services also in Germany and France.


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## Berlin. (Oct 14, 2010)

There are no-stop trains in Germany.. ICE Sprinter!!


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

M-NL said:


> This actually makes me wonder why the EU didn't also standardise 96cm platforms, alongside the 55cm and 76cm. For instance the Netherlands would probably have picked 96cm (up from the 84cm they used to have) if it was an option.


They probably choose two heights that provided a migration path for everyone...



> And yes, I do realise that creating a train that can cope with all platform heights between 55cm and 96cm would be difficult (think of a Thalys from Amsterdam to Paris), but not impossible. In the USA the platform height spread is even bigger, yet they manage. It's only a problem with international traffic.


In the USA they manage by:
- Having separate fleets for service in the east and the west. You won't find superliners in the northeast for example.
- Having long dwell times at stations with low platforms so only a few doors need to be opened, and steps can be placed. 

I guess the EU wanted to avoid that...


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

M-NL said:


> They do use the Talent2 with 600mm low floors between Cottbus and Leipzig for an S-Bahn like service. Also I saw the same Talent2 in a grey S-Bahn livery with also seems to have those 600mm floors. So they do exist, because sometimes you don't have a choice when you need to share platforms between all services.


There are no S-Bahn like services in and around Leipzig though. Don't be misled by the badge on the trains. The service which are funneled through the newly opened trunk route are pretty much the same services they were half a year ago. Low-frequent regional all-stopping services which serve rural areas with consequently low patronage.


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## JumpUp (Aug 28, 2010)

Since today, one of the German/Danish ICE (non-electric) High-Speed trains changed colors from the ICE-design onto the Danish DSB look:










More photos:

http://www.jernbanen.dk/forum/index.php?id=78726


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## FM 2258 (Jan 24, 2004)

^^

Interesting, I thought a country like Denmark would have mostly electrified lines.


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## keepthepast (Oct 23, 2009)

Too bad. The bland and dull blue/gray color scheme is vastly inferior to the sleek and bright DB ICE coloration.


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## Silly_Walks (Aug 23, 2010)

FM 2258 said:


> ^^
> 
> Interesting, I thought a country like Denmark would have mostly electrified lines.


I don't know what "a country like Denmark" is, but Denmark in fact has many lines yet unelectrified, which is why they bought those horrible AnsaldoBreda diesel trains.

Plans are now underway to electrify and speed up large parts of their network.


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## XAN_ (Jan 13, 2011)

FM 2258 said:


> ^^
> 
> Interesting, I thought a country like Denmark would have mostly electrified lines.


Denmark is really electricaly-poor country, in comparison to other Nordic countries, that have an extensive hydrogeneration (Norway), atom plants (Finland) or mix of both (Sweden)


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## bongo-anders (Oct 26, 2008)

All mainlines in Denmark will be electrified in the mid twenties.

The timeline are like this

Lunderskov - Esbjerg in 2015
The new high speed line Copenhagen - Ringsted in 2018
Køge Nord - Næstved in 2018
Ringsted - Fehmarn Tunnel in 2021
Fredericia - Aarhus in 2021-2023
Roskilde - Kalundborg in 2022-2024
Aarhus - Frederikshavn in 2023-2025
Vejle - Struer in 2024-2026

The Odense - Middelfart and Hovedgaard - Aarhus high speed lines and the Vejle Fjord crossing will of course also be electrified.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

I have a question: what is the minimum advance required to buy seat reservations on ICE? I can't find that information, and I'm curious about it (since Germany is the only big European country that de-couples reservations from ticketing on high-speed trains)


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

Suburbanist said:


> I have a question: what is the minimum advance required to buy seat reservations on ICE? I can't find that information, and I'm curious about it (since Germany is the only big European country that de-couples reservations from ticketing on high-speed trains)


You can reserve a seat literally the minute before you board. Such a short-term reservation won't be displayed in the train, however. So have to be prepared to that your seat won't necessarily be free and that you have to displace people on it.


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## Deadeye Reloaded (Apr 25, 2006)

Today the 8th Siemens Velaro-D high-speed bullet train was handed over to Deutsche Bahn at the Berlin Hauptbahnhof. 
8 more trains are on order and they should be delivered in the near future. 

The ultimate wet dream of DB is to send these trains to Belgium, France and even London. :yes: 
It will however take some years to get all the paper work done. hno: 



















SOURCE


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Deadeye Reloaded said:


> It will however take some years to get all the paper work done. hno:


It seems the EU is working on that. Currently every country has it's own certification procedure, with specific tests that need to be performed even if the exact same test was already performed earlier in a different country. For most trains that would mean that in the future you only need to reasses the changes needed to get certified.


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## eu01 (Oct 14, 2005)

M-NL said:


> It seems the EU is working on that.


Well, but do you know about any real progress towards a true solution in this question? 
While the EU did achieve significant integration in many other areas, I still can see the rail transport as an exempt from this. In fact we still have in Europe many "railway kingdoms" with not sufficiently integrated national rail systems of which the mentioned certifications' incompatibility is a notable example.


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## EMArg (Aug 2, 2013)

Leaving Frankfurt Am Main Central Station. Video shot from the inside of the high-speed train:


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## bill623 (Oct 12, 2011)

Will WLBm 172 and 173 which inter-plant manufacturing, thanks


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## webeagle12 (Oct 1, 2007)

JumpUp said:


> Since today, one of the German/Danish ICE (non-electric) High-Speed trains changed colors from the ICE-design onto the Danish DSB look:
> 
> More photos:
> 
> http://www.jernbanen.dk/forum/index.php?id=78726


looks like crap compare to DB


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## FM 2258 (Jan 24, 2004)

Deadeye Reloaded said:


> Today the 8th Siemens Velaro-D high-speed bullet train was handed over to Deutsche Bahn at the Berlin Hauptbahnhof.
> 8 more trains are on order and they should be delivered in the near future.
> 
> The ultimate wet dream of DB is to send these trains to Belgium, France and even London. :yes:
> ...


Velaro's are my favorite high speed trains when it comes to looks...haven't ridden on one yet...I wish the Texas high speed railway would use Velaro's.


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## ddes (Oct 17, 2006)

FM 2258 said:


> Velaro's are my favorite high speed trains when it comes to looks...haven't ridden on one yet...I wish the Texas high speed railway would use Velaro's.


I like the Velaro`s looks too, but I thought the D was a step down compared to the CRH 380C.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

The ICE1/2 and all the ICE3 403 derivatives were styled by the German designer Alexander Neumeister. The new 407 was inspired by that design, but major changes were needed to comply with the current regulations. 

Actually I can't recall a single ugly Neumeister designed train. As for the looks I would choose the JR West 500. You've guessed it, that was also designed by that same guy.


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## FM 2258 (Jan 24, 2004)

M-NL said:


> The ICE1/2 and all the ICE3 403 derivatives were styled by the German designer Alexander Neumeister. The new 407 was inspired by that design, but major changes were needed to comply with the current regulations.
> 
> Actually I can't recall a single ugly Neumeister designed train. As for the looks I would choose the JR West 500. You've guessed it, that was also designed by that same guy.


The JR West 500 looks like a Mercedes on rail. Sweet! The ICE3/CRH3/380B is my all time favorite type of train. When it comes to cars I also think Germans design the best looks.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

bluemeansgo said:


> It somehow seems very un-German to have these partially completed HSR lines around the country.


It is unfortunately very German. German governments of all kinds have always seen it as their priority to promote car sales, as this is believed to be the motor of the German economy. This includes the extension of Autobahns, while there is comparetively little invested into rails (in comparison to neighboring Switzerland and Austria and other countries with relatively high GDP). It is telling that the highway through Thuringia is long built while Munich-Berlin 200/300 kmh line will only be completed 2-3 years from now, and that was part of a priority list to connect Eastern Germany to the West after 1990. 
Also DB is undecided whether to prioritize cheaper upgrades to 200 kmh or new HSR for 250/300, leading to the weird mix at present. 
Plus some HSR lines/upgrades have been stalled for years due to local protests.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

bluemeansgo said:


> Also, how fast can an ICE train accelerate to ~300km/h?


High speed acceleration is a combination of power and aerodynamics. For lack of comparative numbers on aerodynamics the power to weight ratio would be a good comparison:

ICE3 (BR407): 17,6 kW/t 
ICE3 (BR406): 18,2 kW/t
ICE3 (BR403): 19,6 kW/t
N700 (any 16 car variant): 23,9 kW/t
TGV-POS or 2N2: 25,0 kW/t

The N700 was specially designed for quick acceleration, not for a high top speed, so it will probably be the quickest to accelerate of the 5 listed. The TGV would not be far behind though. The ICEs will be slower, because they are slightly heavier and less powerful.


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## Maledives (Nov 27, 2014)

:cheers:


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

Baron Hirsch said:


> It is unfortunately very German. German governments of all kinds have always seen it as their priority to promote car sales, as this is believed to be the motor of the German economy. This includes the extension of Autobahns, while there is comparetively little invested into rails (in comparison to neighboring Switzerland and Austria and other countries with relatively high GDP). It is telling that the highway through Thuringia is long built while Munich-Berlin 200/300 kmh line will only be completed 2-3 years from now, and that was part of a priority list to connect Eastern Germany to the West after 1990.
> Also DB is undecided whether to prioritize cheaper upgrades to 200 kmh or new HSR for 250/300, leading to the weird mix at present.
> Plus some HSR lines/upgrades have been stalled for years due to local protests.


To be fair Switzerland and Austria(until recently) don't have HSR. As for other countries, only few countries like France and Spain have HSR lines all over their countries.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Yes, acceleration is more important to Japan than top speed due to close station spacing. Though the n700 isn't exactly a slouch on its top speed. It's mostly limited by Japan's mountainous terrain, 2500m track radius and noise pollution laws. 

The n700i (export variant) is rated for 330km/h operational speed.

I'd love to see a side by side real world example of these trains. It would be interesting if you took the Japanese system and plopped it into Europe and vice versa. How would local systems fare against one another.t


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

M-NL said:


> High speed acceleration is a combination of power and aerodynamics. For lack of comparative numbers on aerodynamics the power to weight ratio would be a good comparison:
> 
> ICE3 (BR407): 17,6 kW/t
> ICE3 (BR406): 18,2 kW/t
> ...


I don't know if this is typical, but this is TGV speed info I have found: 





The track goes uphill at 4 minutes... but its downhill before that point. I'm guessing around 4:30 to get to 270km/h?

Here's a Japanese E6 accelerating to 300km/h in 4:30 (3:45 to 270km/h) 





Apparently it's capable of 270km/h in 180s (3 minutes) but in practice they don't push them as hard as that.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

bluemeansgo said:


> Apparently it's capable of 270km/h in 180s (3 minutes) but in practice they don't push them as hard as that.


That equates to an average acceleration of 0,42 m/s², which isn't particularly high but in line with high speed services all over the world.


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## KingNick (Sep 23, 2010)

LtBk said:


> To be fair Switzerland and Austria(until recently) don't have HSR. As for other countries, only few countries like France and Spain have HSR lines all over their countries.


He was talking about the general attitude of the government. They rather spend the money on stupid Autobahn enlargements, while almost completely disregarding the railway. I mean just look at those stats:

http://www.allianz-pro-schiene.de/infografiken/infrastruktur/


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

Interesting. It seems other countries has spend more money on motorway expansion than trains in past 10+ years.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

flierfy said:


> That equates to an average acceleration of 0,42 m/s², which isn't particularly high but in line with high speed services all over the world.



It didn't make sense to me why JR Central always touts its acceleration so I dug deeper and found out I was mistaken, sorry!. It is 180s to its max speed (300km/h). Its max speed is limited to 270 on the Tokaido line. In any case, I found an article which states acceleration as 2.6km/h/s (0.72m/s²). http://www.railway-technology.com/projects/n700-shinkansen/

What's acceleration like for ICE and TGV-POS? What about AGV?

Given that German trains need to speed up and down on quite a few lines would it be a good idea to import or buy tech from Japan to improve performance?


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

KingNick said:


> They rather spend the money on stupid Autobahn enlargements, while almost completely disregarding the railway. I mean just look at those stats:
> http://www.allianz-pro-schiene.de/infografiken/infrastruktur/


Yes, statistics. Closing lines is a matter of what amount of kilometers you come from.

I see no stupidity in autobahn enlargements as Germany lacks behind to other european countries in this category.

At the moment the Stuttgart 21 project is maybe advanced and ambitious, maybe discussable but it´s the most expensive railway-project in Germany. 
There should be more investments in rail in Germany, but they would not lead to more high-speed. It´s more about closing gaps of single-tracked parts of lines, signalling, etc.

I remember an article saying, that the average commercial speed of British Rail IC is not much slower than in the german ICE-system. This is mainly because britains have several trains per hour in one direction, whereas only few stop at all stations. The skip-stop-system maybe would make german ICE-system faster. In fact, the numbers of real new HSR-lines is limited to those:

1) HSR Hannover-Hamburg
2) Frankfurt-Mannheim
3) Leipzig-Nürnberg (u/c)

What´s missing is a line in central Germany between Frankfurt-Fulda-Erfurt and Frankfurt-Würzburg. This would relieve existing infrastructure and nearly all ICE-lines would benefit from this. You have to see, that Germany is a polycentric country, where population is spread around several major and minor important cities. So imho the british system with some HSR-lines and other conventional tracks up to 200 km/h would be more sufficient than any french or japanese style system.

Kind regards


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## KingNick (Sep 23, 2010)

Germany's Autobahn network is many things but certainly not underdeveloped. And even such white whale projects like Stuttgart 21 don't change the fact that Germany pours way too little money into its rail network. This is not my personal opinion, but DB themselves are talking about a 30 billion investment gap that is desperately needed and Bahn Chief Grube lacks funds to hire urgently needed staff. Hell Mainz Hbf couldn't be reached with long distance trains last year due to a lack of personnel in the signalbox.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

KingNick said:


> Germany's Autobahn network is many things but certainly not underdeveloped.


As this is maybe OT for railways, to keep it short. Compare average daily traffic on german autobahns with those of other countries. You willl find out, that those stretches have to be 2X3 lanes instead of the classic 2x2 layout. This is the main task for german motorways in future, not the expansion of the network itself.

Kind regards


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

bluemeansgo said:


> *EDIT:
> *Looks like the reason that it takes so long as that this isn't a common route in Germany. Sorry... this was coming from my non-German-resident viewpoint thinking that since these are two places that tourists want to visit (Berlin and Munich) that there must be a fast direct line between them. A better comparison appears to be the* Munich - Frankfurt - Dusseldorf *corridor. Currently, the fastest service I could find does this trip in *~300 minutes* (5 hr) and 7 stops. It's also ~600km long depending on routing.


You should never forget two things about Germany:
- It has a very different structure than eg. France or Spain. In France the main purpose of the railroad is to bring people to Paris. In Germany the main purpose is to bring people to the nearest major town.
- It's spatial structure has changed drastically the last decades. Don't underestimate the effects of the Reunion, which still hasn't been digested completely. A united Germany would never have build the Wurzburg - Hanover main line, but West Germany needed it, as the division completely changed the traffic flows in the network.

I travel on the Basel - Frankfurt - Köln corridor quite regularly. I notice it every time that most people only travel a few stops on those ICE services. Which is why it doesn't make much sense to build lines bypassing the cities (like in France) and trying investing in the existing network often serves the customers better.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Interesting. But is it perhaps that way because of the rail network? If the rail network isn't competitive with the autobahn network why would people use it for longer distances. I agree that Germany is more decentralized but that could actually be a strength. Japan has numerous population centres from Tokyo to Fukuoka which makes HSR useful. I'm sure people travel between cities or they would do so more often if it was easy. Is there a lot of intra-flights between the big cities?


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

bluemeansgo said:


> Interesting. But is it perhaps that way because of the rail network? If the rail network isn't competitive with the autobahn network why would people use it for longer distances. I agree that Germany is more decentralized but that could actually be a strength. Japan has numerous population centres from Tokyo to Fukuoka which makes HSR useful. I'm sure people travel between cities or they would do so more often if it was easy. Is there a lot of intra-flights between the big cities?


I think it not a binary situation. Long-distance ICEs have significant traffic, but so do Autobahnen.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

bluemeansgo said:


> Interesting. But is it perhaps that way because of the rail network? If the rail network isn't competitive with the autobahn network why would people use it for longer distances. I agree that Germany is more decentralized but that could actually be a strength. Japan has numerous population centres from Tokyo to Fukuoka which makes HSR useful. I'm sure people travel between cities or they would do so more often if it was easy. Is there a lot of intra-flights between the big cities?


if you look at the busiest routes from frankfurt airport you will note that most - if not all - of these could completely be done by train - provided a proper german HSR network:

1 Berlin (Tegel) 896.500
2 Hamburg 800.330
3 London (Heathrow)	731.000
4 Munic 541.600
5 Vienna 537.500
6 Paris 510.900

unfortunately db rather plans on cutting down high speed to under 250km/h and maybe even stop building HS-lines at all (frankfurt-mannheim and hannover-hamburg are under reconsideration..). and bypasses are prevented by regional politicians.

also the question for K_ which line he would have build instead of Hannover-Würzburg?


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## gippas (Nov 19, 2013)

^^
You forget one thing. A lot of people travel from Frankfurt to all the places you mentioned with connecting flights. So many people who start their flight from Vienna for example they don't stay Frankfurt but continue to Russia, the US , other European cities etc. The time cost of changing from plane to plane is more or less the same as of changing from plane to train and of course plane travel time remains much faster. Enough to counterbalance the benefit of getting on in the center that train brings (which is useful in a relatively compact city like Vienna, less so in a sprawling metropolis like Paris where travelling to the HSR stations still takes some time). 

So, for many people travelling on these routes, HSR would bring little benefit if any. That's not to say that more HSR connections from and to Frankfurt wouldn't necessarily make sense, just that the air traffic to hubs like Frankfurt should be further analysed and not just taken like that.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

bluemeansgo said:


> Interesting. But is it perhaps that way because of the rail network? If the rail network isn't competitive with the autobahn network why would people use it for longer distances.


 Well, this is correct. ICE is succesful, if it´s faster than car. So, the Berlin-Hamburg-ICE is about 1,5h, car-traffic is 3h. This is really enough to compete with. A worse thing is Berlin-Cologne, which is faster by car, if you take into account, that Cologne-Hbf. isn´t the final destination. Riding this ICE frequently I always wonder about the high passenger-numbers anyway. It seems DBAG has no Problems with less passengers in this relation.


Concerning your mentioned Berlin-Munich-route, this one is very important, not only for tourits. If HSR Berlin-Munich is ready in 2017, Berlin-Munich can be done in 4 to 4,5 h (depending on stops), which is 1 h less than car. Even better times between Berlin-Erfurt 1,75h/Berlin-Nürnberg 2,5h. And now think about air-travel between Munich and Berlin, once the BER would open some unknown day. This can create a rail-link then, leading to significant decrease of flight-passengers Berlin-MUC. This speaking as someone using this relation frequently.

So they speak about creating Sprinter-service between Berlin-Nürnberg-Munich, if it pays out. This would be in accordance with a more british-style high-speed. But it would be additional, it would not be possible to neglect the stops between.

Kind regards


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

Don't they have any Rhür area - Hannover upgrade plans?

I also think DB should introduce more Sprinter services (HS trains that call just at their endpoints).


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## Rohne (Feb 20, 2007)

gippas said:


> ^^
> You forget one thing. A lot of people travel from Frankfurt to all the places you mentioned with connecting flights.


Well, Ulukai's list is made up of O&D traffic mostly. Don't have the detailed data currently available, but i.e. remember Berlin being ~70 to 80% O&D. Connecting traffic is more important on intercontinental and many European routes (not including those in the list).

Bases on traffic and possible benefits, highest priority for contiguous high speed rail corridors should be Düsseldorf - Köln - Frankfurt - Stuttgart - München, followed by Hamburg - Hannover - Frankfurt - Basel. Other lines such as Berlin - Köln, or Berlin - München are nice, but by far not as urgent as the afforementioned two lines.

The real problem is not that Germany would prefer it's Autobahnen over rail, but our dumb politicians are generally not even thinking about providing enough money for infrastructure, but rather spend it for exaggerated social welfare, unnecessary regulation of every part of life and completely beyond-brain currency rescue politics. In fact, even Autobahnen are suffering of not enough funding and major traffic routes like A1, A3, A5, A6 and A8 are feared for regularly becoming parking areas of several 100kms length because urgently needed upgrading projects cannot progress due to lack of funds.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Suburbanist said:


> Don't they have any Rhür area - Hannover upgrade plans?


Dear Suburbanist, not every word in German is spelt with "ü". What you wrote reads more like "scrambled eggs" in German.
Ruhr-Hannover is not the slowest section in the German network. Of it, Hamm to Bielefeld was the Bundesbahn's first experiment in upgrading, going mostly at 200 kmh, but being so bumpy you feel more like riding a horse than an ICE2. East of Bielefeld, the line briefly accelerates to 200 kmh, but cruises mostly at around 150. Here the curvy layout of the line could be improved, with a tunnel to bypass Minden (check any map). 
But even on the Oebisfelde-Spandau section, which is nominally a 250 kmh HSR, ICEs only twice briefly speed up tp 250 kmh, otherwise moving at 230, 200, and somewhere fairly west even as low as 150. No real idea why, the bird reserve section, where speeds drop to 200 kmh, is the least of the problem, quickly bypassed. 
I am sure if there were such superb services on offer in Germany like Paris-Lyon, people would use them. On Köln-Berlin ICEs, there are plenty of people who go the whole way, despite the rather poor traveling time. DB could easily epxeriment on introducing more than hourly services (twice hourly in rush hour and on weekends) here, but it only has old IC train stock to offer, as no new trains are in sight. These old IC trains run on weekends to relieve pressure on the system, and they are artificially slowed down by making them stop in small towns so people do not notice that due to the lack of the ICE system described above, the ICs are just as fast (or max 15 min slower) than the ICEs. 
If new trains ever come and if DB feels bold, it should instead offer an all-stops service with its ICEs as at present, and perhaps 30 minutes later another service stopping only in Berlin Hbf, Hannover, Dortmund, and Cologne.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

Rohne said:


> The real problem is not that Germany would prefer it's Autobahnen over rail, but our dumb politicians are generally not even thinking about providing enough money for infrastructure, but rather spend it for exaggerated social welfare, unnecessary regulation of every part of life and completely beyond-brain currency rescue politics. In fact, even Autobahnen are suffering of not enough funding and major traffic routes like A1, A3, A5, A6 and A8 are feared for regularly becoming parking areas of several 100kms length because urgently needed upgrading projects cannot progress due to lack of funds.


That sounds like most countries these days.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Has Germany completely shelved plans for maglev? They sold the tech in Shanghai but haven't used it domestically yet. Wouldn't some of those routes be a good fit for it or does maglev have more opposition?


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## 00Zy99 (Mar 4, 2013)

bluemeansgo said:


> Has Germany completely shelved plans for maglev? They sold the tech in Shanghai but haven't used it domestically yet. Wouldn't some of those routes be a good fit for it or does maglev have more opposition?


I think it's gone, due to cost.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

Baron Hirsch said:


> On Köln-Berlin ICEs, there are plenty of people who go the whole way, despite the rather poor traveling time. DB could easily epxeriment on introducing more than hourly services (twice hourly in rush hour and on weekends) here, but it only has old IC train stock to offer, as no new trains are in sight.


The old rolling-stock is also necessary for the weird telescoping procedure in Hamm. Exactly my thought, too. Do this service half an hour to Dortmund, having hourly trains via Wuppertal and via Düsseldorf to Cologne. It could save time and alternating skip-stop Bielefeld/Hamm could be possible. 

Despite competition with bus-service ICE does not suffer from less passengers. Travelling Cologne-Berlin without seat-reservation is a mess or ends up with plenty of beers in the bord-restaurant.:cheers: 

The tunnel around Minden seems to be no subject of negotiation anymore. As it was written before, focus is on closing HSR-gap Frankfurt-Mannheim it seems.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Baron Hirsch said:


> If new trains ever come and if DB feels bold, it should instead offer an all-stops service with its ICEs as at present, and perhaps 30 minutes later another service stopping only in Berlin Hbf, Hannover, Dortmund, and Cologne.



That's kind of what Japan does. The faster services come far more often. In short, high speed rail is seen as a way to connect major cities. Slower all-stops services run hourly. The new maglev will run direct service every 15 minutes. Local all-stops will run hourly. 

http://www.hyperdia.com/cgi/en/inte...&year=2014&month=12&day=27&searchday=20141227

A local station may have 12 trains pass before one stops (hourly). Keep in mind though that station spacing in Japan is much shorter (30-40km) so it was necessary to build the ability to pass slower trains into the system.


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## Nexis (Aug 7, 2007)




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## NewYorkNewYork (Dec 29, 2014)

Great video.
What is the length of this tunnel?


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## KingNick (Sep 23, 2010)

7.7 km.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

During the refit of ICE1 and ICE2 the power electronics are changed from GTO to IGBT. For some reason it's power output drops from 4800 kW to 3800 kW per power car, making an already slow HST even slower. Why this reduction?


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## Goy (Sep 27, 2014)

Do you know if they are building Erfurt–Leipzig/Halle high-speed railway line?











http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Erfurt–Leipzig/Halle_high-speed_railway


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

Any news on Frankfurt-Mannheim line?


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## KingNick (Sep 23, 2010)

Goy said:


> Do you know if they are building Erfurt–Leipzig/Halle high-speed railway line?
> 
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Erfurt–Leipzig/Halle_high-speed_railway


http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=117501640&postcount=487


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## Goy (Sep 27, 2014)

They should build a HSR line Berlin-dresden, it could boost East Germany economy. I'd like to see these HSR lines in East Germany:

Berlin - Postdam - Magderburg
Magdebourg - Leipzig
Leipzig - Dresden
Dresden - Cheminitz - Zickwau - Gera - Jena


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## bavarian urbanist (Jan 9, 2013)

Goy said:


> They should build a HSR line Berlin-dresden, it could boost East Germany economy. I'd like to see these HSR lines in East Germany:
> 
> Berlin - Postdam - Magderburg
> Magdebourg - Leipzig
> ...


I'd like to see Munich-Regensburg-Plzen-Praha and Munich-Innsbruck-Venezia. Eastern Germany already got enough new infrastructure, they should try to get on their feet on their own.


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## Goy (Sep 27, 2014)

bavarian urbanist said:


> I'd like to see Munich-Regensburg-Plzen-Praha and Munich-Innsbruck-Venezia. Eastern Germany already got enough new infrastructure, they should try to get on their feet on their own.


I agree with you but not totaly. Munich-Praha is ok! I think it could be a Paneuropean HSP: Paris-Strasbourg-Stuttgart-Munich-Regensburg-Plzen-Praha. But the second line you proposed I have doubts. Austria has many mountains. It is not possible a HSR there. Innsbruck - Venezia is not realistic. It would be too expensive and it would take many time to get ready. Not possible. I think it is better to build a HSR Vienna-Graz-Ljubljana-Venezia. Low lands. 

So about a Berlin-Dresden line it should be priority to Germany gouvernment. Russia is trying to regain influence in East Europe and Dresden is a strategical city. It is a point of linking with many cities in East Europe. Dresden - Wroclaw - Warsaw line could be an interessant project or Berlin - Dresden - Praha - Linz.


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## KingNick (Sep 23, 2010)

Goy said:


> I agree with you but not totaly. Munich-Praha is ok! I think it could be a Paneuropean HSP: Paris-Strasbourg-Stuttgart-Munich-Regensburg-Plzen-Praha. But the second line you proposed I have doubts. Austria has many mountains. It is not possible a HSR there. Innsbruck - Venezia is not realistic. It would be too expensive and it would take many time to get ready. Not possible. I think it is better to build a HSR Vienna-Graz-Ljubljana-Venezia. Low lands.


There already is a paneuropean HSR project called Magistrale for Europe and it doesn't run to Praha, but Budapest: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magistrale_for_Europe

This is for the simple reason that Austria is not just mountains. There are also rather flat areas where HSR is already operational. Especially the western railway is to be named for that purpose with some 230-240 km of HSR between Vienna and Attnang-Puchheim. The second route mentioned by bavarian urbanist does also contain HSR sections in Austria and once everything is finished in 2025 there will be one continuous HSR from the German border in the north all the way to the Italian border in the south.

Regarding your proposal for Vienna - Venezia. One day, there might be HSR connection between those cities (150 km are under construction in Austria at the moment). As it is today it most certainly won't run via Ljubljana but Villach - Tarvis - Udine - Venezia.


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## oslogospelchoir (Jan 12, 2015)

bavarian urbanist said:


> I'd like to see Munich-Regensburg-Plzen-Praha and Munich-Innsbruck-Venezia. Eastern Germany already got enough new infrastructure, they should try to get on their feet on their own.


Very much agree. There should be sufficient demand from Bayern into Praha and other nearby countries for robust HS network.


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## Goy (Sep 27, 2014)

oslogospelchoir said:


> Very much agree. There should be sufficient demand from Bayern into Praha and other nearby countries for robust HS network.


Guy, it is not realistic for while. Beacause of 2 reasons:

1 - Czech Republic have not enough money to build it without EU funds;

2 - Currently countries from Central Europe (Czech Republic, Hungary...) have anti-west and pro-russia gouvernments. They don't want it.

I think a line Berlin-Dresden is ideal for a while, when those countries become more favourable to West they can improve its connection with West countries.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

bavarian urbanist said:


> I'd like to see Munich-Regensburg-Plzen-Praha and Munich-Innsbruck-Venezia. Eastern Germany already got enough new infrastructure, they should try to get on their feet on their own.


Don't worry, we are on our feet in droves already.


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## bavarian urbanist (Jan 9, 2013)

Goy said:


> Guy, it is not realistic for while. Beacause of 2 reasons:
> 
> 1 - Czech Republic have not enough money to build it without EU funds;
> 
> ...


Ah come on. Nobody in his full mind in central europe, which also includes Austria and Germany, btw. has a pro-russian government. There are actually already plans to build what I'd like, but as it is in the country of "we need to save every penny", it will probably not be built anytime soon(The Rgb-Praha-line) -> Donau-Moldau-Bahn, it's called.


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## Rohne (Feb 20, 2007)

Berlin - Dresden or low travelled border crossing lines like those mentioned the last 10 postings are nothing to even try dreaming of, as long as not even Düsseldorf - Frankfurt - Stuttgart - München and Hamburg - Frankfurt - Basel are planned to be contiguous high speed rail corridors.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

oslogospelchoir said:


> Very much agree. There should be sufficient demand from Bayern into Praha and other nearby countries for robust HS network.


If we look at Munich-Praha: No, not at all. Afaik the only direct connection is the odd Alex which has destination coaches switched in Marktredwitz or somewhere only.
I guess that a decent connection Nuremberg - Plzen together with electrificaton of Regensburg - Hof makes more sense than only a HSL from Munich.


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## Rohne (Feb 20, 2007)

In the meantime, the study for Middle Rhine corridor has been finished and published.

In short, for passenger traffic it's recommended to:
- build the HSL Frankfurt - Mannheim for 300kph as planned, but as mixed use (high speed trains during the day, freight trains durng the night)
and
- upgrade Karlsruhe - Graben-Neudorf (junction with HSL Mannheim - Stuttgart) to 4 tracks with 200 kph

So no more doubts about demand and usefulness of the HSL kay:

Financing and time window for construction are a different story, of course.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Meanwhile in Japan they just broke their previous record: 603km/h manned ride on a 42.8km track.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

That must hurt for the Germans, considering they have similar technology (Transrapid) available for immediate deployment. In fact the Shanghai Transrapid achieved 501,5 km/h during testing.


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## Silly_Walks (Aug 23, 2010)

I have been on the Shanghai Transrapid, and it very shaky. I hope the Japanese type of Maglev is better.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Enough shaking to be visible on an in-cab video? I've not seen a Japanese video suggesting it was shaky yet.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

M-NL said:


> That must hurt for the Germans, considering they have similar technology (Transrapid) available for immediate deployment. In fact the Shanghai Transrapid achieved 501,5 km/h during testing.



I'd always thought that the transrapid tech was quite different from the Japanese maglev. The fundamental technology is different. 

The only thing that they have in common is that they both levitate to reduce friction and achieve high speeds.


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

Goy said:


> Guy, it is not realistic for while. Beacause of 2 reasons:
> 
> 1 - Czech Republic have not enough money to build it without EU funds;
> 
> ...





thun said:


> If we look at Munich-Praha: No, not at all. Afaik the only direct connection is the odd Alex which has destination coaches switched in Marktredwitz or somewhere only.
> I guess that a decent connection Nuremberg - Plzen together with electrificaton of Regensburg - Hof makes more sense than only a HSL from Munich.


Few points.

1) Anti - western, pro Russia etc bullshit is not only completely irrelevant here, but it is also made up idiocy. But back to the trains.

2) Berlin, Wien and Prague are all in the European TOP 10 tourist destinations. It would be only logical that if any international HSR line would go through CZ, it would go:
Berlin - Dresden - Praha - Brno - Wien -> Possibly Bratislava and Budapest.
The other important direction is Wien - Brno - Ostrava - Katowice

3) Munich (or Nürnberg)- Praha would be nice, and it could go on to Wroclav, but it simply could not make up as much traffic I would say. Especially, because it has less internal potential in the CZ. But it is fine for some additional projects.

4) At the moment, the rail line between Plzeň - Domažlice - CZ-D border is not electrified and one track. I am not sure how it looks on the German side after Furth im Wald. 

This line should be getting an upgrade on the Czech side in the next years and it has been *decided that it will stay one track line*, with some adjustments and electrification. The speed should be than between 100 - 140 km/h, with 160 km/h max for Pendolino. So, that's at best what it will be there in the next at least 20 years. But I don't expect Pendolino to ever enter Germany.

The spatial plans have reserve for a 200 km/h line there.

5) For the Czech republic the most important relations are Praha - Brno and Praha - Ostrava. If there should be any investments in HSR, it is absolutely clear that they should at first concentrate on the Praha - Brno relation. It would also make the most sense to build those lines from the scratch as the present lines just got completely renovated and would be perfect for all other traffic, local and freight, in the future. It is also completely clear that those investments can happen only as a part of international undertaking with the support of the EU.

6) If there is anything holding this back. It is.
a) Incompetence of the Czech government and it's agencies which are not able to prepare the legislation for this, plan it, gain support for it in D,AU,PL and the EU (financing of up to 85 % is possible with right management of the project), and be able to actually undertake it. That is the biggest problem
b) Germany and Austria have different priorities than this. Even if there is long tradition of Berlin - Wien connection (e.g. Vindobonna), both respective countries would profit more if they finished this connection bypassing Czech republic (i.e. Berlin - Nürnberg - Linz - Wien). And any connection though Praha, will become a partial competition to this, so I don't expect that much support from either Berlin or Wien.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

Tell me about Austrian rail priorities... it is not all bad (the Wien Hauptbahnhof makes a lot of sense and its beneficial impact is clearly also relevant for Czech connections) but the rail upgrades towards Czech, Slovak/Polish destinations are either happening at ultra snail speed or not happening at all. 

Berlin-Vienna would be of perfect HSR distance but instead we have a connection where no one knows if they don't cut it down eventually at all. I am not sure the connection via Nürnberg is such a perfect thing, look at a map. Why would that be preferable to a equally built out HSR corridor via Brno and Prague? Maybe because unlike the castle in the clouds that the Czech version is, the German corridor largely exists or is at least under construction, except for the part from Nürnberg to Linz?


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

From the outsider's point of view it sounds like policymakers in Central Europe are still stuck in the Cold War when it comes to transit improvements to neighboring countries.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Surel said:


> b) Germany and Austria have different priorities than this. Even if there is long tradition of Berlin - Wien connection (e.g. Vindobonna), both respective countries would profit more if they finished this connection bypassing Czech republic (i.e. Berlin - Nürnberg - Linz - Wien). And any connection though Praha, will become a partial competition to this, so I don't expect that much support from either Berlin or Wien.


The last day-time time Berlin-Prague-Vienna (Vindobona) was cancelled in December. While RailJets might have improved services between Vienna and Prague, they have definitely worsened the option for Berlin-Vienna. Now long layovers of an hour are necessary to change trains in Prague. 
With the HSR route Leipzig-Erfurt opening this year and Erfurt-Nuremberg two years from now, The faster route will be using this VDE 8 corridor and the Westbahn, even if Nuremberg-Linz (the link between these two HSR) is admittedly a crawl too and even if a change of trains will still be necessary in Nuremberg. 
Nothing much will be happening anytime soon to compete with this fast but long detour route around CR. Some improvements are underway on the section Berlin-Dresden, but not really HSR. The option of a HSR Dresden-Prague has remained on paper to my knowledge, with neither side taking any steps. 
Then again, Going Berlin-Vienna via Nuremberg is already extremely more expensive than via Prague, and if you are targeting tourists, they may prefer the more affordable route, which happens to be the more scenic one too, even if the Czech government continues to neglect railway development.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

LtBk said:


> From the outsider's point of view it sounds like policymakers in Central Europe are still stuck in the Cold War when it comes to transit improvements to neighboring countries.


Even worse. The EU legislation, fixed on the merit of competition on rails, has put the de facto state monopoly railway companies of different countries at each other's throats. While in the past border-crossing trains were operated as shared enterprises between the state companies, now single companies have to claim prior responsibility for trains and pay a lease for using the other country's rails. As these tend to be artificially high, there is little incentive to operate border-crossing trains. Plus, technical and bureaucratic hurdles (train models must still be approved individually by each country for operation) are an additional turn-off. This contrasts with sometimes lavish subsidies for border-crossing infrastructure, which as rule remains under-used (see the French-Spanish HSR or Villach-Udine). While there is now an increasing awareness for the negative effect of EU regulations on international train operations, we have yet to see decisive action to change things.


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

Baron Hirsch said:


> The last day-time time Berlin-Prague-Vienna (Vindobona) was cancelled in December. While RailJets might have improved services between Vienna and Prague, they have definitely worsened the option for Berlin-Vienna. Now long layovers of an hour are necessary to change trains in Prague.
> With the HSR route Leipzig-Erfurt opening this year and Erfurt-Nuremberg two years from now, The faster route will be using this VDE 8 corridor and the Westbahn, even if Nuremberg-Linz (the link between these two HSR) is admittedly a crawl too and even if a change of trains will still be necessary in Nuremberg.
> Nothing much will be happening anytime soon to compete with this fast but long detour route around CR. Some improvements are underway on the section Berlin-Dresden, but not really HSR. The option of a HSR Dresden-Prague has remained on paper to my knowledge, with neither side taking any steps.
> Then again, Going Berlin-Vienna via Nuremberg is already extremely more expensive than via Prague, and if you are targeting tourists, they may prefer the more affordable route, which happens to be the more scenic one too, even if the Czech government continues to neglect railway development.


Czech republic upgraded all the major lines already. There are 4 so called corridors and the works are already finished on most of the whole master plan, aside from the corridor Praha - Plzeň or České Budějovice and some of the stations and like e.g. Brno. But Brno needs to be rebuild in such a way that it would allow the HSR already. The problem of this decision is that it on most places was not that ambitious, although nevertheless very costly, and kept the alignment. So the speeds were never thought for higher than 160 km/h. Mostly they are on 100 - 160 km/h range.

There is thus not much improvement possible on the Czech side for the conventional Wien - Praha - Berlin line. There were huge works on the line already and the speeds are set. It doesn't make much sense to try to increase the speed on those track even more, as it would require huge investments because most of the tracks would need completely new alignments. Thus I guess building HSR from scratch would be better and economical. And on the segments, where you could increase the speed now to 200+, it doesn't make so much a difference for the whole relation. The only place you could do it with not that high costs is Brno - Břeclav segment.

You can't really say that Czech government ignores the railway development. It just ignores, as of now, the HSR part of it. Other than that railways improved dramatically inside the Czech republic. E.g. on the Praha - Ostrava line you have 3 hour connection, 3 rail operators competing, no subsidies. But the HSR development has to be done as international project. It has little sense for the Czech republic as a national project. It has to be done as build from scratch project, and it has to get EU financing. And those are all areas where the Czech Authorities are not very strong in.

There is additional problem with Germany. The DB netz and DB are not separated entities but a holding and they help each other quite a lot. To illustrate. In the 90s, Czech government bought Pendolino's with the idea, that Czech railway would operate them on the Berlin - Wien route. But DB would not suffer Pendolino's in Germany.

The RailJet story is around the same. The DB would not suffer RailJet in Germany on the Berlin - Dresden, or rather the profitable Hamburg - Dresden line. The Berlin - Dresden line is being upgraded afair to 230 km/h btw.


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Even worse. The EU legislation, fixed on the merit of competition on rails, has put the de facto state monopoly railway companies of different countries at each other's throats. While in the past border-crossing trains were operated as shared enterprises between the state companies, now single companies have to claim prior responsibility for trains and pay a lease for using the other country's rails. As these tend to be artificially high, there is little incentive to operate border-crossing trains. Plus, technical and bureaucratic hurdles (train models must still be approved individually by each country for operation) are an additional turn-off. This contrasts with sometimes lavish subsidies for border-crossing infrastructure, which as rule remains under-used (see the French-Spanish HSR or Villach-Udine). While there is now an increasing awareness for the negative effect of EU regulations on international train operations, we have yet to see decisive action to change things.


It could be perhaps possible, but totally unacceptable for the majority of European public, if there would be a supranational railway lines operator and railway service operator, with national governments having stakes in those. The regional and other local services would be than contracted on the free market.

But it indeed is quite harmful having national operators competing against each other, national authorities then of course helping their respective national champions, with legislation and supervision. In this way, it is very unlikely that we would see in Europe such a railway system as what the Chinese have.


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

Slartibartfas said:


> Berlin-Vienna would be of perfect HSR distance but instead we have a connection where no one knows if they don't cut it down eventually at all. I am not sure the connection via Nürnberg is such a perfect thing, look at a map. Why would that be preferable to a equally built out HSR corridor via Brno and Prague? Maybe because unlike the castle in the clouds that the Czech version is, the German corridor largely exists or is at least under construction, except for the part from Nürnberg to Linz?


a) Because it already exists.
b) Because it is much more important for the intra country connections. So it makes lot of sense to invest the money there first. You can see it also on the fact that the least developed part is between Nürnberg and Linz. It is perfectly understandable and no hard feelings about it .
c) It only shows that in order to create HSR connections in Central Europe, we need international projects. Financing via EU. This brings another problem. What is possible to finance via EU in Czech Republic, won't be eligible for EU financing in Austria and Germany. Which again motivates Austria and Germany to develop rather national than international projects.
d) And because as you say it, castles in the clouds on the Czech side, might turn quite tricky when putting things from mouth on paper, and from paper into reality.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Thanx 4 those maps on CD. I remember the train Prague-Brno was diverted via H. Brod for a while and has now returned to its route via C. Trebova. It seemed to me that the overall traveling time of of the EuroCity Berlin-Budapest had remained the same. Is the speed increase the RailJet now boasts (Prague-Vienna) due to better state of rails west of C. Trebova or simply because of the Austrian section? 
Berlin-Dresden will be upgraded to first 160 kmh, later 200 with some sections remaining slower, no 230 kmh. Nonetheless, this is supposed to reduce traveling times to as little as 70 minutes sometime in the next decade (last problematic part is within Belrin city limits, where NIMBY protests have stopped any works or final planning from happening. DB has surrendered to the NIMBY demands for a tunnel to reduce noise in a southern suburb, but this makes additional planning necessary.
I remember that DB refused to let RailJets operate on the Berlin-Decin section supposedly because the rails were too bad. At the same time, they tried to start a new service on that line with one of CD's private rivals, but had to give up for lack of rolling stock. Now CD will modernize some of its old EuroCitys and operate them on that line. What a shame how competition hinders better services in transborder operations...


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

^^ The "speed increase" is due to a better timetable coordination or so, if I am not mistaken, ie they got rid of some of the inefficiencies of that specific connection. I didn't really get the details. Surel might know more, but there was no improvement of tracks on the Austrian side at least, as far as I know. 

I mean look a the distance, it is not like 4 hours something for that is speed of light anyway.


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Thanx 4 those maps on CD. I remember the train Prague-Brno was diverted via H. Brod for a while and has now returned to its route via C. Trebova. It seemed to me that the overall traveling time of of the EuroCity Berlin-Budapest had remained the same. Is the speed increase the RailJet now boasts (Prague-Vienna) due to better state of rails west of C. Trebova or simply because of the Austrian section?
> Berlin-Dresden will be upgraded to first 160 kmh, later 200 with some sections remaining slower, no 230 kmh. Nonetheless, this is supposed to reduce traveling times to as little as 70 minutes sometime in the next decade (last problematic part is within Belrin city limits, where NIMBY protests have stopped any works or final planning from happening. DB has surrendered to the NIMBY demands for a tunnel to reduce noise in a southern suburb, but this makes additional planning necessary.
> I remember that DB refused to let RailJets operate on the Berlin-Decin section supposedly because the rails were too bad. At the same time, they tried to start a new service on that line with one of CD's private rivals, but had to give up for lack of rolling stock. Now CD will modernize some of its old EuroCitys and operate them on that line. What a shame how competition hinders better services in transborder operations...


I don't know what kind of speed increase they talk about. The RailJets on their own can't offer any speed increase over the normal trains. I guess that any improvement, if there is any, is solely due to the newly opened Wien main station. And I guess that the "improvement" is just having the same travel times as 10 years ago, before the works on the Wien station started.

DB netz did no want there first Pendolinos, they said they are too small. Then they did not want there RailJets, they said, the capacity of the line is too low. The DB did not want to operate them jointly in 10 years framework, which would allow long term financing... etc etc.

I thought Berlin - Dresden was improved to 200+, it's flat land there, isn't it? Maybe it has to do with hub operation, i.e. half hour operation and more speed increase would not be beneficial. But this then leaves of course space for future HSR 300+ km/h line.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

Surel said:


> b) Because it is much more important for the intra country connections. So it makes lot of sense to invest the money there first....


These are all valid points. But once the HSL between Nürnberg and Berlin is finished, the fastest connection is supposedly 2:30. From Vienna to Nürnberg it is 4:42 and that won't change dramatically. So we are speaking of maybe 7:30, if timetables are well adjusted and there is a good connection (I doubt there will be a direct train). Compare this with the current connection via the Czech Republic which manages to do it in 9:03, without high speed. Withou only partial and much more modest investments and upgrade plans it would be probably possible to reach a travel time of close to 7:30 via Prague as well. 

Honestly, a night train which takes 10 h or so makes a lot more sense than a high speed train which uses most of its higher speed just to compensate for the much larger distance. Sadly however this seems to be a minority opinion which not enough people seem to share.


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

^^
Night trains are great. But HSR doesn't render night trains useless, just look at China, it makes more sleeper service possible, especially on the long distance, utilizing the rails at night. With a real 300 km/h HSR, 4 hour Berlin - Wien would be possible (even 3 hour service in fact) to compete with planes. And you still could keep the night service.

Btw, talking about night trains. It is really a pity that the City Night line Praha - Amsterdam is discontinued. The train ends now in Köln.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

Night trains are crap from the past, I'm glad every operator is cutting down in this relic and some eliminated it altogether.


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## Silly_Walks (Aug 23, 2010)

Suburbanist said:


> Night trains are crap from the past, I'm glad every operator is cutting down in this relic and some eliminated it altogether.


Same goes for you, but we still let you hang around here :lol:


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

Slartibartfas said:


> Honestly, a night train which takes 10 h or so makes a lot more sense than a high speed train which uses most of its higher speed just to compensate for the much larger distance. Sadly however this seems to be a minority opinion which not enough people seem to share.


That's because the majority of people would happily fly instead with rail times 6h+


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

^^ I'll grant you that flying is very competitive, but I personally prefer night trains if you have attractive options. For Vienna-Berlin for example I would rather prefer the night train over flying. 

The faster travel is a mirage. With waiting, transfer time etc you have to spend at least 3-4h for flying, where you can't really sleep and can't really do anything you'd enjoy either. The night train leaves, well, in the night. So you'll head to the station at night, spend an hour or two talking to fellow passengers or reading stuff, then you'll sleep until one hour before you'll arrive when you get breakfeast and are kept busy in having it and getting your things together again. You arrive at a time which you would arrive as well when you were flying in the morning, propbably standing up at a rather unpleasent early time in order to be on the safe side, ...

If people resent the level of comfort of the train cabin, I can understand why they are choosing the plane, but for me thats good enough for getting my rest. I am more slept out after the train ride than after an early departure and unpleasent flight marathon. Of course, that is my personal opinion and I take it many do not share it.



Surel said:


> ^^
> Night trains are great. But HSR doesn't render night trains useless, just look at China, it makes more sleeper service possible, especially on the long distance, utilizing the rails at night. With a real 300 km/h HSR, 4 hour Berlin - Wien would be possible (even 3 hour service in fact) to compete with planes. And you still could keep the night service.
> 
> Btw, talking about night trains. It is really a pity that the City Night line Praha - Amsterdam is discontinued. The train ends now in Köln.


I happen to agree, but sadly the train operators seem to disagree.


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

Slartibartfas said:


> ^^ I'll grant you that flying is very competitive, but I personally prefer night trains if you have attractive options. For Vienna-Berlin for example I would rather prefer the night train over flying.
> 
> The faster travel is a mirage. With waiting, transfer time etc you have to spend at least 3-4h for flying, where you can't really sleep and can't really do anything you'd enjoy either. The night train leaves, well, in the night. So you'll head to the station at night, spend an hour or two talking to fellow passengers or reading stuff, then you'll sleep until one hour before you'll arrive when you get breakfeast and are kept busy in having it and getting your things together again. You arrive at a time which you would arrive as well when you were flying in the morning, propbably standing up at a rather unpleasent early time in order to be on the safe side, ...
> 
> If people resent the level of comfort of the train cabin, I can understand why they are choosing the plane, but for me thats good enough for getting my rest. I am more slept out after the train ride than after an early departure and unpleasent flight marathon. Of course, that is my personal opinion and I take it many do not share it.


I understand your argument, but it's not the opinion most people share. I believe part of it is that people these days are not comfortable sleeping in the same room with complete strangers which would be the case unless your company can exactly fill one compartment.

As for flying it depends, the loss of time is not always so bad. For example for lights from Basel I leave my apartment about 1 h 40 min before the take-off (15 min for the train) even a bit less if I have no baggage. Going back and again assuming no baggage it's about 50-60 min from the moment I get out of the plane. Of course if the train ride is only 3-4 h this still makes no sense, but for 6h or more it's a lot more comfortable to fly. The train itself is more comfortable than the plane, but still it's no fun to sit in the same chair for 7 h no matter how good the chair is. Sitting still time in the plane is short and if it is not then you are going so far that no other transport option has a chance. It will take about 20-21 h door to door for my upcoming trip to Hanoi...


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

I am aware of that. I don't know whats the problem. I really can't believe that its because people are so decadent they can't manage to sleep in a room with strangers. But maybe you are right. But if that is the problem, there is no problem. You can book double rooms or even single rooms. The double room, with proper and fairly comfortable beds, costs additional 37.50 EUR on top of the price for a regular 2nd class seat, for Vienna-Berlin that is at least. 

With Vorteilscard, for 2 persons, Vienna-Berlin Euronight, double sleeping room, one way amounts on the 27.4.15 to 224.80 EUR. Proper bed with matrace and linen, personal washing basin, mineral water, newspapers and proper breakfast included. (Apparently there exist also "Deluxe" cabins with personal shower and toilets but I could not find any offer and don't know if there are any availabe and on which routes)

The cheapest, flight at the same day (or the day afterwards) is from Germanwings for 102 EUR (only available at night, so you have to spend the previous evening flying plus pay for accomodation for one more day). That is the only offer at that price range, Air Berlin costs already 199€. 


And with the night train, you simply head to the station instead of going to bed at home (departure 22:40), sleep, have breakfeast, and you'll be there at 9 AM, just in time for making full use of the day. Try to do that with the martyrium you can enjoy with flying on a budget airline. So why again should be flying more attractive? If you want to go for the cheap, you take an intercity bus (44€ one way for 2 persons, ~10 h). If you are concerned about making the best use of your time, you take that night train offer.


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

Sunfuns said:


> I understand your argument, but it's not the opinion most people share. I believe part of it is that people these days are not comfortable sleeping in the same room with complete strangers which would be the case unless your company can exactly fill one compartment.
> 
> As for flying it depends, the loss of time is not always so bad. For example for lights from Basel I leave my apartment about 1 h 40 min before the take-off (15 min for the train) even a bit less if I have no baggage. Going back and again assuming no baggage it's about 50-60 min from the moment I get out of the plane. Of course if the train ride is only 3-4 h this still makes no sense, but for 6h or more it's a lot more comfortable to fly. The train itself is more comfortable than the plane, but still it's no fun to sit in the same chair for 7 h no matter how good the chair is. Sitting still time in the plane is short and if it is not then you are going so far that no other transport option has a chance. It will take about 20-21 h door to door for my upcoming trip to Hanoi...


Yes, normal train seat looses to the plane on 4+ hours trip.
But overnight sleeper wins for me to the the plane on almost any trip. Flying with plane around Europe will cost you always at least 3 hours (the airport time included). That makes the morning trips not really comfortable, let alone yet having the option of early morning flight is not always available.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

^^ Early morning flights are terrible but I usually chose them because you can arrive early. But if there are night trains availabe, I will very much prefer them instead.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

Overnight trains are like transtlantic modern cruise trips: a niche, with some number people who really, really like that option for a variety of reasons, but not enough to guarantee profitability of a frequent service or any service in many cases.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

^^ Modern Cruise ships are something entirely different. There is no rational reason to take a modern cruise ship, other than touristic qualities and enjoying the journey as such. I think I made a fairly good case why there are rational reasons to take night trains, among other reasons because it can be the most time efficient mode of transportation, also compared to flying.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

Slartibartfas said:


> ^^ Modern Cruise ships are something entirely different. There is no rational reason to take a modern cruise ship, other than touristic qualities and enjoying the journey as such. I think I made a fairly good case why there are rational reasons to take night trains, among other reasons because it can be the most time efficient mode of transportation, also compared to flying.


*The problem is that your notion of efficiency discounts the fact you spend a night in a moving bed.* Most people don't equate a night on a train cabin with a night on a normal bedroom (at home or in a hotel). 

It is like saying you can work while eating in front of a computer if you have grease-proof keyboard and mouse. I'm sure some people are indifferent to the circumstances of their eating, most people are not.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

Suburbanist said:


> *The problem is that your notion of efficiency discounts the fact you spend a night in a moving bed.*


So what? If you take a sleep cabin, you'll have a proper bed. Some people might have a problem with a moving bed. But is that your last line of defense? I doubt it is an issue for a whole lot of people. The quality of the bed might be, but if you have a sleep cabin it should be no problem for most either. The idea that cruise ships are a fringe market because the beds are moving is ridiculous. They are because they can't compete timewise, night trains can compete as I showed before. 

Bottom line is, for most people this is comfortable and also good enough to have a full nights sleep and arrive refreshed at the destination, making full use of the day. If I take an early flight, can't sleep long because I have to get up in the middle of the night, just to arrive at the same time as with that Vienna Berlin night train, I could not say the same, I would be tired the rest of the day, especially as the whole airport stuff is quite tiresome as well. Granted, that is just me, but I challenge your claim that everyone else feels differently about it, except for some funny fringe people.


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

The last night train I took was in Georgia few years ago. It was ok, but not exactly comfortable or anywhere close to a hotel room... If I travel for vacation I prefer late flights so I can fly somewhere after work, book in a hotel and start with whatever I want to do in my destination the day after. 

I like trains (hence I'm here) and I use them whenever it seems to make sense, but I have no problem flying or renting a car instead either.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

Well, certainly a hotel can have a higher level of comfort and I think the main drawback is not having a shower, in most of the offers. But otherwise, you can choose. Do you prefer the whole airport procedure, standing, waiting, checknig etc, then go for it. I personally think it is more comfort sleeping in a train cabin, especially if its a soft bed, than having to go through all of the airport stuff. Of course, the train journey has to make sense and be competitive regarding duration and price. On top of that, you don't have the risk of some airline sending your luggage to Novosibirsk and you can fill it with to the brim with stones and pay no extra charges.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

I guess we have to accept one thing the Suburbanist said: the way things are going at the moment, night trains are a niche and most people believe that anything beyond 4 hours is best done flying. 
To change that attitude, it would take a lot, perhaps promoting night trains more pro-actively is one thing, but also improving quality (better shock absorbers, sound insulation, more attached private showers, internet, maybe a film program). Mostly though the EU and its member states should give priority to environnment-friendly traveling by for example taxing flights of less than 1000 km prohibitively or banning them all together.
Also night trains should like in China wake up to the HSR age and offer fast overnight links between cities such as London and Barcelona, London and Berlin, Berlin-Paris, where daytime travel times are a turn-off (8 hours or more), but which can be done easily during a good night's sleep.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

Baron Hirsch said:


> I guess we have to accept one thing the Suburbanist said: the way things are going at the moment, night trains are a niche and most people believe that anything beyond 4 hours is best done flying.
> To change that attitude, it would take a lot, perhaps promoting night trains more pro-actively is one thing, but also improving quality (better shock absorbers, sound insulation, more attached private showers, internet, maybe a film program). Mostly though the EU and its member states should give priority to environnment-friendly traveling by for example taxing flights of less than 1000 km prohibitively or banning them all together.


One problem with this approach is that if you indeed turn night trains in to "rolling hotels", with maybe 20 passengers per carriage, weighing in at 60t each, it quickly stops being an "environment-friendly" way of travelling. Trains consume energy too.

In fact, the most environmentally friendly way to travel long distance in Europe is by bus. So if the aim is to promote the environment busses should be allowed to compete with trains everywhere.

"Banning" air because it manages to successfully compete with rail is not the way to support rail. There are quite a few sub 1000km routes in Europe where air is even the most environmental alternative. (Between the UK and Scandinavia for example...)


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

The rail has it's role and a significant one and air travel has it as well. No need to try to turn back the clock of history, it rarely works well anyway. Maybe in some more distant future non-tourist night trains will make sense again and if so they will be introduced again. The rail infrastructure itself is still being continuously improved across the continent so it's not like it would be difficult to do. Until then though we need to admit that the service is a niche with a limited appeal. 

As for China their air travel market is a lot less efficient than the one in Europe therefore rail is finding it easier to compete than it would here. Of course on certain routes it does and that's great for travellers because the ticket prices are kept reasonable. If I go to Paris I take a train, but there is also an option to fly (Paris Orly). If there wasn't I would probably have to pay more for my train tickets.


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## Stainless (Jun 7, 2009)

chornedsnorkack said:


> Yes. And tax exemption on aviation fuel is protected by international treaties.
> 
> The logical way to answer should be to make rail fuel also tax-free, and leave only road paying taxes on fuel.


I heard that rail fuel is tax free in Denmark, so the ICE-D train to Copenhagen always fills up over there.

On the subject of diesel trains though, does anyone know how far they can go on a tank?


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Night trains are simply bad economics. They're a romantic idea but in reality a lot of people can't sleep on a train or don't want to sleep on a train and would rather get up early and fly. 

Also you have to staff night trains and you also would have fewer opportunities to perform maintenance on the tracks. 

Concentrate, instead, on making day trains faster and keep the tracks at night for freight.


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## 00Zy99 (Mar 4, 2013)

Even if "a lot" of people can't or don't want to sleep on a train, there are still plenty that DO. Sleeper trains are often sold out throughout Europe. 

The passage of a few trains (maybe 3-4 per line) isn't nearly so disruptive to maintenance as freight trains. 

Staffing the sleeper trains isn't as hard as it seems-once you factor in the ground crew and other staff for an airliner, they become more competitive.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

IF they cover their costs or are in such high demand why would they be cancelled. 

I can't speak for Europe but in Japan overnight trains are simply not cost effective. Raising the price results in lower ridership. That's why as high speed rail lines opened the overnight trains seem to go away. 

My guess is that those who book an overnight are travellers trying save a few bucks on a hotel or trying to maximize their time travelling. Those passengers would probably switch to an overnight bus before they switched to a day train any how.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

00Zy99 said:


> Even if "a lot" of people can't or don't want to sleep on a train, there are still plenty that DO. Sleeper trains are often sold out throughout Europe.


They are sometimes sold out. On days everyone wants to travel. The problem is that most of the time they aren't, and then the railways are just shuffling expensive metal around. I have been on night trains where I was the only passenger in the whole carriage.



> The passage of a few trains (maybe 3-4 per line) isn't nearly so disruptive to maintenance as freight trains.


Problem is that health and safety rules require passage of 0 trains for maintenance to be permitted...



> Staffing the sleeper trains isn't as hard as it seems-once you factor in the ground crew and other staff for an airliner, they become more competitive.


you forget that trains have "ground crew" as well, and that the numbers of pkm produced per staff member are higher for airlines (and high speed trains).
I used to take night trains to France from Belgium to go on skiing holidays. Then those trains got cancelled and the railway ran TGVs in stead. 
For the TGV service they only needed on set on saturday, and a crew that travelled with it for the whole journey, put and back. Their lies the big difference... Personal costs are high in railways. The productivity in pkm per staff member is a lot higher for high speed trains then for night trains.


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## 00Zy99 (Mar 4, 2013)

bluemeansgo said:


> IF they cover their costs or are in such high demand why would they be cancelled.
> 
> I can't speak for Europe but in Japan overnight trains are simply not cost effective. Raising the price results in lower ridership. That's why as high speed rail lines opened the overnight trains seem to go away.
> 
> My guess is that those who book an overnight are travellers trying save a few bucks on a hotel or trying to maximize their time travelling. Those passengers would probably switch to an overnight bus before they switched to a day train any how.


As noted on another thread, the politics makes them spend a disproportionate amount of track fees on sleeper trains.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

MarcVD said:


> Indeed. I went to Brussels Midi last september to buy a ticket from Brussels
> to Palermo, and it took about half an hour to have everything fixed, although
> I prepared all the itinerary, down to the train numbers, myself.
> 
> ...


Which is why I am not in favour of punishing other modes just because the railways can't get their act together...


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Suburbanist said:


> Why do they stick to 16.7Hz I'll never understand.


What do they have to gain from switching to 25kV 50 Hz? At this moment the advantages do not outweigh the investment required.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

M-NL said:


> What do they have to gain from switching to 25kV 50 Hz? At this moment the advantages do not outweigh the investment required.


The gain from changing the frequency is that DB stops needing its own power grid! The tension can be whatever.


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## PredyGr (Jan 11, 2005)

chornedsnorkack said:


> How does the energy efficiency of high speed trains compare against slow speed trains?











Energy efficiency: passenger-kilometres carried per unit of energy (1kwh = 0.086kep) (Source: UIC)


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Suburbanist said:


> The gain from changing the frequency is that DB stops needing its own power grid! The tension can be whatever.


Power stations that create 15kV 16.7Hz directly from the public power grid already exist, they're called Bahnstromumformerwerk in German.
They used to use motor-generators for that, but nowadays modern power electronics are used.

If Germany were to switch to 50Hz they would need to change a lot of infrastructure, because 50Hz requires much larger safety distances, even at 15kV. The original reason to go with 16.7Hz in the first place was because it produced less arcing in the motors and switch gear.

In 25 years or so, when Germany has phased out PZB/LZB in favour of ERTMS, all new equipment is capable of running on 25kV and all the old equipment is not used anymore because it's to expensive to retrofit with ERTMS, then would be a good time to switch.


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

http://www.freiepresse.de/NACHRICHT...Neubaustrecke-Dresden-Prag-artikel9180988.php



> EU, Sachsen und Tschechien für Neubaustrecke Dresden-Prag
> 
> Dresden (dpa/sn) - Gemeinsam mit der tschechischen Regierung und der EU-Kommission will Sachsen die Aufnahme der lange geplanten Bahn-Neubaustrecke Dresden-Prag in den Bundesverkehrswegeplan erreichen. Die Europäische Union habe die Strecke selbst bei der Bundesregierung angemeldet und auch die Deutsche Bahn habe ihre Unterstützung zugesagt, sagte Sachsens Verkehrsminister Martin Dulig (SPD) am Dienstag bei einem Treffen mit dem EU-Koordinator Mathieu Grosch und dem Eisenbahndirektor der tschechischen Regierung, Jindrich Kušnír, in Dresden. Deshalb seien die Vorzeichen günstig.
> 
> ...


There seems to be at least some media stir about Dresden - Praha line if anything. There´s been already several similar news in the last months that I read.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Would be very good for making Czech rail routes still attractive as a corridor once the HSR Leipzig-Nuremberg is opened in 2018 or so. Would be also good to decrease flights to Prague in favor of rail from Northern Germany. A pity though about the old line, one of the most beautiful in Central Europe. I guess it will be still used for slower trains, as the Rhine Valley line(s) remains in use despite Cologne-Frankfurt HSR.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

Maybe they can rebrand it with some fancy name, like the Swiss did with many of their routes to increase tourism.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Would be also good to decrease flights to Prague in favor of rail from Northern Germany.


Berlin-Nuremberg will be something like 2 1/2h, imagine this with Prague-Berlin. It would be possible with HSR, this would be great. I suppose if any route from Germany to the eastern countries would be worth of HSR it would be Dresden-Prague and Berlin-Warsaw.

Kind regards


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## Surel (May 5, 2010)

http://www.ceskenoviny.cz/news/zpra...terested-in-high-speed-rail-to-berlin/1212239



> He said the Czech Republic is interested in building a high-speed Prague-Berlin line.
> 
> "I asked the Chancellor for intensive cooperation in the mutual development of rail connection. The Czech Republic is very strongly interested in upgrading the rail link between Prague and Berlin. We believe that high-speed trains could be serving it in the future. We would also like very much to modernise the rail connection between Prague and Munich," Sobotka said.


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## whatsuplucas (Jun 10, 2013)

tunnel owl said:


> I suppose if any route from Germany to the eastern countries would be worth of HSR it would be Dresden-Prague and Berlin-Warsaw.


Yeah. The Berlin-Warszawa Express, at ~5h30min, is not what I would call especially fast.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

PredyGr said:


> Energy efficiency: passenger-kilometres carried per unit of energy (1kwh = 0.086kep) (Source: UIC)


Sorry, but that graph doesn't make sense. How could a highspeed train could possibly be more energy efficient than a slower IC train for example? The only way I could imagine that they could get to these numbers is by calculating with a very low usage rate for the slow train while the high speed train is considered sold out. 

Or is it because high speed trains have fewer stops therefore have to accelerate less due to that?


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

That's exactly it. The heavier an object is the more energy it takes to accelerate. High speed trains on dedicated rails are built for aerodynamics and can be built lighter when on dedicated tracks. Slower trains make more stops. Think of it the same way that a Ferrari gets better fuel economy on the highway at higher speeds than a heavier SUV driven in town.


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## Slartibartfas (Aug 15, 2006)

EDIT:
I had a look at the UIC study. Interesting read. Of course it was done by someone very interested in showing a low energy consumption for high speed train but it still shows some very valid points.


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## Xoser_barcelona (Jul 15, 2008)

bluemeansgo said:


> Yeah. Germany shouldn't really be compared to France at all. Culturally and geographically it is much closer to a nation like Japan.....


I think Germany is Germany and France is France. Placing Germany culturally closer to Japan than France provokes a Wie Bitte (HUI BITTA in Romaji) Japan is an Island Nation with the transport onus on the Taiheyo(?) belt of cities stretching from Chiba pref. until Fukuoka afaik. Germany has lots of people, granted, but they are not all on the coast in a long line of cities. 

Germany has Siemens and a great engineering mittelstand but they also have BMW, Mercedes, VW and OPEL which is a formidable car lobby to compete with when looking to obtain funds for infrastructure projects (Autobahn v. NBS).


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Xoser_barcelona said:


> I think Germany is Germany and France is France. Placing Germany culturally closer to Japan than France provokes a Wie Bitte (HUI BITTA in Romaji) Japan is an Island Nation with the transport onus on the Taiheyo(?) belt of cities stretching from Chiba pref. until Fukuoka afaik. Germany has lots of people, granted, but they are not all on the coast in a long line of cities.
> 
> Germany has Siemens and a great engineering mittelstand but they also have BMW, Mercedes, VW and OPEL which is a formidable car lobby to compete with when looking to obtain funds for infrastructure projects (Autobahn v. NBS).


Yes, there is the historic Tokaido route along which the big three cities (Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka) are built, but the point is that unlike France, which is a hub and spoke system around Paris, Germany and Japan have long strings of large cities. Yes, Japan is a narrower, longer country, but Shinkansen lines in Kyushu, for example, were built separate from the main system. Lines like the Hokuriku Shinkansen and Joetsu Shinkansen aren't along the main string of cities along the coast (though they do connect primarily with Tokyo).

Additionally, the cultural values that place an importance on scheduling, rules and efficiency, cleanliness and high-quality engineering, places Japan closer to Germany than its neighbour, France.

Japan also has to deal with a strong automotive sector and a very extensive highway system (pork-barrel politics aside), with powerhouses like Honda and Toyota, along with many successful manufacturers like Mitsubishi, Subaru, Nissan, Mazda. Japan's auto industry is one of top three in the world.

Both nations have a strong work ethic and highly value relaxation.

All I'm saying is that when it comes down to it, Germany has (perhaps surprisingly) more in common with Japan than France. I'm not saying they're the same in all ways (e.g. Germany has VERY little coast), but that they have enough in common for people to look East rather than West when comparing different country's train systems.


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## Xoser_barcelona (Jul 15, 2008)

bluemeansgo said:


> Yes, there is the historic Tokaido route along which the big three cities (Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka) are built, but the point is that unlike France, which is a hub and spoke system around Paris, Germany and Japan have long strings of large cities...
> 
> _Maybe Germany is a Hubs and Spokes system with various hubs and their spokes, but yes there is no German Paris or London equivalent for that matter._
> 
> ...


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Xoser_barcelona said:


> _I don't think this is true and hope some French forumer can big up great French Engineering expertise as this is now very off topic/hors topic_
> _ Some people... ;-) Please let the record show that Japan is Honto sugoi, Germany rules and France is fantastique.._


Getting back on topic... it's pretty clear that the French hub rail system doesn't work in Germany as it has closely spaced medium-sized cities and the rail systems are run much differently. 

I personally agree with the poster that said France and Germany are different beasts. And the rail problems Germany faces are more similar to a country "like" Japan with its closely spaced stations than France (one mega-city with spokes). Definitely would be a more appropriate system to emulate than the Paris-centric French system.


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## Slagathor (Jul 29, 2007)

If any European nation can be compared to Japan in that respect, it's surely Italy. Long shaped, three major cities in a relatively straight line (Milan, Rome, Naples), nasty mountains getting in the way, earthquake zones causing headaches... It's got it all. 

But I totally agree that Germany is probably the hardest country in Europe to build a high speed rail network just because of how its population is spread throughout the country. Unlike France, Spain and, to a lesser extent, the UK, it doesn't have a single very dominant capital city. If you wanted to connect all the significant cities of Germany with each other through high speed railway lines, you'd need a hell of a network. Certainly something vastly more complicated than the starfish networks of France and Spain.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

33Hz said:


> This is my point. It's easy to build a hub and spoke HSR system like France when there is one obvious connection point and it dominates the politics. It is not so obvious where to start when you have a many-to-many nodes requirement like Germany and they are all lobbying for their own HSR stops.


Quite the contrary. It is way simpler to build a network high-speed lines between the major cities in a country like Germany than it is to connect provincial towns of France to its capital.


With 4 of the 6 largest and most important cities being connectable by a single line it would have been quite obvious where to start implementing the high-speed technology in Germany.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

flierfy said:


> Quite the contrary. It is way simpler to build a network high-speed lines between the major cities in a country like Germany than it is to connect provincial towns of France to its capital.
> 
> 
> With 4 of the 6 largest and most important cities being connectable by a single line it would have been quite obvious where to start implementing the high-speed technology in Germany.


The problem is that when they started implementing the high speed system in Germany the country was very different than it is now. There was a pressing need for a new north-south corridor ever since the partition after WW-II, and thus that got build. But it would never have been build it Germany hadn't been partitioned.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

K_ said:


> The problem is that when they started implementing the high speed system in Germany the country was very different than it is now. There was a pressing need for a new north-south corridor ever since the partition after WW-II, and thus that got build. But it would never have been build it Germany hadn't been partitioned.


There was a strong discussion back in the 70s wether to take Cologne Frankfurt or Hannover Würzburg as first step oft HSR


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

K_ said:


> The problem is that when they started implementing the high speed system in Germany the country was very different than it is now. There was a pressing need for a new north-south corridor ever since the partition after WW-II, and thus that got build. But it would never have been build it Germany hadn't been partitioned.


The country wasn't that different though. Major population centres in West Germany were on or near the indicated line. In fact the southwest of Germany has always been denser populated than the north.

Neither do I buy the argument that West Germany was in a dire need of additional north-south capacities due to the division of Germany. There was no part of West Germany which was actually cut off from anything essential. And the pre-war transport links had not only been restored, new ones had already been created by the construction of motorways. The North Sea ports were the gateways to the world before and after WW2 and all railway lines connecting southern Germany with Hamburg and Bremen ran entirely on West German territory.
Due to European integration sea ports in Italy and the Netherlands had even become increasingly important for German trade and therefore the need to ship goods to northern Germany had already diminished.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

flierfy said:


> The country wasn't that different though.


If you call 40% smaller "not that different", then there isn't much point in debating I'm afraid....


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Oh K, don't always be so dogmatic. The Anschluss added 20 % population to Germoney, but as the East German GDP and even that of West Berlin was rather adversely effected by the economic policies of reunification, there was little economic incentive to add mid-size Eastern towns via HSR. Almost all HSR investments have concentrated on connecting the new capital to West Germany: Hannover, Hamburg and 2 years from now Munich. Leipzig and Erfurt will benefit from the latter too. A short section of Leipzig-Dresden has been upgraded for 200 kmh. Otherwise it has been the policy to upgrade rails to mid-size Eastern towns to 160 kmh (Schwerin, Rostock, Cottbus etc.), usually from Berlin. 
While these investments (especially the 3 Berlin HSR) might have gone to the detriment of investments into Western infrastructure, no North to South major line on Western territory had gone through Eastern territory before the war and even for towns somewhat close to the internal border, such as Hamburg-Munich, a detour through the East would never have made sense.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

K_ said:


> If you call 40% smaller "not that different", then there isn't much point in debating I'm afraid....


The country may have been divided but it was certainly not smaller.


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## k.k.jetcar (Jul 17, 2008)

Good discussion about German transport corridors and historical/geographic patterns that influenced it.



> in Japan people go on 5 day a year company managed holidays.


Maybe in _1968_. Not anymore. Most now go out of their way to keep their holiday plans secret from their co-workers (to avoid having to buy souvenirs for everyone). I would say Japanese holiday patterns mimic the anglo-saxon pattern (i.e. very short) rather than continental patterns of month long leisure...


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

Baron Hirsch said:


> While these investments (especially the 3 Berlin HSR) might have gone to the detriment of investments into Western infrastructure, no North to South major line on Western territory had gone through Eastern territory before the war and even for towns somewhat close to the internal border, such as Hamburg-Munich, a detour through the East would never have made sense.


Germany was always a country far more polycentric than Great Britain or France. Berlin was the capital of Prussia and the merger called deutsches Reich still was a pattern of provinces with strong capitals. Anyway please note, that the first motorway for public use was Cologne-Bonn. Electrification of rail-lines in the former GDR didn´t took place first in Berlin due to technical reasons, it was Saxonia. This discussion of what would have been is always nice but not helpful for the present.

Germany falling apart in east and west after 1948 mainly affected west-german parts near the border (Hamburg, Braunschweig) and Berlin. Still people in Stuttgart or Cologne know little if anything about the former GDR because they never kept in touch with this system and the problems resulting from the partition.

Edit: Coming back to HSR in Germany, there is one specific thing which is only found in Germany. The main agglomerations of Rhein-Ruhr, Cologne, Munich, Stuttgart, Hamburg and Berlin are near the border of Germany, not in the middle, except Frankfurt. There are several important minor towns in between but there is a strong need to link those big cities. From that point of view it made sense to create the north-south-link first, others followed. So a HSR-network makes sense in Germany but it has no core like Paris, it´s like a web linking important points at the border. A main hub is Frankfurt anyway as it lies in the middle. Frankfurt21 would have created a real solution for problems with HSR travel-speed and reliability.

New HSR-lines in Germany have to tasks:
1) Completing the links between the most important cities
2) Relieve existing lines by seperating freight/regional service from HSR

This is the so called Netz21-strategy and they have to do:
HSR Frankfurt-Mannheim
HSR Frankfurt-Fulda-Erfurt/Würzburg
HSR Hannover-Hamburg/Bremen

Kind regards


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## Bbbut (Aug 23, 2014)

skyshakernowlive said:


> I'm surprised France took lead of HSR in Europe. Germany has much better demographics, it has several major cities which are too close for air travel but to far for bus, and good population densities and a liberal population.
> 
> Why such slow development?


Unlike the posts above I think it has very little to do with geographical setup of Germany and 95% is down to politics.
France is building all these new HSR routes with PPP-investments at ridiculous levels. It is taking on huge dept out of some kind of prestige sentiment that will haunt them in 20 years (at least from my German penny pincher viewpoint).
It is clear with current low interest rates, that Germany could easily triple its railway investment without much effort or 'overspending'. But it is just not doing it, because there is little political will behind it. Politicians have different priorities and voters do not seem to care either.
They are not even sure what to do with DB in the future. Fully privatize it or not? Throw money at it or foster competition? The few actions they do are not particularly pro-rail, like allowing the intercity bus lines or lowering the subsidies for regional rail.


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## mrsmartman (Mar 16, 2015)

It is relatively difficult for developed countries to build new HSR routes. My impression for German HSR is that it sells well overseas.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

mrsmartman said:


> My impression for German HSR is that it sells well overseas.


And this is probably the reason why high-speed sections in Germany are barely longer than test tracks.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

'Made in Germany' is still a very very powerful brand almost anywhere across the globe.
However on the other hand consider this:
German HSR technology was sold to Spain, Turkey, Russia, China, Taiwan and Belgium (Thalys).
French HSR was sold to Spain, Italy, Tunesia, South Korea, China, USA and Belgium.
So the French aren't doing that bad either.


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## Silly_Walks (Aug 23, 2010)

M-NL said:


> German HSR technology was sold to Spain, Turkey, Russia, China, Taiwan and *Belgium (Thalys)*.
> French HSR was sold to Spain, Italy, Tunesia, South Korea, China, USA and Belgium.


Thalys PBA and PBKA are part of the TGV family of high-speed trains built by Alstom in France.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Did you notice that Belgium was included for both the French and German list because of that?

Note that I also excluded the USA from the German list, despite that Bombardier Transportation is essentially a German company and was co-builder of the Acela.


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## Silly_Walks (Aug 23, 2010)

M-NL said:


> Did you notice that Belgium was included for both the French and German list because of that?


Did you notice that you specifically placed Belgium with the German list for Thalys, which I then told you uses French trains?


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## Galaxy (Jul 30, 2004)

flierfy said:


> Quite the contrary. It is way simpler to build a network high-speed lines between the major cities in a country like Germany than it is to connect provincial towns of France to its capital.
> 
> 
> With 4 of the 6 largest and most important cities being connectable by a single line it would have been quite obvious where to start implementing the high-speed technology in Germany.



The problem is the majority of Germans do not live in cities like Hamburg, Berlin, and Frankufrt. The live in more spread out in smaller cities like Pforzheim, Bayreuth, and Ulm. Connecting the big cities will give you a relatively small amount of passengers.


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## 00Zy99 (Mar 4, 2013)

Galaxy said:


> The problem is the majority of Germans do not live in cities like Hamburg, Berlin, and Frankufrt. The live in more spread out in smaller cities like Pforzheim, Bayreuth, and Ulm. Connecting the big cities will give you a relatively small amount of passengers.


Its been said that some also live in a city called Bielefeld. However, nobody has ever been able to conclusively prove this. :lol::lol:


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## KingNick (Sep 23, 2010)

Galaxy said:


> The problem is the majority of Germans do not live in cities like Hamburg, Berlin, and Frankufrt. The live in more spread out in smaller cities like Pforzheim, Bayreuth, and Ulm. Connecting the big cities will give you a relatively small amount of passengers.


Who cares where the majority lives? Those cities on the Köln - München line have enough inhabitants to fill a HS train every 30 minutes withouth a single stop in between the cities.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

KingNick said:


> Who cares where the majority lives? Those cities on the Köln - München line have enough inhabitants to fill a HS train every 30 minutes withouth a single stop in between the cities.


If that were the case DB would be running lots of non stop trains already. They aren't.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

K_ said:


> If that were the case DB would be running lots of non stop trains already. They aren't.


How could they when the tracks are missing. For this kind of services a dedicated high-speed line would be needed. But only some sections of it have been built as yet.



Galaxy said:


> The problem is the majority of Germans do not live in cities like Hamburg, Berlin, and Frankufrt. The live in more spread out in smaller cities like Pforzheim, Bayreuth, and Ulm. Connecting the big cities will give you a relatively small amount of passengers.


It doesn't have to serve a majority to be worthwhile. The number of people who benefit directly from a piece of infrastructure will always be a small minority in a fairly large country like Germany. That applies for a Köln-München high-speed line as well as the railway lines to and from Pforzheim, Bayreuth and Ulm.


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## thun (Aug 8, 2007)

But governments unfortunately are facing the challenge that they have to use public funds in a way that as much citizens as possible are profiting of them.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

Trains from smaller cities are treat like local or rapid service and they must never impede the super express. 

Same as the autobahn really. 

People who take a train from small city to large city get local service. At large city they can transfer to super express to get to destination. 

This way suburbs are served (small cities) and the direct trains offering the most competitive service are all full.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

thun said:


> But governments unfortunately are facing the challenge that they have to use public funds in a way that as much citizens as possible are profiting of them.


No, public funds have to be used in a way to benefit the country economically. A Köln-München high-speed line would do exactly this.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

bluemeansgo said:


> Trains from smaller cities are treat like local or rapid service and they must never impede the super express.
> 
> Same as the autobahn really.
> 
> ...


Unfortunately that does not seem to be working in Germany. While many cities form part of larger agglomerations, such as the Rhein Main Area, passengers still clamor to have direct ICE services from Darmstadt or other places that could easily reach Frankfurt Hbf within less than an hour. Also DB has now announced that it aims to reinstate direct IC services to mid-size towns that had fallen off the grid and are currently only being served by RegionalExpress. There is a subjective and an objective need for direct services to such places: many passengers consider it a nuisance to interrupt their journey, gather their belongings and change. Depending on luggage, children, and physical condition, this can be stress. But there is also an objective side: DB hardly ever manages to stick to its schedules, connections are easily disrupted by delays and then it it better to sit in a train that will get to your destination eventually than being stuck on some in-between station. 
By the way to always quote the false ideal, I believe TGVs do usually connect quite a number of small towns off their beaten route at least a few times a day.


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

Baron Hirsch said:


> By the way to always quote the false ideal, I believe TGVs do usually connect quite a number of small towns off their beaten route at least a few times a day.


Definitely true, but it must be said that these things are easier to arrange in what is essentially a monocentric network. To cite a slightly flippant example, the S-Bahns of several large German cities also have a number of trains that either stop at every second station or service only the outer or inner suburbs. When the large majority of passengers want to get into/out of the centre of the network as quickly as possible this is an ideal solution. In Japan they can obtain something similar (although like Germany they have a very dense pack of provincial cities) because most of the Shinkansen traffic takes place on a straight north-south line. It wouldn't necessarily work in a multi-nodal network like Germany's railway grid. 

I think in addition to the German "peculiarities" already mentioned we need to add a few differences of culture and/or perception. First, when HSR was introduced in France (and even more so in Spain) the following message was repeatedly drilled into the population: "This is not an upgrade of an existing railway network; it is an alternative to air transport". - Which, in turn, made point-to-point railway connections much easier to sell. The planes between Paris and Lyon did not make intermediate landings in Dijon, so why should the TGVs stop there? However, in Germany the HS lines are mostly perceived as improvements of existing railway networks, and therefore the public debate evolves along well-know battle lines: (1) this is about the travel time between immediately neighbouring towns; and (2) it is an outrage if a town loses its well-earned rights to be serviced by all intercity trains in this part of the country. 

Secondly, the Germans are extremely attached to their "Heimart" (homestead) and perhaps for this reason there is little acceptance of the apparently inevitable decline of small-town society. In a country like France - and even in my tiny native Denmark - the press is full of stories about how the population in 1-2 generations' time will be living in a dozen large urban centres separated by empty space. Once the population accepts this vision of the future it becomes obvious that the railway investments should focus on connecting this dozen of agglomerations with as high travel speed as possible. (And, as a corollary, invest in metros and trams in those towns.) This is the public perception of the future, and the basis for current infrastructure planning, in a lot of European countries. But apparently not in Germany.


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## krisu99 (May 16, 2008)

.
Q: Why are discussions about German Railways over and over again caught by friendly dogfights "_German HSR infrastructure layout vs. French HSR infrastructure layout"_? 

It was like this 10 years ago, it will be like this in 10 years. The chain of arguments and counter-arguments could be copied and pasted from 10 pages before. It's basically like rewriting the bible over and over again ... 


I see this as a funny "coming of age" phenomena of every rail fain seems to go through during a certain phase of life, me included (long time ago luckily) 

Never mind, don't let me disturb the good discussions ... ;-)


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

> Secondly, the Germans are extremely attached to their "Heimart" (homestead) and perhaps for this reason there is little acceptance of the apparently inevitable decline of small-town society. In a country like France - and even in my tiny native Denmark - the press is full of stories about how the population in 1-2 generations' time will be living in a dozen large urban centres separated by empty space. Once the population accepts this vision of the future it becomes obvious that the railway investments should focus on connecting this dozen of agglomerations with as high travel speed as possible. (And, as a corollary, invest in metros and trams in those towns.) This is the public perception of the future, and the basis for current infrastructure planning, in a lot of European countries. But apparently not in Germany.


I don't know about that. According to demographic projections posted by user Chrissib and other people, the major urban areas and towns are growing while the rural areas and smaller towns are facing population decline.


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

The population trend is more or less identical everywhere in the developed world. The difference is only in the extent and public perception.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

Deutsche Bahn might buy trains and parts from China in near future:


> *Deutsche Bahn eyes shopping spree in China*
> 
> German rail operator Deutsche Bahn has said it's considering buying trains and spare parts from Chinese producers in a couple of years. German suppliers such as Siemens will not be amused by the announcement.
> 
> ...


http://www.dw.de/deutsche-bahn-eyes-shopping-spree-in-china/a-18475815

Comments?


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

LtBk said:


> Deutsche Bahn might buy trains and parts from China in near future:
> 
> 
> http://www.dw.de/deutsche-bahn-eyes-shopping-spree-in-china/a-18475815
> ...


Given the huge trade surplus Germany has with China buying more in China would be a good thing. As long as the quality is good.


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## LondonerMiles (Jan 5, 2012)

Actually, I think Japan can be most closely compared to Britain. We are both proud island nations, and proud of our monarchy and culture. Furthermore unlike Germany and France, Japan and Britain have a culture of perhaps being a little unspoken, and social etiquette is very important in both countries. Unfortunately, we do not have the industry to compare to Japan, we used to, but lets not go down that road...


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## Slagathor (Jul 29, 2007)

^^ All interesting points on culture, but we're talking about high speed rail here.


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## Shenkey (Mar 19, 2009)

Why wouldn't they buy AGV/TGV?

Alstom at least knows how to make a train, as Siemens just proves time and again it does not.


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## VITORIA MAN (Jan 31, 2013)

talgo avril ?
Hace ya un año by Luis Manuel Franco, en Flickr
or caf oaris
CAF Oaris en Zaragoza-Delicias by Jorge del Valle, en Flickr


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

In general good news I find. I always thought that DB did not market the sprinter idea enough. However the current sprinter Berlin-Frankfurt via Hanover claims a traveling time of only 3:34, so in fact the directer route via Erfurt would be decisively slower. I also find it too bad that again there is no sprinter Berlin-Hanover-Dortmund-Cologne, which I believe could win its share out of this busy line.


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## telemaxx (Dec 7, 2007)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Although it can only crank up to 250 kmh, it is to be used mostly on the new Munich-Leipzig/Halle-Hamburg line, which will have several 300 kmh-sections. Source: http://dmm.travel/news/artikel/lesen/2015/09/erster-icx-auf-testfahrten-unterwegs-71360/ (in German)


According to the new Fernverkehrskonzept 2030 the ICE4 will first be introduced on the lines Hamburg-Hannover-München and Hamburg-Hannover-Frankfurt-Stuttgart (ICE lines 25 and 22) from 12/2017. From 12/2019 it is planned to introduce the ICE4 on Berlin-Erfurt-Munich for the regular services (line 28). The ICE sprinter Berlin-Munich needs trains sets, which are capable to run 300 km/h, so ICE class 403, 406 or 407 (ICE 3). I think 403 is likely because 406 (and 407) are needed for international services.

Source (in German): http://www.deutschebahn.com/file/de...a/praesentation_neues_fernverkehrskonzept.pdf



Baron Hirsch said:


> In general good news I find. I always thought that DB did not market the sprinter idea enough. However the current sprinter Berlin-Frankfurt via Hanover claims a traveling time of only 3:34, so in fact the directer route via Erfurt would be decisively slower. I also find it too bad that again there is no sprinter Berlin-Hanover-Dortmund-Cologne, which I believe could win its share out of this busy line.


You're right regarding the Sprinter via Hanover. However, that one is only riding twice a day, the new Sprinter via Halle and Erfurt is riding four times per day. In the longer term there is some potential for further reduction of journey time when Halle Hbf is renewed and Bitterfeld-Halle is upgraded to 200 km/h. Furthermore, there are concepts for a fast junction from the HSL Hannover-Würzburg to Eisenach along Bebra, which could reduce journey time for another ten minutes. 

For Berlin-Hannover-Cologne I think it is very hard to introduce additional trains because of the section Wunstorf-Minden, which is a bottleneck. There are, however, plans for two ICE trains per hour between Cologne and Berlin by integrating the IC line Cologne-Hannover-Berlin into the ICE network (maybe that's what you meant in the other Germany railways thread, Baron Hirsch?).


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## Nexis (Aug 7, 2007)

*ICE Tunnel Irlahüll Süd*


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## Coccodrillo (Sep 30, 2005)

A prospect from DB Netze of the new Erfurt-Halle/Leipzig HSL full of details (54 MB): http://fahrweg.dbnetze.com/file/fah...TvE/9837564/data/2015_33_Streckenprospekt.pdf


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## Nexis (Aug 7, 2007)




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## Christian1981 (Nov 24, 2005)

*ICE High Speed Railway Leipzig - Erfurt*


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## OzFrog (Oct 19, 2004)

Christian1981 said:


>


When did that line open between Leipzig and Erfurt?


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## telemaxx (Dec 7, 2007)

Not yet. It will open on 9 December of this year.


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## Deadeye Reloaded (Apr 25, 2006)

Presentation of the first brand new ICE 4 (formerly know as ICx) in Berlin! :master: :siren:

The ICE 4 fleet wil replace all ICE 1 and ICE 2 trains. :yes:

-Vmax: 250 km/h (12-car train) / 230 km/h (7-car train)
-Power: 9.900 kW (12-car trian) / 4.950 kW (7-car train)
-Length: 346 m (12-car train) / 200 m (7-car trian)
-Capacity: 830 seats (12-car train) / 456 seats (7-car train)
-On order: 85 x 12-car trains / 45 x 7-car trains
-Producer: Siemens AG

















































*SOURCE*


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## Autostädter (Nov 29, 2009)

It's weird that initially the new trains were meant to replace the old IC trains first and ICE 1/2 later but now it sounds like they only replace ICE 1/2 and ICs will be replaced by double deck trains. :?
Also, in the second video the space between the seats looks very small and the seats look thin and not very comfy.


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## Shenkey (Mar 19, 2009)

Older version looks way better, this one is plain ugly. It would make way more sense to buy AGV and it is faster also.


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## aquaticko (Mar 15, 2011)

^^I'm guessing that the AGV's capabilities are beyond what this train is intended for, and the idea of Deutsche Bahn buying French trains is...strange. 

However, no doubt this is not a pretty train.


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## Sopomon (Oct 2, 2010)

^^ Seeing it in the flesh, it's far less ugly than I had feared seeing the renderings - but I'm still left wondering who decided to have all of Siemens' designers fired...


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## Autostädter (Nov 29, 2009)

i don't think it's ugly altough the design isn't very sophisticated. I think it looks better than the current Velaro D and possibly even better than the AGV with it's bulky head.


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## dlomen (Dec 5, 2015)

The design looks very old


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## Gedeon (Apr 5, 2013)

Sopomon said:


> ^^ Seeing it in the flesh, it's far less ugly than I had feared seeing the renderings - but I'm still left wondering who decided to have all of Siemens' designers fired...


You mean this guy? http://www.alexander-neumeister.com/projects.html (designer of ICE 1/2/3, Transrapid, Talent, Desiro, etc.)

The ICx/ICE 4 was designed by Bombardier design team and won a Red Dot design award: http://www.marketwired.com/press-re...es-red-dot-design-award-tsx-bbd.b-2034184.htm

But Neumeister's work can hardly be topped, he is one of the greatest designers (and greatest train designer) of our time.


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## Bbbut (Aug 23, 2014)

In terms of aesthetics the ICE3 does look better to me as well. The edges and the carp mouth don't do it for me on the new one.
But thank God, they finally got rid of the round door windows, a design element that ruined the side view of all its predecessors.
So overall its an average looking high speed train, not great but definitively not as horrible to look at as the AVG for example.

And in terms of economy I do think the Germans are on the right path. A train service is not about the highest speed possible. To burn twice as much energy just to gain some measly minutes on select few lines, is not the 'smart way' forward.
Better upgrade your fleet to run a lot of ecological 'fast enough'-trains than to chase speed records, spend billions on prestige lines and neglect the rest of your network...


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

Bbbut said:


> And in terms of economy I do think the Germans are on the right pass. A train service is not about the highest speed possible. To burn twice as much energy just to gain some measly minutes on select few lines, is not the 'smart way' forward.
> Better upgrade your fleet to run a lot of ecological* 'fast enough'-trains *than to chase speed records, spend billions on prestige lines and neglect the rest of your network...


Bold part = mediocrity instead of excellence, not something worth of the 4th largest World economy.


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## Gedeon (Apr 5, 2013)

Suburbanist said:


> Bold part = mediocrity instead of excellence, not something worth of the 4th largest World economy.


Problem with Germany is that they have many mid-sized cities that are not quite far apart, unlike France or China with large, but fewer urban areas that are at a greater distance.


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## suasion (Sep 7, 2015)

Suburbanist said:


> Bold part = mediocrity instead of excellence, not something worth of the 4th largest World economy.


I travel around Europe a lot and I have to say of thelarger countries, the German's have the simplest most efficient system to move lots of people between cities. The Spanish AVE like the French TGV is an overcomplicated system. They consume too many resources for infrequent fast trains to the detriment of the rest of the network.
Saving 20 minutes on a train going only 6 times a day is rubbish unless your appointment happens to coincide with one of the arrival times.

The time difference between 250 km/h and 300 kmh is only 10 minutes per hour and only when travelling at full speed, but takes almost 1.5 times more energy to accelerate.


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## SamuraiBlue (Apr 2, 2010)

The Transrapid clearance is 1cm between track and magnet compared to 10cm of the Japanese system but I speculate that the shaking is not due to clearance but alignment of the Shanghai track combined with the inherent boobing through propulsion.
As for depressurized tubes I doubt it will be realized on this planet due to cost in maintaining the low pressure through out the total length of the tracks. If maglevs are constructed on the moon in the next century definitely yes but on Earth I doubt it.


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## aquaticko (Mar 15, 2011)

Bbbut said:


> That is just not true! :bash:
> 
> For the ICE4 project the DB actually went out of their way and specifically set up an international tender for it.
> They deliberately aimed for lower speed requirements (250 km/h max) but emphasized economy and comfort. So almost everybody 'in the game' was able to take part.
> ...


"Won by default"--that's funny. That's like when people say they've set up a fair test open for anyone to take, when in reality it's been set up specifically so that one outcome is inevitable and the whole thing is, in actuality, a farce. If DB were so desperate to not have Siemens provide trains, then why didn't they change their expectations? And the other two were never publically revealed, but the two big ones were Alstom and Siemens? Gee, I wonder why. It's totally fair to say that the technical requirements were such that those two were, effectively, the only real competitors, but to have a coincidence wherein the only supplier that met all the requirements is both a domestic company *and* the dominant supplier of high speed trains in Germany? That looks less like a coincidence and more like an intended result.

Comfort and economy are actually much more technically-complicated to deliver than speed, in a lot of ways. It's easy to put a big engine in a little car to make it go fast in a straight line, but to make it do so while being comfortable, efficient, and manageable is a lot more complicated. 



> PS: In what world is this thing not one of the ugliest trains on the market?


It may not be what you'd call "pretty", but it inarguably a technical-looking and futuristic design.


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## Bbbut (Aug 23, 2014)

But that is just an accusation on your part!

Like I sad, DB was pissed at Siemens at that time. They made it quite clear to the press that they were actively looking for an alternative. Instead of going with them as their usual supplier or set up an faux-tender like you imply, they supposedly went directly to all the other producers. The CEO was giving interviews that Shinkansen could easily run on Germans lines if Hitachi would put in the effort to get them licensed.
They also said, they were not interested in interfering much in the development. It would be a very hands-off approach in with the producers were not expected to create something revolutionary, but could take their current proven design instead.

The final requirement document was very detailed, no question about it (300 pages, 8900 technical specifications). But only 27% of these criteria were obligatory.
There was a lot of room for different products. Even locomotive hauled designs were allowed!


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

suasion said:


> the trains will always lose time entering and leaving stations no matter how fast they can travel between them


There is still a lot of room for improvement there. Because most of these stations are historically situated in city centres the high(er) speed stretches usually end some distance from the stations, so the train has to creep for several kilometers at low speeds, losing a lot of time. The same thing happens to TGVs. 

When you take the Shinkansen on the other hand: Except for Tokyo where it is limited to 70 km/h to 110 km/h, they have built new high speed stations at better locations when the existing location was less suitable (like Shin-Osaka for instance).


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

I could be wrong, but aren't delays of train deliveries common these days?


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## telemaxx (Dec 7, 2007)

So far, the ICE4 is on schedule btw.


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## hans280 (Jun 13, 2008)

aquaticko said:


> "Won by default"--that's funny. That's like when people say they've set up a fair test open for anyone to take, when in reality it's been set up specifically so that one outcome is inevitable and the whole thing is, in actuality, a farce. If DB were so desperate to not have Siemens provide trains, then why didn't they change their expectations?


I'm not sure that's the whole story. I think the most credible "western world" competitor to Siemens's ICE4 is probably Bombardier's Zefiro. (For reasons already mentioned we cannot know whether Bombardier was initially in contention.) Alstom's AGV is commonly considered as a failed project - even here in France. If you need proof of the last statement, please consider the following: Siemens beat Alstom to deliver the next generation of Eurostar trains - despite the fact that there is a French shareholding majority in the operating company. According to the (French) CEO of the company Siemens was so far ahead on all the main bidding criteria that there could have been no excuse for not selecting it.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

Deadeye Reloaded said:


> Deutsche Bahn has and will have enough high-speed bullet trains (+300 km/h) for the stretches where such high speed is possible.


Except that this isn't true. From December 2017 on the Berlin-München-line will be equipped for top speeds of 300 km/h for almost half of its length. That will make it the ICE line with the greatest percentage of highspeed stretches. Yet, this line won't be served by vehicles that match the conditions of the tracks.
Due to technical restrictions pretty much all of 300 km/h capable trainsets of the ICE fleet are committed to services using the Köln-Frankfurt/M highspeed line. That the capabilities of these highspeed trains are then wasted on classic lines beyond Kön and Frankfurt/M is an irony and a very expensive joke.
As a matter of fact Germany lacks a cohesive highspeed network which could bring the best out of the trains. But it also lacks a train operating company that purchase trains which could bring out the best of the railway as well. This is where countries like France, Spain or Italy beat us by large distances. Not to mention Japan where trains and tracks always form a symbiotic unit.


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## Deadeye Reloaded (Apr 25, 2006)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Only because it has decisively lowered its ambitions. The Velaro sets were acquired not for inner-German routes, but for international rides. Many of the French-German HSR rides now being served by TGVs were actually supposed to be provided by ICEs. Also DB seems to have completely abandoned its plans of serving the Cologne-London connection. As a result, the Velaro, which were expensively equipped to fit with all signaling and electricity voltage systems in Europe, run routes such as Munich-Stuttgart-Cologne-Dortmund.


^^
Even if you don´t count the Velaro trains there are still 50 ICE 3 (class 403) wich is more than enough for the few routes where trains can go +300 km/h. 




aquaticko said:


> ^^They'll keep buying Siemens because Deutschland über alles, but no, nationalism is never the best reason to do something.
> 
> And ultimately I agree; Germany could use the stimulus that a massive infrastructure investment would provide. However, as the literal birthplace of austerity and place where that idea has found a very loving home, it's probably not going to happen.


^^
Austerity is no more used in Germany when it comes to infrastructure. The government is investing many billions in rail and road to regain Germany´s leading position as Europe´s country with the most modern infrastructure. :cheers:
I will search for some numbers and post it later. Prepare to be astonished! :shocked:




aquaticko said:


> Just wondering, how competitive is the ICE with domestic air travel? As an American living in a smaller city with its own airport a mere 75km north of Boston (with its major airport), I fantasize that in smaller countries with good rail systems, domestic air travel becomes obsolete. How close is Germany to my fantasy ? (I'm not expecting "very")


^^
There were direct flights between Berlin and Hamburg but they were all cancelled when Deutsche Bahn modernised the rail line between these cities. From this point in time the ICE killed the air travel on this route. :cheers:


ICE 4 drive by. A really nice view of this master piece of engineering! :master:


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## 00Zy99 (Mar 4, 2013)

Wow! The renderings were awful, but it's really not that bad in person. (still like the oval windows on the ICE3, tho)


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Deadeye Reloaded said:


> ^^
> Even if you don´t count the Velaro trains there are still 50 ICE 3 (class 403) wich is more than enough for the few routes where trains can go +300 km/h.
> 
> 
> ...


Hamburg - Berlin? Yes, I am willing to accept that DB is competitive to air flight on HSR or semi-HSR for distances under 300 km, but think of Berlin-Frankfurt: 545 km and airlines are still very much present, whereas TGVs have pretty much done away with flights on the (admittedly shorter) 475 km run Paris-Lyon. 
I am not saying the French system is the solution to all problems, but I see DB going increasingly for mediocrity both in rolling stock and grid development. If they embraced some alternative vision - for example like Austria, no intention to break speed records, but serious grid development to create short cuts, comfortable modern trains and stations, and for long-distance upkeep a night train fleet, then I would say why not, give it a shot. But expecting people to sit on daytime trains for 6 to 8 hours to cross Germany at max speeds of 160-230 kmh without any innovations on comfort (promising free wifi now DB's big goal while every Hungarian suburban train has this on offer). International travel is being given up entirely to air travel except where like France there is a neighboring HSR to exploit.


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Hamburg - Berlin? Yes, I am willing to accept that DB is competitive to air flight on HSR or semi-HSR for distances under 300 km, but think of Berlin-Frankfurt: 545 km and airlines are still very much present, *whereas TGVs have pretty much done away with flights on the (admittedly shorter) 475 km run Paris-Lyon.*


Is there also a TGV from Lyon to CDG airport? If yes then it explains it partially. Some flight exist purely as connections for long distance routes and not because they are competitive services themselves. Basel-Frankfurt is an excellent is an excellent example. The distance is ca 320 km and it takes about 3 h by ICE or by car (assuming very light traffic). There are numerous flights between these two cities. I've used them many times to connect to flights to somewhere else. Much safer and cheaper that way than trying to combine air and rail.


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## Shenkey (Mar 19, 2009)

SamuraiBlue said:


> The Transrapid clearance is 1cm between track and magnet compared to 10cm of the Japanese system but I speculate that the shaking is not due to clearance but alignment of the Shanghai track combined with the inherent boobing through propulsion.
> As for depressurized tubes I doubt it will be realized on this planet due to cost in maintaining the low pressure through out the total length of the tracks. If maglevs are constructed on the moon in the next century definitely yes but on Earth I doubt it.


You don't need low pressure. You can have half a bar and together with artificial wind would easily suffice.



Bbbut said:


> PS: In what world is this thing not one of the ugliest trains on the market?


Looks like the future.

Sleek straight line from top of the cabin to the front and shoe like design on the sides over the wheels, makes it look like it is made for moving and ready to attack.



Bbbut said:


> But that is just an accusation on your part!
> 
> Like I sad, DB was pissed at Siemens at that time. They made it quite clear to the press that they were actively looking for an alternative. Instead of going with them as their usual supplier or set up an faux-tender like you imply, they supposedly went directly to all the other producers. The CEO was giving interviews that Shinkansen could easily run on Germans lines if Hitachi would put in the effort to get them licensed.
> They also said, they were not interested in interfering much in the development. It would be a very hands-off approach in with the producers were not expected to create something revolutionary, but could take their current proven design instead.
> ...


Did they specify that in case of a crash, the train should not pancake as on that bridge a few years back?



And as someone has said. Zefiro is not a bad choice either.



Deadeye Reloaded said:


> Austerity is no more used in Germany when it comes to infrastructure. The government is investing many billions in rail and road to regain Germany´s leading position as Europe´s country with the most modern infrastructure. :cheers:
> I will search for some numbers and post it later. Prepare to be astonished! :shocked:


Train looks better in video tho. Still bad, but better than pictures.

Without % of GDP numbers this statement is irrelevant
http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statis...hp/Government_expenditure_on_economic_affairs










Check transport


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## SamuraiBlue (Apr 2, 2010)

Shenkey said:


> You don't need low pressure. You can have half a bar and together with artificial wind would easily suffice.


Half a bar *IS LOW PRESSURE* Dud.


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## dimlys1994 (Dec 19, 2010)

From Railway Gazette:



> http://www.railwaygazette.com/news/...t-leipzig-opening-will-cut-journey-times.html
> 
> *Erfurt – Leipzig opening will cut journey times*
> 09 Dec 2015
> ...


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## Deadeye Reloaded (Apr 25, 2006)

^^
And TIME has chosen Merkel as person of the year today. :yes:

So this new high speed line was opened by the Chancellor of the Free World! :master:


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## Shenkey (Mar 19, 2009)

SamuraiBlue said:


> Half a bar *IS LOW PRESSURE* Dud.


We physicists say low pressure when it is 1 Pascal or less

At that you still do not need Copper bindings between 2 tubes as rubber deforms way too much when you go really low.


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## SamuraiBlue (Apr 2, 2010)

Shenkey said:


> We physicists say low pressure when it is 1 Pascal or less


Physicists don't use arbitrary terms such as "Low Pressure" to define a state.:lol:


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## suasion (Sep 7, 2015)

I'm a physicist, low pressure has no value, it would just imply the pressure is lower.


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## Shenkey (Mar 19, 2009)

:rofl:

Anyway, half a bar is not really low and even getting it to 0.8 Bar, would greatly increase the attained speed with the same energy consumed, which is the whole point.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

hans280 said:


> I am sure Germany can learn a lot from Japan. I myself am a bit tired of hearing German apologists explain that with the dense population in Germany a true high-speed concept is not feasible. In these situations I catch myself thinking "what about Japan, which has a much denser population?".


Yeah, stations are quite close to one another in the densest parts of Japan. There's only ~180 km between Tokyo and Shizuoka, yet there's 6 stations. Some are 40–50km apart. However, most trains rarely stop between these locations:









Keep in mind that the Tokaido line is the World's original HSR line ( intended for maximum 210 km/h ) and currently limited to 285 km/h due to a 2500m curve radius (and tunnel boom)... which would have influenced how many stations were built. Newer lines have a lot fewer stations and rely on regular trains to feed HSR.



> But there is one important difference. The Japanese HS "network" is basically one long string branching out in two directions from Tokyo. (The one exception is the tracks via Takasaki.)


The train to Niigata was actually a Pork-barrel politics mistake. That line would not have been built were it not for the PM at that time being from that area. And even still, those trains go to Tokyo. They will eventually be a 3rd route between Tokyo and Osaka through Kanazawa.



> In my opinion that makes it a lot easier to run trains stopping at every second or every third station, for a couple of reasons: (1) a very large proportion of the passengers come from, or travel to, the enormous Tokyo agglomeration so a top priority is to maximise travel speeds on a point-to-point basis between various cities and Tokyo;


Almost. There are essentially two major population centres. Kanto (Tokyo) and Kansai (Osaka). North and East Japan identifies and connects with Tokyo. West and Kyushu are more connected with Osaka. Still, though you're right. It's essentially one line into either Osaka or Tokyo. Saying that, All trains North of Tokyo require a transfer to get to anywhere West. The lines are in the same station but not physically connected. So, you can't actually get on a train in Hakodate, Hokkaido and end up in Kagoshima, Kyushu... it would require ( at minimum ) 2 transfers. It would also be 2200 km! Think Berlin to Madrid, with a transfer in Belgium and southern France (Brussels and Bordeaux?). 

Very few Japanese will take a train like that for 13 hours and I suspect very few Europeans make this journey as well. They will fly. 


> and (2) the Japanese passengers are far more likely to need only one train (here I guess. I haven't seen statistics, but it seems highly probably given the shape of the country) than in Germany where long-distance travel very often means than one has to change.


Well, it depends on where one wants to go, to be honest. Japanese are used to transferring because a major disadvantage... before the Shinkansen, most of Japan used narrow gauge rail. So, the high speed rail lines are completely in their own ROW, not shared with regular rail and have NO crossings. 

Transfers are made as painless as possible due to accurate timetables and an integrated fare gate system across the country.

Also, people in the smaller cities will get on an all-stops train and in many cases transfer to a faster train when they get to a major city.

The line between Berlin and Frankfurt is interesting to me. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's a pretty important link, connecting the Political capital to the Financial capital. It's between 550–600km which is a little longer than the Tokaido line in Japan ( ~510 km ) between its capital (Tokyo) and Osaka (the 2nd largest city in Japan).

According to a quick search on Google, the Berlin-Frankfurt line take 3h40min and only makes two stops. 

The Tokyo – Osaka line has a max speed of 285km/h, makes 4 stops ( Shinagawa, Yokohama, Nagoya and Kyoto ) and does this run as fast as 2:22. 

Although I realize Frankfurt is further away, that train which left Tokyo will be in Hiroshima ( 900 km away from Tokyo ) in 4 hours. This is all with a max speed of 285km/h along most of the line, and 300km west of Osaka. *I'm not sure why the ICE can't seem to come remotely close to these kinds of times. It seems like it should be able to easily break the 3hr mark (and I apologize if I'm wrong on this time).* I know the Japanese trains along the Tokaido are some of the fastest accelerating trains in the world, but still that's a big gap. 

Don't get me wrong, I think it's a great network in Germany that's slowly but surely building up, but it seems very piecemeal and lacking focus. One clear link that's missing is Berlin-Munich. Perfect distance for a line and it would complete the HSR loop around Germany. It seems that there just isn't the stomach to connect large cities together. I would assume a considerable number of people just fly when when they want to travel any longer than about 4 hours.

Then again, I'm not completely familiar with the travel patterns inside Germany either.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

Don't forget one thing: Germany in its present form has only existed for about 25 years. building a world class high speed railway network takes longer than that. That Germany suffers from powerfully nimbyism doesn't help...


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

hans280 said:


> ^^What is the distance between Hamburg and Munich? French SNCF manages the 730 km between Paris and Marseille in (just over) 3 hours.


How many stops is that French train making?

It sounds like approximately the same distance as Tokyo-Okayama which does the 730km run in 3h17–3h25 (7 stops)


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## bifhihher (Apr 1, 2015)

^^

None and the time is 3:05 minutes. (direct train)

The distance also seems a bit different, I get 790km between both stations by car...


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## Rohne (Feb 20, 2007)

goschio said:


> Currently the fasted between Frankfurt and Munich is 3:10h with one stop in Nuremberg (metro 3.5 million/ city 500,000 population).
> 
> Without that one stop you could probably save another 10 to 15 minutes?
> 
> ...


You took a very bad example with Frankfurt - Nürnberg - München. More than 3 hours for a distance of less than 400km is not competitive at all, not even compared to the car. It would be a different story, if travel time was reduced to 2:30 at max. You could easily achieve this via Stuttgart as well as via Nürnberg just by closing the gaps in the HSR network - and don't even need to skip a single stop compared to today. But then again you have Metropolises like Mannheim, Darmstadt, Aschaffenburg and even Günzburg, whose mayors want every single HSR trains to stop in their towns, considerably slowing down the planning processes first and achievable time savings once the lines are completed.


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## suasion (Sep 7, 2015)

> But then again you have Metropolises like Mannheim, Darmstadt, Aschaffenburg and even Günzburg, whose mayors want every single HSR trains to stop in their towns,


It would be very remiss of mayors in such cities not to canvass for every transport connection they can. I'm not saying their demands should be met but wouldm't you want your mayor to do the same. If your town get skipped that is a very real loss of service unless the skipping trains are additional services


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## chornedsnorkack (Mar 13, 2009)

K_ said:


> Don't forget one thing: Germany in its present form has only existed for about 25 years. building a world class high speed railway network takes longer than that. That Germany suffers from powerfully nimbyism doesn't help...


25 years before opening of Tokaido Shinkansen was 1939.


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

chornedsnorkack said:


> 25 years before opening of Tokaido Shinkansen was 1939.


And your point is?


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## K_ (Jan 5, 2010)

Rohne said:


> You took a very bad example with Frankfurt - Nürnberg - München. More than 3 hours for a distance of less than 400km is not competitive at all, not even compared to the car. It would be a different story, if travel time was reduced to 2:30 at max. You could easily achieve this via Stuttgart as well as via Nürnberg just by closing the gaps in the HSR network - and don't even need to skip a single stop compared to today.


Closing the gaps is an on-going process. But Germany has powerfull oposition to deal with. Remember Stuttgart?



> But then again you have Metropolises like Mannheim, Darmstadt, Aschaffenburg and even Günzburg, whose mayors want every single HSR trains to stop in their towns, considerably slowing down the planning processes first and achievable time savings once the lines are completed.


The thing is: Is there enough demand to fill trains that run non stop, and are therefore a bit faster? I have the impression that where there is DB does run such trains (the ICE Sprinters). 
One of the reasons why the trains form Frankfurt to Munich make these stops is that there is a big market for transport from places in between to Franfurt and Munich, and I wouldn't be surprised if it was even a bigger market than the Frankfurt to Munich market. One thing I always notice in Germany is how at every stop easily about a third of the passengers get off (and others get on). 
So you need a mix of trains, like they do in Japan, but think for a moment. Suppose there was only enough market for one train on hour on Tokyo - Osaka. Would you run a Nozomi? Or a Kodama ...

You also need to keep the network in mind. Otherwhise you end up like France where only train travel to/from Paris is getting better.


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

bifhihher said:


> ^^
> 
> None and the time is 3:05 minutes. (direct train)
> 
> The distance also seems a bit different, I get 790km between both stations by car...


790km between Paris and Marseille or between Tokyo and Okayama?

I get about 770km from station to station (by car) in France, but I'm not sure if the roads are longer or shorter. 

I wonder what a non-stop train could do between Tokyo and Okayama could do (or between Tokyo and Osaka for that matter). 7 minutes stopped at the station comes right off. 

Due to the N700s Shinkansen's faster acceleration, slowing stops make less of an impact but I remember about 5 minutes each side of a station when riding from Osaka to Kyushu.

I suppose there's not much point to a direct train as trains are required to slow down when entering busy the urban areas of Tokyo–Yokohama, Nagoya, Kyoto–Osaka to something around 100km/h due to noise laws. 

I don't know if similar restrictions are placed on the TGV line though.


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## bifhihher (Apr 1, 2015)

790 from Paris to Marseille;
In France trains don't have to slow down for noise because the through stations are build just outside the city.
Some Eurostars fly through Lille a couple of meters from the platform.

Germany should have done the same, keep the stations in the city center (for high-speed trains stopping in the city) and build a station right outside of the city where the train can fly through.

France is updating it's railway to make Paris a little less central, the connection Bordeaux - Montpellier is being build


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## bifhihher (Apr 1, 2015)

Double post, please delete


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## kato2k8 (May 4, 2008)

goschio said:


> All the major German cities (Hamburg, Berlin, Frankfurt, Cologne/Dusseldorf, Munich, Stuttgart) are growing.


5-15% in 18 (!) years aren't really growth, that _is_ barely keeping up the population on an annual basis.



hans280 said:


> I haven't seen statistics, but it seems highly probably given the shape of the country) than in Germany where long-distance travel very often means than one has to change.


The system realistically is built in such a way that one has to change long-distance trains at most once (plus from feeder traffic at either end of course).



Rohne said:


> But then again you have Metropolises like Mannheim, Darmstadt, Aschaffenburg and even Günzburg


At least one bad example in there. Because DB shapes its entire nationwide timetable around only two hubs in Germany. Cologne and Mannheim. That's due to these two being the branch points for the main HSR connection.

Darmstadt has a grand total of six ICE trains stopping there per day, two thirds of which are of the sprinter variety that connects urban regions by making typically three closely-spaced stops at either end of the line and not stopping inbetween (for Darmstadt: daily Rhein-Main / Berlin and Rhein-Main / Hamburg sprinters).


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## bluemeansgo (Oct 28, 2008)

bifhihher said:


> 790 from Paris to Marseille;
> In France trains don't have to slow down for noise because the through stations are build just outside the city.
> Some Eurostars fly through Lille a couple of meters from the platform.


Yeah Japan is similar but it's more built up in general. 

Slowing down is partly noise (there are strict noise pollution laws) and partly the product of it being a major metropolitan centre. Many stations are not built downtown but it is still entering an urban area which is a planned stop anyhow. 

Note that trains are not limited between major cities just in them, which ends up not being a big deal as trains would make the these stops anyhow. It doesn't make sense to bypass large population centres without stopping as that's where the people want to go. Greater Osaka is around 16 million ppl. No surprise that there are three stops every train makes: Kyoto, Kobe, and Osaka. Greater Nagoya is the smallest around 11 million, a little smaller than Greater Paris. 

In addition, travel from Tokyo past Osaka is more rare. Essentially the Japanese system is like taking Paris, Germany and England, adding a few more 1million+ cities to fill the gaps in and stringing a train line between them.

And it's 80% mountains. Different problems than France which really has 2 or maybe 3 major population centres separated by countryside. 

Also the noise laws are much stricter in Japan in general. 



> Germany should have done the same, keep the stations in the city center (for high-speed trains stopping in the city) and build a station right outside of the city where the train can fly through.


I think Germany has more large cities though. 4 cities over 1 million people. I think this image illustrates it well. 









It's easy to bypass small provincial French towns on your way to large population centres when those centres are essentially countryside towns. I think that fits into the HSR model nicely. Japan seems to be a better model for Germany than France. Densely packed distributed population centres. Germany just needs to invest in faster accelerating trains, make most of the trains direct between these cities and focus on keeping trains running at higher speeds. A trains between Paris and Birmingham wouldn't avoid London and likewise it doesn't make sense for German trains to avoid many of these cities. They're all bigger than Marseille, for example. 

It's a shame Germany never could get its Maglev off the ground there. It would seem that given the distances between cities it would offer Germany a great system.


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## goschio (Dec 2, 2002)

bluemeansgo said:


> It's a shame Germany never could get its Maglev off the ground there. It would seem that given the distances between cities it would offer Germany a great system.


Yes, that would have been an awesome system. Unfortunately, that train has left the station. 

Since Germany doesn't really plan to upgrade its high-speed rail network to 300km/h throughout, the next step in about 20 to 30 years could be the hyper-loop. Who knows. Another competition could be dedicated high speed roads for automated electric cars.


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## chornedsnorkack (Mar 13, 2009)

bluemeansgo said:


> Yeah Japan is similar but it's more built up in general.
> 
> Note that trains are not limited between major cities just in them, which ends up not being a big deal as trains would make the these stops anyhow. It doesn't make sense to bypass large population centres without stopping as that's where the people want to go. Greater Osaka is around 16 million ppl. No surprise that there are three stops every train makes: Kyoto, Kobe, and Osaka. Greater Nagoya is the smallest around 11 million, a little smaller than Greater Paris.
> 
> ...


That´s about Tokaido/Sanyo Shinkansen, though. Northern Japan is densely settled, but not so densely.
Tohoku/Hokkaido Shinkansen is 824 km. With 6 stops that all trains make: Tokyo, Omiya, Sendai, Morioka, Shin-Aomori, Shin-Hakodata.


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## erbse (Nov 8, 2006)

Sunfuns said:


> It does work in France though and Germany is more wealthy.


Germany is much more federalised and de-centralised compared to France though. It's more densely populated and has a bunch more agglomerations and pop centers.
It also isn't as easy as in Japan, where all the trains just need to go up and down the coastline. Germany is much more intertwined and needs a spider net of trains to work, that's the challenge.


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## Rohne (Feb 20, 2007)

kato2k8 said:


> At least one bad example in there. Because DB shapes its entire nationwide timetable around only two hubs in Germany. Cologne and Mannheim. That's due to these two being the branch points for the main HSR connection.
> 
> Darmstadt has a grand total of six ICE trains stopping there per day, two thirds of which are of the sprinter variety that connects urban regions by making typically three closely-spaced stops at either end of the line and not stopping inbetween (for Darmstadt: daily Rhein-Main / Berlin and Rhein-Main / Hamburg sprinters).


You can expect so many trains between Frankfurt and Mannheim once the HSL is built (but it's especially Darmstadt and Mannheim with their 100% demands why there's no progress since more than a decade now), there wouldn't be any lack in connectivity by skipping Mannheim with some of these trains. Most other trains would still stop there for O&D traffic and connections. But less than 1hr travel time between Frankfurt Hbf and Stuttgart is only possible when you don't have to stop in Mannheim. And now Mannheim's Mayor gets scared because he forgot about the freight trains that will all run through his town if no bypass is built :bash:
And Darmstadt, those out-of-regular-interval trains don't really count. They should concentrate on keeping their hourly ICs and improving fast regional connections to Mannheim, Frankfurt, Wiesbaden and Frankfurt Flughafen. And maybe some of these kind of "regional ICEs" stopping everywhere between Köln and Frankfurt can be extended to Darmstadt. But there's no reason for any single long distance ICE which doesn't end in Rhein-Main to stop in Darmstadt, just 20km south of Frankfurt. Those trains wouldn't even reach the maximum speed allowed before having to break again. Using high speed trains for this is just absurdity and wasting potential.

Don't underestimate the potential for those few-stop-trains. Very most passengers are not entering or leaving trains in Ulm or Ingolstadt, but in Frankfurt, München or Hamburg. Travel times that are competitive to flights are possible, and the passenger potential is huge (you could easily fill hourly sprinter trains only stopping in Düsseldorf, Köln, Frankfurt, Stuttgart and München just from the current airline passengers on this corridor) - not even thinking about 'induced traffic' and the potential from getting former car travellers to travel by train.


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## 00Zy99 (Mar 4, 2013)

goschio said:


> Yes, that would have been an awesome system. Unfortunately, that train has left the station.
> 
> Since Germany doesn't really plan to upgrade its high-speed rail network to 300km/h throughout, the next step in about 20 to 30 years could be the hyper-loop. Who knows. Another competition could be dedicated high speed roads for automated electric cars.


Hahaha. Ah, yeah.

As multiple other posters have noted, Hyperloop is nothing but snake oil (a complete fraud). There are so many problems at the technical, economic, and conceptual levels that its just laughable. And "high speed roads" would never have enough capacity for the land they would require-besides they already exist in the form of the Autobahn.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

> 5-15% in 18 (!) years aren't really growth, that is barely keeping up the population on an annual basis.


Where are you getting the figure from? Goscho is right that most German cities are growing.


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## JumpUp (Aug 28, 2010)

*Section 2: New High-Speed Rail Gelnhausen - Fulda*

Because the old tracks are very curvy in that section, one needs new High-Speed Rail from Gelnhausen to Fulda. In the last 5 years there have been many, many discussions about what's the best way to built them.

There are been ca. 12 alternative routings (some more north, some more south, some with more tunnels, some along the motorway etc. etc.).
This summer, the final route has been choosen, Route No. 4 looking like this:
(Orange: Bridge / Blue: Tunnel / Green: open countryside)



- 44 km of new 250-300 km/h High-Speed-Rail
- ca. 10 minutes time saving (compared to today)
- most of it is on a bridge or in a tunnel
- building might start within the next 7-10 years (hopefully, not date is yet given)
- at "Mittelkalbach" the new High-Speed Rail will join the Würzburg - Hannover High-Speed-Rail (it's in service since the 1990s)


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## JumpUp (Aug 28, 2010)

If you have questions, feel free to ask.
I will continue this series with more infrastructure projects very soon!


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Here is some very nice footage (incl. construction timelapses) of the high speed section of VDE 8 (a.k.a. HSL Berlin- Munich):


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

Talgo trains for DB
https://www.cnmv.es/Portal/hr/ResultadoBusquedaHR.aspx?nif=a84453075&division=1&lang=en&ihr=2



> The national railway operator Deutsche Bahn has signed a framework agreement for the manufacturing of up to 100 Talgo 230 trainsets and signs an order of 23 trainsets for a total consideration amounting approximately 550 million euros.
> 
> On February 5 th, 2019 Deutsche Bahn, German national operator has signed a framework agreement to manufacture up to 100 Talgo 230 trainsets or a maximum speed of 230 km/h including traction system.
> 
> ...


The Talgo 230 does not exist yet, I imagine it will be a variant on the Talgo 250 (S-130 S-730 and Afrosiyob in Uzbekistan) with traction equipment that will not be Bombardier, but IngeTeam like the Avril por the Afrosiyob; although being for Germany it could vary.


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## Momo1435 (Oct 3, 2005)

They will use the trains on national and internationale long distance ICs. Berlin–Amsterdam, Köln–Westerland (Sylt) and Hamburg–Oberstdorf are named by the DB in their press release (in German):

https://www.deutschebahn.com/de/pre...züge-beim-spanischen-Hersteller-Talgo-3763624


So they will be used on services for which they initially ordered the ICE4. That train has become more and more an ICE1 replacement, so they did need more new trains for these IC services. Siemens won't be too happy that they didn't simply order more ICE4s.

I wonder if these new DB trains will get a typical Talgo Duck Nose.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Gusiluz said:


> Talgo trains for DB
> https://www.cnmv.es/Portal/hr/ResultadoBusquedaHR.aspx?nif=a84453075&division=1&lang=en&ihr=2
> 
> 
> ...


Germany and the Netherlands have different voltage on their nets. At present, locomotives are changed for the Berlin-Amsterdam train at the border, taking up about 12 minutes, if there are no complications, at a stop that otherwise might not even warrant a stop at all. So will the Talgos be adapted for two separate voltage systems? Or will Talgo 230 come with separable locomotives, like a RailJet? 
Also, I hope they take the opportunity to step up the speed of Berlin-Amsterdam connections. At present, the overall traveling time of 6 1/2 hours for 700 km distance is quite miserable. This is due not so much to the fact that present trains are only capable of 200 kmh on the Berlin-Hannover HSL, but rather to the train's constant stopping everywhere. On the German side it is still reasonable, something like a former InterRegio (which the train used to be classed as) or RegionalExpress, but on the Dutch side, it stops pretty much every 15 km in various mid-size towns, which seem to have frequent connections anyways.


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## Stuu (Feb 7, 2007)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Germany and the Netherlands have different voltage on their nets. At present, locomotives are changed for the Berlin-Amsterdam train at the border, taking up about 12 minutes, if there are no complications, at a stop that otherwise might not even warrant a stop at all.


Why do they still need to do that? Both Germany and the Netherlands have multi-voltage locomotives


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Probably not enough? This service has definitely been neglected in recent years. I suppose the new service will be the opportunity to revamp this line. Berlin-Hanover-North Rhine Westphalia services will be revamped and slightly rescheduled as of 2023 anyways, so we can hope that this opens windows for an improved Berlin-Hanover-Amsterdam service as well. Problem is that most of the route used on both sides of the border are rather tight with local traffic, so any change will effect if not take away slots for frequently stopping trains.


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## wbrm (Sep 9, 2008)

Stuu said:


> Why do they still need to do that? Both Germany and the Netherlands have multi-voltage locomotives


I suppose because Dutch Railways don't have 200km/h locomotives (yet). DB Fernverkehr doesn't have multisystem locomotives.


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

^^ https://railcolornews.com/2019/02/05/de-deutsch-bahn-to-ordwer-23-talgo-passenger-trains/
Deutsche Bahn tenders for loco-hauled long distance passenger trains Written by Railcolor Headquarters on 03.03.2017 
And:
Deutsche Bahn to order 23 Talgo passenger trains Written by Railcolor Headquarters on 05.02.2019


> Originally, in 2011, DB wanted to order both multi-system and AC voltage ICE4 trains, so they could be deployed in Germany, Switzerland, Austria and in DC voltage countries such as the Netherlands. But these plans have changed over time.
> Now DB has released a new tender for a framework agreement for newly built “Zugverbänden (Lokomotiven und Wagenzüge)”: train compositions (locomotives and loco-hauled rakes for passenger services).
> They should have production capacity for at least twenty trains per year, starting in 2021. One composition should have at least 485 seats.
> ...
> ...


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## MrAronymous (Aug 7, 2011)

^ The trains:






some more info


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## Momo1435 (Oct 3, 2005)

DB Press release on the new Talgo ECx trains.

https://www.deutschebahn.com/de/presse/suche_Medienpakete/medienpaket_ECx-3932956


The trains will consist of a multi-system locomotive and a set of 17 Talgo carriages. It will have 570 seats, 85 1st class and 485 2nd class. Max speed = 230 km/h. The whole train will be barrier free, perfect for people with a disability. With a floor height of 760mm, there will be a level entrance from the standard platforms with the same height. The trains will have a bordbistro with a lounge area. 




















There are more images in the press release.


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## TedStriker (May 18, 2009)

^^

Does anyone think it possible that the electric locomotives chosen will feature a small diesel engine to enable them to haul trains to and from Westerland and Oberstdorf?


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## da_scotty (Nov 4, 2008)

Doesn't look very "high speed".


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## Momo1435 (Oct 3, 2005)

TedStriker said:


> ^^
> 
> Does anyone think it possible that the electric locomotives chosen will feature a small diesel engine to enable them to haul trains to and from Westerland and Oberstdorf?


I don't think that a small last-mile diesel engine will be powerful enough to drive and power such a train. As this trains will have standard couplers it's more likely that a diesel loco will haul/push the trainsets on the non electrified sections.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

The only thing that can be small is the tank, otherwise you need a pretty large diesel engine which also becomes a hazard on itself.

Pitiful "solution" by DB. Why have they abandoned the ICx project? It was already something watered down with the 249km/h speed limit, now it is down to 230...

Meanwhile in Italy there is serious conversations or running services at 360km/h on regularly scheduled routes.


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## wbrm (Sep 9, 2008)

The ICx/ICE4 intended for cross border service into the Netherlands (short version and multisystem) would only have been 230km/h. The ICx project was heavily revised. Now all the ICE4 will be monosystem with depending on the length a max speed of 230km/h (7 coaches), 250km/h (12 coaches) and 265 km/h (13 coaches).
For me the Talgo design is superior over the 230km/h ICE4 design given the step free acces at each door en no steep inclines/steps inside the train. It will be interesting to compare this Talgo design to the yet to be introduced new generation of Austrian ÖBB Railjet from Siemens.


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## Suburbanist (Dec 25, 2009)

So aren't there any long-term plans to replace the ICE3 international trains that can run on Dutch railways? This would mean, in the long term, slower travel between Amsterdam and Frankfurt as they would not reach max speed between Köln and Frankfurt airport.


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## wbrm (Sep 9, 2008)

The ICE3 trains are fairly recent and here to stay, albeit modernised. In the coming years replacement of ICE2, ICE T and single deck IC stock will start with IC2 (already underway), ICE4 (already underway) and the new Talgo trains. ICE1 will be modernised (again).


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## da_scotty (Nov 4, 2008)

Suburbanist said:


> So aren't there any long-term plans to replace the ICE3 international trains that can run on Dutch railways? This would mean, in the long term, slower travel between Amsterdam and Frankfurt as they would not reach max speed between Köln and Frankfurt airport.


I think the main speed-problem is in the Amsterdam-Dusseldorf section and not in Germany.


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

TedStriker said:


> Does anyone think it possible that the electric locomotives chosen will feature a small diesel engine to enable them to haul trains to and from Westerland and Oberstdorf?


The multi-system locomotive (suitable for 25 kV 50 Hz; 15 kV 16·7 Hz and 3 kV DC operation) will be changed for another diesel locomotive in those routes.









Locomotive TRAV-CA L-9202 (2005) Talgo electric prototype for variable gauge, precursor of the Renfe 130 series:


DB says in the press release that in the next tenders the LD trains must have the doors and all the floor at the level of the platform.


> Der Zug ist stufenlos, das heißt der Einstieg befindet sich auf Bahnsteighöhe. Rollstuhlfahrern ist es so möglich, selbständig ein- und auszusteigen. Aber auch Reisenden mit Gepäck oder Familien mit Kinderwagen wird der Einstieg erleichtert. Dies ist auch der Beginn eines neuen Standards: Zukünftig werden alle neuen Fahrzeugausschreibungen im Fernverkehr die besonders kundenfreundlichen Einstiege aufweisen.
> 
> Aufgrund des Niederflurkonzeptes von Talgo sind fast alle Sitzplätze im Zug ebenfalls stufenlos erreichbar. Nur wenige Sitzplätze am Ende des Zuges sind über Stufen zugänglich.
> 
> ...












This will leave the HST fleet in 2025:


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## wbrm (Sep 9, 2008)

Gusiluz said:


> The multi-system locomotive (suitable for 25 kV 50 Hz; 15 kV 16·7 Hz and 3 kV DC operation)...


That's probably an error because the Netherlands where this locomotive will also operate (route of introduction will be Berlin - Amsterdam) has 1,5kV DC.


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

https://www.railwaygazette.com/news...ew/view/db-unveils-details-of-ecx-talgos.html


> Described as a mix blending features from ICE and IC trains, each ECx set of 17 Talgo cars including a driving trailer will be matched with a four-axle multi-system locomotive suitable for 25 kV 50 Hz; 15 kV 16·7 Hz and 3 kV DC operation. Total weight of the 230 km/h trainset is put at around 425 tonnes. According to Huber, the Talgo 230 trainsets would also be able to operate with diesel locomotives.


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## da_scotty (Nov 4, 2008)

Maybe they are compatible with the presumed dutch vectron order?


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

In that case the Netherlands needs to hurry up with their intended switch to 3 kV DC, otherwise the Berlin to Amsterdam ECx will not even make it to the border (voltage switch at Bad Bentheim)...
But in reality, from a technical standpoint most equipment designed for 3 kV DC would run at 1.5 kV DC just fine. In fact most Belgian equipment can run into the Netherlands just fine. That is, AFAIK, except for some newer equipment, which is computer controlled and not programmed to handle voltages under 2 kV (the lower voltage limit according to EN 50163).


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## wbrm (Sep 9, 2008)

da_scotty said:


> Maybe they are compatible with the presumed dutch vectron order?


That would be very suprising given the fact that (1) DB already communicates about not changing locomotives at the border and (2) with using NS Vectrons all the way DB wouldn't need that much Talgo locomotives and (3) the 230km/h capability is not yet on the market for Vectron, which is an improvement this Talgo stock (+ Talgo locomotive) can offer over the current stock. Besides they need to homologate the Talgo locomotive anyway for the German domestic services, just adding the Netherlands makes sense. 
So an error I would say.


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

*ICE passengers*

 

Source


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## Are Solars (Mar 29, 2019)

@Gusiluz: Passengers.km are billion, not million.

From the source:

Passengers ICE (million): 93.9
Volume sold ICE (million pkm): 31,066

And thank you for the data and the source link.


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

^^ Yes, already. Thank you!

It is that the table is written in Spanish (Año, Alemania): the decimal separator and the point have the opposite meaning


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

According to DB's annual summary, the 13 ICE TD trains that were still making charter and substitutions (20 entered service between 2001 and 2003) have been removed from service last year.


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## Nexis (Aug 7, 2007)




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## TER200 (Jan 27, 2019)

DB prepares a tender for 90 (up from the 30announced 2 weeks ago) high-speed trains, which they want tu put in service as soon as December 2022 :
https://railcolornews.com/2019/10/02/de-db-fernverkehr-starts-tender-for-up-to-90-high-speed-trains/
original _indicative notice _in german : https://ted.europa.eu/TED/notice/ud...ted+Services&WT.rss_a=453090-2019&WT.rss_ev=a

Requirements are :
200 long, the possibility of coupling with the existing BR407 Velaro D is desired.
300 or 320 km/h
Ability to operate in the Netherlands, Belgium, and France is also desired.

Basically, it seems they want 90 new BR407 on top of the existing 17 ^^.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

TER200 said:


> Basically, it seems they want 90 new BR407 on top of the existing 17 ^^.


How about the Velaro Novo instead? Yes, it's a new model again, but if it's as much an improvement as Siemens claims, why not?


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Velaro Novo will not be ready in time for this tender. It might be a shame that this opportunity is wasted.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

While I was bored, I was looking for a map with all currently planned or u/c railway projects in Germany. I didn't find one as the one realeased with BVWP 2030 isn't up to date anymore since the it was decided to introduce the Deutschlandtakt clockface timetable. I then decided to create a map as best as I could myself. This map is not complete and also probably not 100% accurate but it might give you a decent overview. 


This includes all larger projects currently planned, u/c and necessary for Deutschlandtakt. Several smaller projects are missing.
PDF: 
Datei von filehorst.de laden

Legend:


Of course, given German glacial planning and construction speed, we'll be _extremely _lucky to see this by 2050+++ but fingers crossed. It's still nowhere great but if everything was built, I'd give it a passing grade.

Because I was still bored, I made a fantasy map of a much more rail-oriented Germany with a HS-network worth the name.


PDF:
Datei von filehorst.de laden


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

*DB Facts and figures 2019*

The total *fleet *is 289 HST (+15):

58 ICE 1 (-1) Which train?
44 ICE 2
67 ICE T
79 ICE 3 / Velaro D
41 ICE 4 (+16)

*Passengers on ICE trains* running on any line, not to be confused with HSR passengers:

*Year / million pkm / % / Passengers (million) / %*

1991 / 2,040 / — / 5.900 / —

1992 / 5,200 / 154,9 % / 15.300 / 159,3 %

1993 / 7,000 / 34,6 % / 16.400 / 7,2 %

1994 / 8,200 / 17,1 % / 20.800 / 26,8 %

1995 / 8,700 / 6,1 % / 24.600 / 18,3 %

1996 / 8,900 / 2,3 % / 27.363 / 11,2 %

1997 / 9,300 / 4,5 % / 28.300 / 3,4 %

1998 / 10,200 / 9,7 % / 31.400 / 11,0 %

1999 / 11,590 / 13,6 % / 35.640 / 13,5 %

2000 / 13,900 / 19,9 % / 41.610 / 16,8 %

2001 / 15,500 / 11,5 % / 46.700 / 12,2 %

2002 / 15,300 / -1,3 % / 47.600 / 1,9 %

2003 / 17,500 / 14,4 % / 56.500 / 18,7 %

2004 / 19,604 / 12,0 % / 63.704 / 12,8 %

2005 / 20,850 / 6,4 % / 66.800 / 4,9 %

2006 / 21,600 / 3,6 % / 66.900 / 0,1 %

2007 / 21,919 / 1,5 % / 70.531 / 5,4 %

2008 / 23,333 / 6,5 % / 74.700 / 5,9 %

2009 / 22,561 / -3,3 % / 73.200 / -2,0 %

2010 / 23,903 / 5,9 % / 77.800 / 6,3 %

2011 / 23,306 / -2,5 % / 76.100 / -2,2 %

2012 / 24,753 / 6,2 % / 76.600 / 0,7 %

2013 / 25,178 / 1,7 % / 78.800 / 2,9 %

2014 / 24,316 / -3,4 % / 78.000 / -1,0 %

2015 / 25,280 / 4,0 % / 79.500 / 1,9 %

2016 / 27,213 / 7,6 % / 83.400 / 4,9 %

2017 / 28,502 / 4,7 % / 86.700 / 4,0 %

2018 / 31,066 / 9,0 % / 93.900 / 8,3 %

2019 / 33,205 / 6,9 % / 99.200 / 5,6 %


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## TER200 (Jan 27, 2019)

TER200 said:


> DB prepares a tender for 90 (up from the 30 announced 2 weeks ago) high-speed trains, which they want to put in service as soon as December 2022 :
> https://railcolornews.com/2019/10/02/de-db-fernverkehr-starts-tender-for-up-to-90-high-speed-trains/
> original _indicative notice _in german : Supplies - 453090-2019 - TED Tenders Electronic Daily
> 
> ...





Baron Hirsch said:


> Velaro Novo will not be ready in time for this tender. It might be a shame that this opportunity is wasted.


You were right. DB ordered Siemens 30 new trainsets similar to the existing BR407 :








DB expands ICE fleet with 30 additional Siemens Velaro trains


DB has announced an order worth €1bn for a further 30 Siemens Velaro ICE3 trains for delivery between December 2022 and 2026




www.railjournal.com












[DE / Expert] Playing it safe: DB orders updated Velaro D HST to ensure rapid delivery


The final design will be available this Autumn – but today we already got a glimpse of the next series of high-speed trains for Germany (and beyond). Look’s familiar don’t you thi…




railcolornews.com


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

I can't find anything on the new trains being 4 system like the BR407 or just 15 kV only? The articles only mentions they are intended for domestic use, but also "Expanding the Velaro fleet will also enable DB to increase use on services to Paris and Brussels". Are there enough existing ICE3M sets (406/407) enough for this?
The thing is, when you change something to or leave out components it is formally a different train requiring partially new certification and the certification of the BR407 was a nightmare.
And another question: which train control systems did BR407 originally come with (PZB/LZB, KVB/TVM, TBL, ERTMS)? Buying new train without ERTMS would be stupid, because it would preclude use on VDE8.


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

^^ It would be absurd, and maybe even illegal, to buy HSTs without ERTMS:
*In 2021 all ICE 1 ICE T ICE 3 and Velaro with ETCS 2* IRJ

There are 17 ICE 3NG BR407 with ETCS, LZB , PZB , TBL 1 y 2, TVM , ATB and KVB according to Drehscheibe magazine
I bet they're single voltage for Germany


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## krisu99 (May 16, 2008)

Germany has a rather modest HSR-network as we all know. Also, average speed is relatively low because new high speed-sections are mostly somehow patched into the existing slow network.

I would therefore recommend to build new sections only in Iberian broad gauge. By doing so, new alignments have to be found along the entire length between to initial cities like Sewilla in southern bavaria and Mattrit near hamburg. High punctuality levels and high average speeds will be achievable for all cititzens. Over the years, and with the help of 50%-EU funding, all Länder will gain new High Speed connections that are fast, efficient and reliable.
Average speeds of 273km/h between Berlin and Munich are reality now thanks to the obligation to find ways to lay new Iberian gauge tracks.

The old 1435mm network will coexist with the broad gauge network for quite a while. However, due to Corona pandemic and lack of funds, the ambitious initial "Breitspur Hochgeschwindigkeit 2020" Plan can not be reached as planned, and work along several new HSR lines slows dowon or comes to a halt.

Therefore the government Angela Merkel decides to patch the missing Iberian broad gauge section with dual gauge track technology made by Siemens and Vossloh. By doing so, elegantly both classic and broad gauge trains coexist peacefully on the same lines! Genius idea.

However, time and experience tells that double gauge sections cause lots of difficulties with switches, overhead catenary, signalling complexity and maintenance in general.

Therefore, to reduce complexity and successfully further cut costs, classic two-track lines will be converted into two single track lines, one Iberian and one 1435mm. That said, DB never wanted this as this creates horrible bottlenecks reducing significantly capacity and timetable resilience.

However, regional governments and their politicians, especially those of the eastern Länder close to Poland, insisted on the availability of continuous Iberian broad gauge tracks along the "Mittelmur Korridor" (Mediterruneon Corridor), from Görlitz and Bautzen all the way to France in order to foster export of freight by train while meeting green-economy Co2 transition targets. Especially Volkswagen-SEAT intervened at all political levels to promote the dual gauge / dual single track approach "Mittelmur Korridor" in order to profit from exports to Spain and Portugal, without the need of variable gauge freight trains.

In fact, EU has decided that in order to implement fast HSR across Europe without the need of inefficient old Cambiadores De Ancho at the borders -in order to foster economic growth and wealth- the new standard gauge in Europe will be set to 1668mm.

Therefore, in a few years, we can travel for from Porto to Warsaw along new TEN corridor number 729 with an average speed of 281km/h, or from Trapani to Kiruna at 297km/h.


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

I think that Darmstadt will likely be the "Ashford International" of the line - they give them a station to keep quiet but in a few years not much stops there. Still, they will get regular 15 minute trains to the airport long distance station for cross-platform interchange to ICEs, so it is not all bad under this plan.

If you look at the most recent presentation to the stakeholder conference here, Frankfurt Stadion is planned to be relieved by the proposed tunnel. The north side of Stuttgart might also be sped up further (they think 6' is possible). It's also clear from the documents there that designing a train type (ICE4) that goes less than 300 km/h was a mistake, as they don't plan to buy many more. Instead the number of 300 km/h units required has gone up a lot.

Personally I wish Germany would consider its position as the crossroads of Europe a little bit more in the planning of this. For example, they say there will be some short increases in 300 km/h sections between Berlin and NRW, but at the same time they say they have a desire to re-establish a Berlin to Paris service. Likewise the EU desire to link Paris to Budapest - it is no good getting from Paris to the border in under 2 hours when it takes a further 3+ just to reach Munich. NBS limited to 250 km/h isn't going to help and cities like Ulm and Karlsruhe (important though they are at an national level) don't warrant stops on international trains.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Also from page 40: fast turnouts in Mannheim Hbf, for a faster approach there.

On which page did you find the tunnel? I don't see it in the proposed measures in Hessen on page 148.


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

AlbertJP said:


> On which page did you find the tunnel?


146


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

That's about a new tunnel under Frankfurt Hbf. It doesn't say much about Stadion but there is already a separate project website for that: BauInfoPortal

Looks like Frankfurt Hbf - Stadion will get 6-tracked (2 S-bahn, 2 to Airport Fernbf, 2 to the south).


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

It sounds like the old dilemma of German HS trains: almost every train must head to almost every Hbf. Then, those Hbf come close to collapsing under the massive traffic, and again difficult infrastructure improvements in already built-up environments must follow. Frankfurt has a few services already that bypass its Hbf, stopping only at the airport or in Süd, and such patterns make sense for well served cities. 
When the Cologne - Frankfurt HSL opened, the 300,000 inhabitant city of Bonn and the 120,000 inh. city of Koblenz got bypassed and were only compensated by French-style peripheral stations, although naturally there were many protests. Cologne - Frankfurt turned out a huge success. No car can match the speed of the connection and even Bonn residents can still access the line with a 30 minute tram ride into the middle of nowhere. Why must therefore now everything revert to the old way, travelers from Lyon and Amsterdam, who anyways might be tempted to fly instead, detour for an extra 10 minutes via Darmstadt? 
Mannheim, just like Frankfurt, might even profit if the odd ICE or two bypassed this heavily taxed hub.


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Why must therefore now everything revert to the old way, travelers from Lyon and Amsterdam, who anyways might be tempted to fly instead, detour for an extra 10 minutes via Darmstadt?


I agree with most of what you say but this is not correct - most of the traffic will bypass Darmstadt.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Germany is surprisingly rural, unlike in many other countries the vast majority of the population doesn't live in the major cities. So, it's usually a political decision, as the politicians need to make their voters happy. That's why even Cologne-Frankfurt has those stations in Montabaur and Limburg. It's not great but I'm not super mad about it as long as it's still possible for faster services to bypass those stations as it will be in Darmstadt. However, when that escalates to a Mannheim situation, where local politicians block a bypass even for trains that won't call in their station anyway, it's super stupid.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Hi 33, what I meant is: of all the ICE lines, the ICE Frankfurt to Lyon and Basel to Berlin (sorry, not Amsterdam) are foreseen to stop in Darmstadt. I get angry that with countless shorter ICE lines, two of the longest and most likely to have to compete with airlines are the ones chosen to satisfy Darmstadt's desire to connect to the wider world. There are or will be several shorter ICE lines, which terminate in Stuttgart, Freiburg, or Tübingen, where the Darmstadt detour of ten minutes would make more sense, in my humble opinion.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

TM_Germany said:


> Germany is surprisingly rural, unlike in many other countries the vast majority of the population doesn't live in the major cities. So, it's usually a political decision, as the politicians need to make their voters happy. That's why even Cologne-Frankfurt has those stations in Montabaur and Limburg. It's not great but I'm not super mad about it as long as it's still possible for faster services to bypass those stations as it will be in Darmstadt. However, when that escalates to a Mannheim situation, where local politicians block a bypass even for trains that won't call in their station anyway, it's super stupid.


Which countries are you referring to? Urbanization in DE is close to 80% according to Wiki, so I wouldn't call you country "rural". Better term would be decentralization I think.


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

TM_Germany said:


> Germany is surprisingly rural


I wouldn't say rural. it's rather that Germany has a lot of 100,000-500,000 towns.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

According to Statista, only 31% of Germans live in cities of 100,000 or more link, even though there are over 80 of them. Only 10% of the population lives in the four biggest cities with over 1 million population. Most Germans actually live in towns sized 10,000-50,000 people. Of course that is relative as well, as apparently 77% of people do live in metropolitan areas (however ridicilously large they are defined as in Germany).

That's definitely a contrast to many other countries imo. Unlike most other countries, many metropolitan areas are also very polycentric, e.g. FF/Main has at least 8 ICE stops that I can think of at the top of my head.

I guess in other countries you might think of this situation as "suburban" but since they are all historically grown communities with their own identity and center, that doesn't quite fit.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

To me the solution chosen for Darmstadt is quite balanced: minimal so it doesn't cost a fortune (using a good deal of existing tracks), but still functional for a limited traffic.

About HSL/NBS or not, I think it's not wrong in this context, ICE traffic on this segment is dense, a dedicated infra is justified... so, just make it fully independent and thus fast.
Usually I push for upgrades of existing lines before going for a segregated NBS, but in this case upgrading the old lines would give zero advantages (ICEs wouldn't serve those places anyway).
I don't really see a functional ABS solution here. High speed is just a (positive) byproduct of that logic.

I noticed that in the southern approach to Mannheim, the HSL tracks are laid down with an unusually large gap (here), is that space reserved for a possible bypass?
It would be wise if the new line north of the city would include a similar design. After all, when a train leaves Waldhof it's not running at full speed anyway, so no harm in designing the new line as a connecting branch.
Imagine having a continuous Frankfurt - Stuttgart/Karlsruhe HSL, from which you can branch off to Mannheim or to Darmstadt. As I said in the other topic, that's what the Italian Direttissima concept was about, and when traffic is dense it's a good compromise between speed and frequency.

One thing I can't really understand is why the preferred variant must include a rather expensive connection towards Mainz Bischofsheim. That's clearly for freight trains. What is the point in having them on the NBS? There's plenty of space for freight traffic on several other lines there.
They could make better use of that money by upgrading the connecting curve in Gross-Gerau, if anything.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Freight traffic will use the line at night as well. Probably another political compromise to relieve towns of the existing lines of noise during the night.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

Oh nice, another Wiesbaden waste, at least it's cheaper this time  it might just happen to not survive a budget review... 


Are there detailed plans for the upgrade of Stadion?

If only there could be a huge plan to begin a 4 track tunnel in Zeppelinheim...


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

I believe AlbertJP posted the project page above: BauInfoPortal. I wish they'd built a tunnel or otherwise new approach from the south to Hbf, that crawling around is f*ucking infuriating. It takes as long to go from Frankfurt Hbf to Airport as it does to go from Airport to Limburg Süd. But alas, we'll have to be content with a regular four tracking.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

The more I look at the German network, the more it is obvious to me that a Berlin-like city tunnel is necessary in Frankfurt too.










Think to the amount of time the ICE fleet loses by creeping around that node...
That would be a real game changer for the European rail network.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Well, the good news is that that tunnel is planned. The bad news is that afaik the approaches will stay slow.


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## flierfy (Mar 4, 2008)

Wilhem275 said:


> One thing I can't really understand is why the preferred variant must include a rather expensive connection towards Mainz Bischofsheim. That's clearly for freight trains. What is the point in having them on the NBS? There's plenty of space for freight traffic on several other lines there.
> They could make better use of that money by upgrading the connecting curve in Gross-Gerau, if anything.


That's a noise protection measure. Unlike existing lines the new one will by-pass every human settlement along the way. Routing freight trains via the new line at night keeps these noisy trains away from where they currently annoy residents.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

Baron Hirsch said:


> oreseen to stop in Darmstadt. I get angry that with countless shorter ICE lines, two of the longest and most likely to have to compete with airlines are the ones chosen to satisfy Darmstadt's desire to connect to the wider world. There are or will be several shorter ICE lines, which terminate in Stuttgart, Freiburg, or Tübingen, where the Darmstadt detour of ten minutes would make more sense, in my humble opinion.


well, as i told, deutschlandtakt is some political marketing bullshit; DB (or whoever wants to) could -theoretically- run trains just like they want, without regard to political sensitivities unless they change the whole regime. also from the wiesbaden-experience with its singletrack-connection i wouldnt count on too much ICEs taking the darmstadt-detour.
my problem with the darmstadt connection isnt so much about highspeed trains (still its a bottlebeck if you have a delayed train..) but more that it cant be used for freight trains, so lots of them will continue to run on the old line through all the cities at night and also that it is too limited to run some additional regional trains.
if you already have the construction site and spend lots of money there then why not make it really useful future-proof and lay a second track there?

on the other hand i am happy about every city that can be circumnavigated at maximum speed, which is rather the exception in germany:
i added all existing (and future) slow city passages on the central german highspeedlines to the following map in green and in light-blue the creeping exits from the nodes:












TM_Germany said:


> Well, the good news is that that tunnel is planned. The bad news is that afaik the approaches will stay slow.


thats what i was trying to say before. you build a tunnel in the north (frankfurt) and a highspeedline in the south (zeppelinheim-mannheim waldhof) for some billions each but leave out the about 5km inbetween (frankfurt stadion area) where trains will be slowed down to 60 (!) kph in the curves. thats just mad..
also in cologne-area the highspeedline simply stops some 20km or so before the city center/central-station so you waste lots of time creeping there.
same thing in stuttgart between S21 tunnels and the highspeedline to mannheim - and i highly doubt it will be fixed in the next 50 years or so. if they had wanted to do so, they should have extended S21 tunnels and connected them directly to the highspeedline.


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## Natasza K (Aug 22, 2020)

derUlukai said:


> i added all existing (and future) slow city passages on the central german highspeedlines to the following map in green and in light-blue the creeping exits from the nodes:


Not much high speed in the East...


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

All the lines going towards Berlin are in the East, as well as between Leipzig and Dresden. A large part of the line between Dresen and Berlin was also upgraded to 200 km/h this year, which is missing on the map. Aside from that, there just isn't much population there. Aside from maybe an international link with Poland, I don't really see the need for more line there.


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## Natasza K (Aug 22, 2020)

TM_Germany said:


> Aside from maybe an international link with Poland, I don't really see the need for more line there.


Maybe. Still 30 years later differences between western Germany and eastern Germany are big.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

I would actually say that the east has a much better High Speed network than the west. Most cities have better average travel times than cities in the West. Infrastructure in the East is better in general than in the West.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

It is not so much about East or West. It is rather about being "on the grid" of high- to semi-high speed lines or far from them. There are jut some mid-size towns especially near borders, such as Trier, Konstanz, or Chemnitz, which are bypassed by the fast routes by a great distance, plus some very underdeveloped main routes, so that Saarbrücken, Passau, and Dresden do not not have travel times that can compete. The Dtldtakt development plan focuses mainly on improving the core grid, leaving these underdeveloped lines mainly as they are. Dresden, as mentioned above, is in the process of getting serious upgrades towards Berlin and Leipzig and in the long run to Prague as well.
What strikes my eye is that the whole Northwest has no genuine, HSR, only upgraded ca. 200 kmh. One could think that Cologne-Osnabrück-Hamburg might deserve better, especially if it was intelligently hooked up to Copenhagen and beyond.


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## Natasza K (Aug 22, 2020)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Dresden, as mentioned above, is in the process of getting serious upgrades towards Berlin and Leipzig and in the long run to Prague as well.


The connection to Prague is neglected unfortunately. It can be that there is no economic potential. Otherwise I agree that NW Germany is left outside alone as well...


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Yeah, the route from Cologne/Ruhr to Bremen/Hamburg/-(Copenhagen) ist quite a disappointment. Those are the oldest sections of higher speed rail in Germany, running at 200 km/h already in the 70s. Unfortunately it seems like the already existing relative high speed makes an entirely new 300 km/h route improbable. 
A new (way too short) section of 300km/h rail is supposed to be built between Hannover and Bielefeld and I'm still hoping that the voodoo maths of the "alpha-E" solution between Hannover and Hamburg gets replaced by the only sensible solution there, a new 300km/h alignment as well. That way, at least he trips between Hamburg and the Ruhr will be sped up, even if over a different route. Apart from that, there should really be an upgrade to the line between Bad Oeyenhausen and the Dutch border for the traffic between Amsterdam and Berlin, but that flew out of the last demand plan.

Otherwise, the cities you mentioned are just kind of badly placed geographically. No long distance corridors pass through there, however a significant upgrade to their rail lines would be great nonetheless.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Natasza K said:


> The connection to Prague is neglected unfortunately. It can be that there is no economic potential. Otherwise I agree that NW Germany is left outside alone as well...


An entirely new rail line between Dresden and Prague with a long base tunnel under the ore mountains is plannes. However, it will take a long time until it will even start construction.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

TM_Germany said:


> Well, the good news is that that tunnel is planned. The bad news is that afaik the approaches will stay slow.


Is it possible to speed up the approaches by replacing the curves or that be too expensive? From what I read it's still in planning stages.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> Otherwise, the cities you mentioned are just kind of badly placed geographically. No long distance corridors pass through there, however a significant upgrade to their rail lines would be great nonetheless.


"No long-distance corridors?" If you just look at the German map, you might get that impression. However, not if you look at a European map. 

Passau: On Frankfurt-Linz-Vienna route
Trier: On Frankfurt/Cologne-Koblenz-Luxemburg
Konstanz: On Stuttgart-Zürich-Gotthard-Milan
Saarbrücken: On Frankfurt-Paris
Chemnitz: um, well, I am sure you can go to some very pretty places in the Czech mountains from there....

This leads us to another recurrent topic, i.e. Germany's reluctance to develop at least mid-standard access routes to the the heavy infrastructure investments of neighboring countries into Transeuropean networks. Among these the LGV Est, the Brenner Basis Tunnel, Gotthard Basis Tunnel, Westbahn etc. To my recollection, Luxemburg had even offered to upgrade the line through the German side of the Mosel Valley, if DB would commit itself to running regular EC connections in return. However, DB in its short-sightedness struck the deal down.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

LtBk said:


> Is it possible to speed up the approaches by replacing the curves or that be too expensive? From what I read it's still in planning stages.


You'd need at two more tunnels. The entire southern approach would need to be tunneled, as otherwise you'd need to cute through protected forest, some neighbourhoods and need a new bridge. The eastern approach depends on whether the tunnel will end at the line north of the river or south of it. If they use the southern route, they'd need to tunnel under Offenbach. But both of those lines are congested and limited to 160km/h as well.









Definitely more expensive but worthwile imo.


In both cases, the next bottleneck is already coming up in Hanau...


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Baron Hirsch said:


> "No long-distance corridors?" If you just look at the German map, you might get that impression. However, not if you look at a European map.
> 
> Passau: On Frankfurt-Linz-Vienna route
> Trier: On Frankfurt/Cologne-Koblenz-Luxemburg
> ...


Sure, International corridors should be imrpoved. Especially Vienna-Munich, that's such an obvious HSL route. Frankfurt-Nuremberg-Passau-Vienne as well, but more of a regular update. However even today Passau's rail connection shouldn't be too bad.
Konstanz isn't even on the corridor between Stuttgart and Zürich, those trains pass through Singen today. Although that corridor definitely need improvement as well.
Saarbrücken has nice rail connections on that corridor already and is also getting upgraded.
Chemnitz: it seems like you noticed as well that there is nothing there. Doesn't mean it wouldn't still be nice to get better rail connections for locals.
That story with Luxemburg is new to me. That sounds a little like too good to bet true to have Luxemburg pay for German infrastructure. Do you know where you have heard this? Of course, if it's true, then it's stupid.

But you're right of course, most international connections are bad and need drastic improvement.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

TM_Germany said:


> You'd need at two more tunnels. The entire southern approach would need to be tunneled, as otherwise you'd need to cute through protected forest, some neighbourhoods and need a new bridge. The eastern approach depends on whether the tunnel will end at the line north of the river or south of it. If they use the southern route, they'd need to tunnel under Offenbach. But both of those lines are congested and limited to 160km/h as well.
> 
> Definitely more expensive but worthwile imo.
> 
> ...


One Long Tunnel would be sufficient if you would connect it to the northeast approach. Also you could better speed the northeastern approach up to > 200 kph as you don't have much curves there until Hanau - even a northern bypass of Hanau would be possible with some political will of doing so....
Biggest problem for now with the northern approach is the rather suboptimal planning for the S-Bahn Expansion there instead of making it a proper 4track railway..

Where did you get that nice maps with the Speedlimits from?


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> Sure, International corridors should be imrpoved. Especially Vienna-Munich, that's such an obvious HSL route. Frankfurt-Nuremberg-Passau-Vienne as well, but more of a regular update. However even today Passau's rail connection shouldn't be too bad.
> Konstanz isn't even on the corridor between Stuttgart and Zürich, those trains pass through Singen today. Although that corridor definitely need improvement as well.
> Saarbrücken has nice rail connections on that corridor already and is also getting upgraded.
> Chemnitz: it seems like you noticed as well that there is nothing there. Doesn't mean it wouldn't still be nice to get better rail connections for locals.
> ...


I think we agree in principle. Just a few technicalities: Trains from Stuttgart to Konstanz (presently taking 2 1/2 hours for a 175 km distance, google claiming the ride can be done 1 h 50 min by car) also use the way via Singen, from where it is another 20 minutes to Konstanz (and an alternative line into Zürich). So an upgrade on the German side of Stuttgart - Zürich would also be of great benefit for Konstanz passengers.
Passau is not quite as bad, but bad enough for a town on at least a secondary grid. 230 km from Nürnberg, it takes just under two hours with a tilting ICE3. In this way, a direct train from Cologne takes amazing 7 hours to get there. 
Saarbrücken with 183 km (all of these highway distances) from Frankfurt at just under two hours is also not too great, and especially the contrast is big, with the trains speeding up to 330 kmh once on the LGV Est. 

Finally I found some old local newspaper pieces on the Luxemburg investment into a fast connection to Cologne. Luxemburg invested around 8 million out of a total of 19 million Euros into double-tracking the rails from Trier to the Luxemburg border, a sum the German government had found unfeasible (even though they should consider themselves lucky long-distance commuters decide to live and pay taxes on the German side of the border, rather than live and pay taxes on the other side). Luxemburg also invested into several train sets that were dedicated to make the long-distance run and were to bypass Trier on the northern side of the Mosel, on a rail line that is at present freight only. However, since DB could not decide where to place the intermediate local stops, this service will remain postponed by five years until 2024. 








Nahverkehr: Luxemburg sauer: Trierer Weststrecke muss schneller reaktiviert werden


Luxemburg ist sauer, dass auf der Trierer Weststrecke erst 2024 grenzüberschreitende Nahverkehrszüge rollen sollen. Er hätte sich gewünscht, dass dies wie zunächst geplant bereits in diesem Jahr reaktiviert werde, sagte der luxemburgische Verkehrsminister volksfreund.de




www.volksfreund.de












Bahnstrecke Trier-Luxemburg wird zweigleisig ausgebaut


Die Bahnstrecke zwischen Igel und der luxemburgischen Grenze wird zweispurig ausgebaut. Die Kosten in Höhe von 19 Millionen Euro werden zwischen dem deutschen Bund, Luxemburg und dem Land Rheinland-Pfalz aufgeteilt. Dies sagte der deutsche Verkehrsminister Peter Ramsauer in einem Interview mit...




www.wort.lu


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

derUlukai said:


> One Long Tunnel would be sufficient if you would connect it to the northeast approach. Also you could better speed the northeastern approach up to > 200 kph as you don't have much curves there until Hanau - even a northern bypass of Hanau would be possible with some political will of doing so....
> Biggest problem for now with the northern approach is the rather suboptimal planning for the S-Bahn Expansion there instead of making it a proper 4track railway..
> 
> Where did you get that nice maps with the Speedlimits from?


Isn't the Nordmainsche S-Bahn project basically a 4 tracking of the railway?

You're right though. It looks like the northern option would be much more feasable, bypassing both Offenbach and Hanau without major tunneling. And having more options for speeding up. Ideally this would all already be taken care of in the current expansion. Oh, how I wish our transport planning was better.

Here is the map:





OpenRailwayMap


OpenRailwayMap - An OpenStreetMap-based project for creating a map of the world's railway infrastructure.




www.openrailwaymap.org


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

Afaik it's a 4 tracking of the northern approach but the two new tracks will be used by 2 hourly s-bahns exclusively, while regional and freight trains will crowd on the other two tracks and long-distance trains are planned to take the slow, southern approach.
All of those plans doesn't make too much sense in my opinion..


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Damn. Ah well, if 4 tracks are there it shouldn't be too much trouble to install some switches or whatever to use it more flexibly. Are they removing level crossings there as well? That would be needed for further speed improvements.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

Don't know about the details, but afaik it will be highly problematic to run other trains on the new tracks if it is written in the planning approval decision that they are to be used exclusive by the s-bahns.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

Suggestion: Send you ideas to whoever is in charge of infrastructure planning and development.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

Pretty sure it'd be only waste of time and you get your nice nonsense standard reply. Too much political capital has already been invested on the inferior solutions, also it looks like the guys in charge nowadays are terribly afraid of the few nimbys, while the aging German society in general don't care about infrastructure plannings too much. Furthermore several fuxxed up large scale projects (S21 im looking at you..) in the recent past are not really helpful in getting public support for new proposals..


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Who knows, might be worth a try. Sending it to Búndesverkehrministerium, Hessisches Verkehrsministerium, DB, as well as associations like VCD or ProBahn. You'd only need to write a single letter and CC each one. Maybe even look at some E-Mail adresses from local and federal politicians who are pro-infrastructure. Not sure where you could look that up though. Won't change anything but then at least you tried. I tried fighting with Hessen.Mobil some time ago but nothing much came from it. The guys from AutobahnOnline forum are usually pretty successful in at least getting informative answers back, though.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

I was going to suggest writing letters or typing emails to you local Federal and/or state representive of your district.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

derUlukai said:


> on the other hand i am happy about every city that can be circumnavigated at maximum speed, which is rather the exception in germany:
> i added all existing (and future) slow city passages on the central german highspeedlines to the following map in green and in light-blue the creeping exits from the nodes:
> 
> 
> ...


In general I agree, but I think we should distinguish between cities where all trains will always stop and cities which can be skipped by some services.

What is lacking in Germany, in the first place, is an actually fast level of service. Current ICE and IC would be perfectly fine... as IC and IR respectively. A very good network to complement some real high speed service.
It's not even a political matter, those trains would pay for their own cost.

Given this, there would still be a limited number of cities where any train would stop, so an 80 km/h pass-through is not really a big deal there.
I'm thinking about Stuttgart, Hannover, Nürnberg for example (Kassel and Erfurt, maybe).
Köln is not in a bad condition IMHO, it is true that the HSL ends in Siegburg but there's a straight 200-160 stretch all the way to Deutz (lower level). Going north is very slow, though.

Frankfurt clearly has a problem because those slow approaches are much longer.

On the other hand, it is just true that places like Ulm, Augsburg, Fulda, Göttingen are a pointless loss of time for non stop trains. But at this point there isn't much that can be done. Halle could still be corrected with a short HSL bypass leading directly to Bitterfeld at 200 km/h.

I think the lesson should be to avoid this mistake for the remaining HSL links.
For example, it is quite clear that the new Berlin - Erfurt line is one bit of a straight Berlin - Frankfurt HSL. This line should completely skip Bebra, Fulda and Hanau, just going straight into Frankfurt Ost and then into the tunnel. Now that would be a great line.
It could also be a chance to upgrade the Frankfurt - Hannover connection, by adding a bypass that joins the HSL to Hannover just north of Fulda.

A direct Stuttgart - Frankfurt line is still possible, and in that case the slower approach to Mannheim ceases to be a problem, because it limits only trains stopping there.

Most of these direct lines would be expensive to build because of tunnels, ok, but in terms of network this is not science fiction, it's just that Germany is not used to this kind of service.
As I said earlier, it's the original Direttissima concept, build a super direct line from A to B and then add several junctions for an extra level of service. It perfectly fits with the highly integrated levels of service typical in Germany.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

agree with stuttgart and hannover, although at these you theoretically even by now have (slow) bypasses. also i could think of a nünberg bypass, but aswell as for kassel it would be quite expansive and there would be a really limited number of trains that would skip those cities. priority bypasses should be göttingen, fulda, hanau, then ulm and at one point mannheim and erfurt (although both are connecting hubs, but i still see some demand for nonstop trains there in the future).
also agree that the problem for köln approach isnt as bad as in frankfurt, althought you could have quite some improvements there which are in planning phase since about 20 years (german wikipedia knows more) - still not much has happened there.
also, you know the plans for fulda - erfurt? or rather: _fulda - fuxxing gerstungen__(!) _nothing about a straight highspeed line berlin - frankfurt and skipping any of the cities you mentioned. they even want to include a stop in the almost 30k inhabitant metropole bad hersfeld here... 
also plannings for a new 300kph highspeedline connecting hannover to the rhine-ruhr-region just started.. it is limited to the less than 90 (!) km between hannover and bielefeld (or, even more precise, herford/vlotho or bad oyenhausen), so you cant skip the very important town of bielefeld aswell..
so for all U/C or planned highspeed rails i cant see that they have learnt anything from the german mistakes - in fact, planning nowadays is worse than about 20 years ago, when DB built the standal bypass, pushed for a mannheim bypass and they constructed the frankfurt-köln line without slow passings in one of the cities in between.

i dont think i will ever see any of those bypasses for some nimby/"ecological"/"economical" bullshit reasons. and i'm only in my mid thirties now.
and as long as you dont have any of those bypasses it makes economically no sense to have non-stop-trains, as they dont cut too much time from passingcreeping through all those villages. thats also why DB ordered all those 249kph trains ("ice4") recently - cause if you dont have a real highspeed network, then why waste money on 300kph trainsets that can run at that speed for about 10% of their schedules..


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

I share your frustration about the short-sightedness of present developments. Even running a badly needed ICE Sprinter Berlin-Cologne failed due to the resistance of the Westphalian municipalities. Bielefeld is fairly big, passenger turnover so-so, but we can consider ourselves lucky if locals do not manage to impose stops in Gütersloh, Herford, Bad Oyenhausen and worst of all, Minden on the future HSR. 
Forget about the 100,000+ municipalities you are complaining about, it would be a start if not almost all trains hat to stop in five-digit inhabitant towns such as Wittenberg or Straubing. Ironically, it is not the small towns where ICEs have started to bypass, but the overcrowded major hubs. Frankfurt has some ICEs passing by the main station, stopping at the airport or in Süd, whereas Köln has some that stop in Deutz only.
As you mentioned, trains to the Northeast of Cologne (to Wuppertal) run at slow speeds on curvy lines at around 120 kmh, wasting precious times for passengers towards Berlin or Hamburg, but nobody has considered a HSR here. My favorite fantasy would be a line that leaves Cologne straight East in the direction of Bergisch Gladbach (where trains could occasionally stop) to then speed up through the Bergische Land at 300 kmh. The line would pass through rather uninhabited territory until Hagen, where a branch could be created for some services to run onto the old line from there, but most trains would continue non-stop at 300 kmh to Dortmund, from where they could then continue either towards Münster/Hamburg or Hamm/Berlin. I am sure this could decisively shorten the 1 hour 8 min. ride Cologne-Dortmund to 40 minutes or so and if stopping at Dortmund, would serve the Ruhr Area as well.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

There has been a private study/idea of a short HSR-route between Dortmund and Hagen. This would eleminate the shaky ride from Hamm to Hagen and leave space for freight trains. Also I would see Dortmund as the easternmost access to HSR of the Rhine-Ruhr-area.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

just read the wikipedia article about eurotunnel yesterday - they started negotiations and plannings in 1984 and finished constructions in 1993 (opened in 1994) - so they built a 50km tunnel under the ocean with two countries involved in less than ten years.

in contrast, you have frankfurt-mannheim, about 100km on flat land, absolutely no tunnels needed here,scrapped an almost ready-to-build planning (that took 11 years, from 1993-2004) in 2015, restarted the process in 2016, after 4 years and lots of nimby talks you now have the favored line (which probably gets sued during the next 5years), even in the best case planning "might" be finished in 2024, then construction will take 5-6years, so it wont be finished until the early 2030s - at best.
planning process in germany is a dysfunctional mess..


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## Stuu (Feb 7, 2007)

derUlukai said:


> just read the wikipedia article about eurotunnel yesterday - they started negotiations and plannings in 1984 and finished constructions in 1993 (opened in 1994) - so they built a 50km tunnel under the ocean with two countries involved in less than ten years.
> 
> in contrast, you have frankfurt-mannheim, about 100km on flat land, absolutely no tunnels needed here,scrapped an almost ready-to-build planning (that took 11 years, from 1993-2004) in 2015, restarted the process in 2016, after 4 years and lots of nimby talks you now have the favored line (which probably gets sued during the next 5years), even in the best case planning "might" be finished in 2024, then construction will take 5-6years, so it wont be finished until the early 2030s - at best.
> planning process in germany is a dysfunctional mess..


Not exactly: a serious start was made to digging a Channel tunnel in the 1970s, as well as the 1880s attempt, so it had been thought about and planned for a very long time... although that said, it does seem that Germany has seriously lost it's way with infrastructure planning and construction


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

Didn't the Germany passed a law earlier to streamline infrastructure planning and development, and make it difficult for NIMBYs to stop the projects?


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## Grotlaufen (Mar 2, 2007)

derUlukai said:


> just read the wikipedia article about eurotunnel yesterday - they started negotiations and plannings in 1984 and finished constructions in 1993 (opened in 1994) - so they built a 50km tunnel under the ocean with two countries involved in less than ten years.
> 
> in contrast, you have frankfurt-mannheim, about 100km on flat land, absolutely no tunnels needed here,scrapped an almost ready-to-build planning (that took 11 years, from 1993-2004) in 2015, restarted the process in 2016, after 4 years and lots of nimby talks you now have the favored line (which probably gets sued during the next 5years), even in the best case planning "might" be finished in 2024, then construction will take 5-6years, so it wont be finished until the early 2030s - at best.


The _Chunnel _didn't have to pass through some existing property at sea, which meant negotiations included far fewer stakeholders than in a normal project of this scope. You also have to take note on the connecting high-speed rail to the tunnel, which on the British side (from the tunnel to London) wasn't finished until 2007 (in contrast the French were done with their construction by the inauguration in 1994).


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

LtBk said:


> Didn't the Germany passed a law earlier to streamline infrastructure planning and development, and make it difficult for NIMBYs to stop the projects?


Yes. These are two separate laws. One foresees a faster planning process for 14 selected infrastructure projects, 7 of which are rail, including the above-mentioned Hannover-Bielefeld HSR. Final approval will be by parliament. 
The second law declutters some existing regulations, lowers the planning requirements for urban rail and for changes to existing infrastructure.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

I hope Bielefeld-Hannover HSR comes to reality. The local SPD tries to oppose the project in a way like: Have you heard, that they want to build an HSR between both cities without connecting Minden and other small towns? The same stupid politicians didn´t wanted the first attempt of two short HSR-routes, including smaller towns and Minden. It´s NYMBYism and you will always find left-wing parties trying to benefit from a natural opposition against every big project.


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## Braillard (Jul 31, 2010)

Germany is the biggest economy of Europe, its most populated country, and in a very central geographical position. Many of Europe’s woes - including railway connectivity and its competitiveness versus other intercity transport such as plane - can only be solved once Germany starts to act like it. I dearly hope that Germany starts having a true Europe-wide vision for its high-speed rail, and less of an « island » mentality.


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## geogregor (Dec 11, 2006)

tunnel owl said:


> It´s NYMBYism and you will always find left-wing parties trying to benefit from a natural opposition against every big project.


It is not just "left-wing" which is NIMBY. In fact it is often often the right of center parties who represent typical NIMBY constituents, often the rural folks, often affluent suburbanites.

That is the case in the UK where people most opposed to the HS2 construction are the rural conservatives from the south of the country.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

In Germany things are different. Undoubtly some conservative orientated people might get affected by protests, but they are nearly all organized by left-wing organisations like BUND, Greenpeace, green Party etc.


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

just had a flyer (paper!) from the local "liberal democrats" in my mailbox. they complain (among other things, such as not testing autonomous vehicles when building a new 900-meter section of tramway ) about the southern approach of the highspeedline as you wont have more ICEs stopping in darmstadt, but destroy a substantial part of the western city forrest. well.. not that they would present any alternative to this (like a two-track approach..  )


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

Why not a zero-track approach?


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## derUlukai (May 31, 2007)

as long as you build a highspeed bypass for mannheim too, i`m fine with that.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Grotlaufen said:


> The _Chunnel _didn't have to pass through some existing property at sea, which meant negotiations included far fewer stakeholders than in a normal project of this scope. You also have to take note on the connecting high-speed rail to the tunnel, which on the British side (from the tunnel to London) wasn't finished until 2007 (in contrast the French were done with their construction by the inauguration in 1994).


If you don't mention HS1, we won't mention Gare du Nord!


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

I recall seeing (probably 20 years ago) a protest cartoon from early 1990s or even 1980s of a "monster" ICE train rising up like a snake over a forest. It was probably from a NIMBY group in Germany protesting about a new high speed train being built. Does anyone know what I mean and maybe still knows where this can be found? Thanks.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

New video by the B1M about Stuttgart 21 with nice footage and the fundmentals about the discussion:


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## Aim9X (Jul 18, 2018)

I feel like that some of these projects don't get enough spotlight outside of Germany. The plan to build an underground station below Marseille Saint-Charles along with the improvements on the existing main line to Nice (LNPCA) kind of reminds me of Stuttgart 21 too.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Well, to be fair, almost any railway project in Germany, including Stuttgart 21, isn't all that special on an international stage.


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## CornelM (Jun 23, 2013)

*High Speed Trains in München Hbf.




*


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## CornelM (Jun 23, 2013)

High Speed Trains at Frankfurt/Main Hbf.


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## rheintram (Mar 5, 2008)




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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

Another great video about Stuttgart-Ulm high speed line (the only one in construction in Germany). Particularly interesting to see how places which were in heavy construction few years ago now look like an ordinary farmland. They claim it will be operational in a year.


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

In this video the latest progress (till July 2021) of Filder tunnel which is part of the Stuttgart 21 project is discussed. It is the 3rd longest railway tunnel in Germany. Digging was finished in 2019 and the tunnel boring machine has now been removed.






Cut and cover parts of the tunnel including construction of structures needed to mitigate sonic boom have now been finished. Since August they have started to work on railway infrastructure. First trains are scheduled for 2025 albeit I don't think this long time line is because of this tunnel.


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

I wonder how exactly are they going to use the Wendlingen-Ulm high speed line in the intermediary time period before Stuttgart 21 is finished. Would it be by joining the conventional line at Wendlingen and then reaching Stuttgart via Plochingen?


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Sunfuns said:


> I wonder how exactly are they going to use the Wendlingen-Ulm high speed line in the intermediary time period before Stuttgart 21 is finished. Would it be by joining the conventional line at Wendlingen and then reaching Stuttgart via Plochingen?


Yes, exactly. There is a connection to the conventional line at Wendlingen, so the new line will be connected with that.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

There'll just be a fairly long single track section because the curve at Wendlingen only joins the northern tunnel, and trains can only cross to the southern track at Nabern some 9 kilometers away.

Anyway it'll speed up the ICE service, and there will be an hourly local train Ulm - Merklingen - Wendlingen from which you can change to other trains at Wendlingen (or the bus to the airport.)


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

I see... Anyway when all projects are finished if I understood correctly there will be an hourly service from Stuttgart to Munich on this line (half hourly overall) as well as an hourly regional service Stuttgart - Ulm -Friedrichshafen.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

The service RE5 Stuttgart - Ulm - Friedrichshafen - Lindau-Insel will already see some changes with this year's timetable change as the Ulm - Friedrichshafen - Lindau route has been electrified; the loco will not be changed to diesel in Ulm anymore and the trains will run to Lindau-Reutin instead of Lindau-Insel.

The exact timetable is still unclear, in this German forum people can't find a satisfactory solution that conserves existing interchanges in Ulm, München and Karlsruhe.

The roughly two-hourly IC services Karlsruhe-München and Frankfurt/Dortmund/Saarbrücken - Austria won't be able to use the new railway for now as their stock lacks ETCS, but on the other hand, the people in Göppingen would complain if they lost all of their long distance services.


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## Sunfuns (Mar 26, 2012)

Right, that electrification will be also a boon for Zurich-Munich services which will be shorter by 30 min starting from December 13th (3 h 30 min).


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

No, that service is already electrified since last December. It benefits from an update to the safety systems that allows crossing the borders non-stop.


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## da_scotty (Nov 4, 2008)

All Thalys services in Germany will be named Eurostar in 2024!


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Are you sure? As I read the announcement, it says nothing about the Thalys name, just that the Eurostar name will be retained. Merging the companies does not automatically mean that the brands will be merged.

Edit: source was from another topic:


33Hz said:


> And Eurostar brand to be retained.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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## da_scotty (Nov 4, 2008)

In Dutch?








Thalys gaat (in 2024) verder als Eurostar


Hogesnelheidstrein Thalys, bekend van de snelle trein tussen Amsterdam en Parijs, gaat vanaf medio 2024 Eurostar heten, net als de trein naar Londen. De on




www.treinreiziger.nl


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Thanks, that clarifies it indeed. Hadn't read them yet.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Both the ICE3 (403) and the ICE3M (406) are certified for 330 km/h operation. My question is: Why? For both models a 300 km/h certification would be enough, because they are not used on any lines requiring more speed. Certification for a higher speed just means you have to test at higher speeds (at least 330 + 10% = 363 km/h). Have there ever been plans for 330 km/h lines in Germany?

The newer ICE3M (407) model that replaced the 406 on the Frankfurt to Paris route has a 320 km/h certification, just for France.


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

M-NL said:


> Why? For both models a 300 km/h certification would be enough,





M-NL said:


> The newer ICE3M (407) model that replaced the 406 on the Frankfurt to Paris route has a 320 km/h certification, just for France.


You've kind of answered your own question there. But Köln-Frankfurt and Nürnberg-Ingolstat were designed for 330 km/h at one point and got reigned in (Greens?). Also, I wonder if this was also for export reasons: Claim to be faster than the French etc. For a while the brochure for that generation of Velaro even claimed 360 km/h top speed - just to match the AGV.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

This situation is not limited to Germany. A lot of rolling stock in the Netherlands is capable of 160 km/h and have the corresponding stickers in the driver cabs, yet the conventional network only supports 140 km/h max at the moment. Despite there having been plans to increase speeds in the past, hence the faster rolling stock, chances of actual speed upgrades on most of the network are slim. The legacy ATC, the soil conditions and the overhead wire construction are often limiting factors and sometimes the short distances make speed increases useless.
The downgrade of the 330 km/h design speed to a 300 km/h service speed may actually be something as trivial as noise. Those extra 30 km/h can create a lot of extra noise and they wanted to save on noise reduction measures.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Isn't the speed limit in NL mostly due to the 1500 V DC electrification? 
The 300km/h limit was set into federal law, it was raised from a much lower point when the first SFS were being built, I guess they didn't consider that trains might one day go faster. 
I'm guessing export reasons for the 330km/h certification as well. The Velaro now runs with 350km/h in China after all now.


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## wbrm (Sep 9, 2008)

In France maximum speed on 1,5kV DC can be up to 220km/h so no it doesn’t.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

The most important right now is that the ATB system does not support >140 km/h, and ETCS is not rolled out yet on most of the network. But the lower tension and bad ground conditions are certainly playing a role, as it makes any upgrade more expensive. Upgrading to ETCS is not enough to reach higher speeds, one needs to upgrade the power supply and stabilise the ground as well before it's of any use.

(As an example: modern electric locos like the Traxx, Vectron or BR 189 are not allowed above 100 km/h on most routes due to ground conditions not permitting axle loads >22t with high speeds. This is currently causing issues timetabling night trains as those all run with modern multisystem locos, on routes with as much as 12 other trains per hour that are permitted to run faster.)


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

To get back OT, because technically with 230 km/h it now is a German high speed train:
Makes you wonder what weight the loco of the near future ICE-L, which is going to be used on the Berlin - Amsterdam route, will be. On the other hand, on that route the soil type of the stretch from the German border to at least Amersfoort is sand. So soil conditions are not a reason why speeds can't be increased on that route.
Even if you would reroute this train via Zwolle and the Hanzelijn (equipped with ETCS and suitable for 200 km/h), soil conditions shouldn't be a problem (the single line capacity between Wierden and Zwolle is).

In hindsight I actually don't understand why DB chose to go for a driving trailer for the ICE-L, instead of locos on both ends, just like DSB. Especially since DB is also going to use the new rakes for seasonal routes with diesel traction. Talgo now needs to completely redesign their Travca, because the test model only had 2400 kW of power and wasn't multi system enough.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

M-NL said:


> On the other hand, on that route the soil type of the stretch from the German border to at least Amersfoort is sand.


Mostly yes. ProRail has indicated that the European Sleeper hauled by a Vectron is allowed to go 130 km/h most of the route, except for a section around Deventer (near the IJssel river) as well as Rijssen - Wierden (near the Regge.) And of course some sections in the west of the country.


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## Gusiluz (Apr 4, 2013)

....


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## [email protected] (Jul 25, 2010)




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## [email protected] (Jul 25, 2010)




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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Here's a timelapse of a test drive on the Wendlingen-Ulm HSL


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> Here's a timelapse of a test drive on the Wendlingen-Ulm HSL


I don’t know if it can properly be called a “test drive”. It’s an inspection/measuring vehicle travelling the complete stretch from Ulm to Wendlingen at minimal speed.
Here is the complete video just under 3h of duration:


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## juangch5 (Oct 30, 2011)

[email protected] said:


>


Great video, perfectly explained and very interesting. 

Now, for what I understand, the only two high-speed projects in Germany are Stuttgart-21 and the upgrade of the Karlsruhe-Basel line, right? It feels a bit underwhelming. Also, although I understand the idea of mixed use, and it is indeed a less expensive and cost effective measure, it feels like some routes should be separate, in order to improve the service and speed and better connect the country + replace some of the domestic routes between Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg & Munich (to name a few). When I travelled there, the Munich-Hamburg trip timetable was around 8hs, which made it indeed not an option considering it was more expensive that air travel.

I understand that maybe with the new government in place, the green may push for some high speed infrastructure in order to reduce CO2 emission. Anyone knows if there is any proposal or project in their electoral platform?


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

juangch5 said:


> Now, for what I understand, the only two high-speed projects in Germany are Stuttgart-21 and the upgrade of the Karlsruhe-Basel line, right?


I recommend you look here, as there are many more high speed projects in development.





__





BauInfoPortal






bauprojekte.deutschebahn.com


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

While there is indeed not too much u/c, a lot of lines are in planning, trying to establish a definite route. Some have been at this stage for the last 20 years, as there is a lot of contention about these routes and their potential local impact (to use a neutral term), but it seems that already since the previous government, there is some earnest attempt to come to conclusions. 
Lines where such planning is ongoing include:

Hamburg-Hannover
Hannover-Bielefeld
Fulda-Erfurt
Dresden-Usti nad Labem
Also, some sections of Nürnberg-Erfurt HSR that are not yet high-speed, such as around Bamberg, are undergoing upgrades at the moment. 
The list above is just off the top of my head, maybe there is more. 
The Greens have unfortunately not been very pro-HSR, highlighting the negative impact of heavy duty construction and focusing instead on local commuter rail. In general though, there is now a much more positive attitude in the country towards rail as part of a solution to climate change, and as I said, even the previous government switched their policy and adapted to this in the last years.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

A few other projects are already in a later stage:

construction for Lübeck-Puttgarden(-Denmark) is about to start
the route for Mannheim-Karlsruhe Frankfurt-Mannheim has recently been established

Upgrades are being planned for both routes from Frankfurt to Munich. Ulm-Augsburg is in planning stage, and this line would more-or-less complete the 'southern' route given Augsburg-Munich is already a 4-track railway with segregated fast and regional traffic. On the 'northern' route, there are discussions about building a tunnel under Frankfurt and closing the gaps Hanau-Würzburg-Nuremberg, but that is less progressed, so for the next few decades the southern route will probably be the fastest one.

And then there are many projects that are not HSR but used by ICEs. Emmerich-Oberhausen and the "Dresdener Bahn" providing a new southern route into Berlin Hbf come to mind.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

I would add Frankfurt - Mannheim HSR on a slow but consequent way to be constructed in the next years.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Yes, that's what I meant. My bad. Mannheim-Karlsruhe is not that far yet.


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## doc7austin (Jun 24, 2012)

A new high-speed railway Hanau-Fulda/Würzburg is badly needed. Basically, a connection between Hanau and the Hannover-Würzburg High-Speed Railway would add a lot of value.
The hourly frequency Frankfurt-Hamburg, Frankfurt-Berlin, and Frankfurt-Dresden have to be routed over the old Kinzigtalbahn. These trains have to share the track with regional and cargo traffic, as well.


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## juangch5 (Oct 30, 2011)

Thank you all for your responses. 

So the next two decades will be a busy one for the German HS network. 

I don't get the opposition of the greens to the construction of new HS Routes. Clearly the positive impact of eliminating the need for domestic flight would certainly outweigh the disruption of the construction of new lines. Besides, it's not as it were to be built in the middle of a National Park or something like that. It seems that sometimes they miss the forest for the trees (pun intended )


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Speaking about forests, the Frankfurt-Mannheim railway will cut through them quite a bit, so I do understand that that generates opposition. And so would Hanau-Würzburg.

Actually getting rid of short flights would require policies like France's. There are still too many short routes being flown between NRW and Berlin, for instance, which are not going to disappear immediately when Bielefeld-Hannover is built.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

It is true though, that most of these projects are still relatively far away. I'll try to order some of these projects according to how far along they are at the top of my head:

*Category A*: Ongoing

1) Stuttgart 21
supposed to be finished in 2025, it's not really a HSR project in the traditional sense.








kjunix, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons


2) SFS Wndlingen - Ulm
supposed to open this year and will be the only new HSL for quite a while








Stoeffler, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons


3) Dresdner Bahn
the sort of HSR part of this already got completed in 2020 with quite a low profile. The majority of the route between Berlin and Dresden is now capable of 200 km/h and equipped with ETCS. The "last mile" connection within Berlin is still under construction and even though it will only be 160 km/ fast, it will cut travel time considerably. I think this is supposed to be completed in 2026. There is also still a section of the route on the Dresden end that needs upgrading, though that might take a while.














Bahnblogstelle.com


Bahnblogstelle ist ein Internet-Blog und Nachrichtenmagazin zu technischen, betrieblichen und sicherheitsrelevanten Themen der Eisenbahn.



bahnblogstelle.net


















Bahnblogstelle.com


Bahnblogstelle ist ein Internet-Blog und Nachrichtenmagazin zu technischen, betrieblichen und sicherheitsrelevanten Themen der Eisenbahn.



bahnblogstelle.net






4) Rhine Valley
both the connection to Switzerland as well as the Netherlands are getting upgraded. The Netherlands connection is quite pathetic and will only receive a third track, although the speed increase to 200 km/h is nice. 
The Switzerland connection is a national emberassment and will supposedly take at leat until the 2040s till completion. The end result will be a pair of new tracks parallel to the old ones with 250km/h in most places, with an upgraded 200km/h section around Freiburg.









Hbf878, OpenStreetMap contributorsOpenStreetMap contributors, CC BY-SA 2.0 <Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic — CC BY-SA 2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

















Das Projekt







emmerich-oberhausen.de





5) Ludwigshafen- Saarbrücken
another relatively low-profile project is the upgrading of that route to 200km/h. Neither of these cities are very important, however this will also speed up quite a few trains between Frankfurt and Paris








Pechristener, CC BY-SA 4.0 <Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International — CC BY-SA 4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons


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## juangch5 (Oct 30, 2011)

Thank you very much! Excellent post! It's an incredible summary of all the ongoing projects!


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

*Category B*: Projects that might get built within the next 10 years:

1) the remainder of VDI 8.1, specifically the section between Ebensfeld and Nuremburg will get a new pair of tracks with 230km/h. An other country would have just built the 300km/h line all the way to Nuremburg and not 10 years after the rest was completed. Don't ask me why this is.













Der Streckenabschnitt VDE 8.1 Ausbaustrecke Nürnberg–Ebensfeld


Verkehrsprojekt Deutsche Einheit Nr. 8



www.vde8.de






2) Ulm - Augsburg
the continuation of S21, SFS Wendlingen Ulm and the route between Munich and Augsburg, which was upgraded to 230/km/h already in th 1970s. Will make more or less the whole route between Stuttgart and Munich high-ish speed. Will have speeds of 200-250km/h, mostly on a new alignment (depending on the variant)








Hbf878, OpenStreetMap contributors, David LiuzzoOpenStreetMap contributors, CC BY-SA 2.0 <Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic — CC BY-SA 2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons


3) (Frankfurt-) Hanau - Fulda - Eisenach
two very badly needed lines for the Frankfurt - Berlin relation. They will be very impressive engineering wise, however for some reason also only 230 km/h fast.








Hbf878, OpenStreetMap contributors and David LiuzzoOpenStreetMap contributors, CC BY-SA 2.0 <Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic — CC BY-SA 2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons









Hbf878, OpenStreetMap contributors and David LiuzzoOpenStreetMap contributors, CC BY-SA 2.0 <Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic — CC BY-SA 2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

4) Fehrmarnbelttunnel connection
The railway connection to the Fehmarnbelttunnel. A new alignment with 200 km/h. Not very impressive at all for a new alignment and it also empties onto the traditional 160km/h line after Lübeck.













Schienenanbindung der Festen Fehmarnbeltquerung


Die Feste Fehmarnbeltquerung auf Schiene und Straße. Wir bauen die leistungsfähige Schienenanbindung von Fehmarn nach Lübeck.




www.anbindung-fbq.de





5) Frankfurt -Mannheim HSL
A long overdue HSL and the only true 300 km/h line that has a chance of being realized in the next 10 years. It's less than 60 km long but possible the most important project capacity wise.








Hbf878, OpenStreetMap contributors, David LiuzzoOpenStreetMap contributors, CC BY-SA 2.0 <Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic — CC BY-SA 2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons


6) upgrades of the Hannover - Berlin line
It currently uncludes a 200km/h portion that will be upgraded to 250 km/h










Dossier


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

*Category C*: Projects that will at best start in the 2030s

1) Dresden - Czech Republic
This project is relatively young and seemingly on low burn. Will include a long base tunnel under the Ore Mountains with 200 km/h and continue on a 300km/h new line in the Czeck Republic













Streckenverlauf - Neubaustrecke Dresden–Prag


Die Neubaustrecke Dresden–Prag verbindet zukünftig die beiden Städte mit dem längsten Tunnel Deutschlands. Erfahren Sie alles zu diesem Projekt.




neubaustrecke-dresden-prag.de






2) Brenner northern approach
This is another pretty emberassing project. Still in very early stages of developement and with heavy local opposition.
















Nordzulauf unter die Erde - Bayernkurier


2028 soll der Brennerbasistunnel in Betrieb gehen. In Bayern wird allerdings noch über die Zulaufstrecken zu dem Schienenprojekt gestritten. Nun hat die Bahn das umfangreiche Planungsverfahren auf fünf Trassenvarianten eingegrenzt.




www.bayernkurier.de





3) Nuremburg - Würzurg
One of two actually impressive projects to come forth from the "Deutschlandtakt". A true 300 km/h HSL between the two cities to realize the needed travel times. Also important for the northern route between Frankfurt and Munich, although nothing is planned for the remaining slow bit between Würzburg and Frankfurt.
There isn't even an officialy map so far, as far as I can tell.

4) Hannover - Bielefeld
The other true HSR necessitated by the Deutschlandtakt. 300km/h between the two mentioned cities, although it really should go all the way to Dortmund or at least Hamm. Very important for the Rhine-Ruhr to Berlin relation. Cologne and Dusseldorf to Berlin will still have to suffer crawling through all the Ruhr cities.








Hbf878, OpenStreetMap contributors, David LiuzzoOpenStreetMap contributors, CC BY-SA 2.0 <Creative Commons — Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic — CC BY-SA 2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

5) Hannover - Hamburg
This is a complete shitshow. It's one of the most important corridors in Germany from both passenger and freight perspective and it is currently hilariously over capacity and prone to delays. It will either need a complete four-tracking in the near future, or an new parallel line. Deutschlandtakt would require a 300 km/h new alignment. Unfortunately this project is seemingly more plagued by NIMBYism as well as environmentalists than any other. They grouped together to block anything more than some minor 3 tracking and signalling upgrades, which is just not going to work. We'll see what this ends up as.

6) Long distance tunnel Frankfurt
Quite impressive project which will help relieve capacity and cut travel times. Unfortunately all approaches to Frankfurt Hbf will remain slow with the current plan, especially to the east.










16.09. – Thema – Fernbahntunnel Frankfurt am Main: Bund, Land und Deutsche Bahn starten Machbarkeitsstudie | PRO BAHN Landesverband Hessen e.V.



To sum it up, there are quite a few projects going around, but very little that is actually ambitious. A *lot *more is necessary to get enough capacity for a significant model shift and and to compete with airlines travel-time wise.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

TM_Germany said:


> 2) Brenner northern approach
> This is another pretty emberassing project. Still in very early stages of developement and with heavy local opposition.


The route is a bit more fixed than on your picture. As can be seen on Überblick - Bahnprojekt Brenner-Nordzulauf, the eastern route around Rosenheim has been chosen.


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## Amexpat (Jan 30, 2014)

TM_Germany said:


> *Category B*: Projects that might get built within the next 10 years:
> 
> 4) Fehrmarnbelttunnel connection
> The railway connection to the Fehmarnbelttunnel. A new alignment with 200 km/h. Not very impressive at all for a new alignment and it also empties onto the traditional 160km/h line after Lübeck.
> ...


Living in Norway, I hope the they accelerate and give a proper connection to the Fehmarnbelt Tunnel connection. It will be part of an important corridor for freight coming from Continental Europe to Scandinavia.


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## PippO.SkaiO (Nov 5, 2021)

AlbertJP said:


> The route is a bit more fixed than on your picture. As can be seen on Überblick - Bahnprojekt Brenner-Nordzulauf, the eastern route around Rosenheim has been chosen.


Do you know if ETCS will be ever installed on Grafing-Kufstein of the Nordzulauf?
Better, do you have updates on A-F points of this 2016 Austrian report on ScanMed corridor (see below)?


PippO.SkaiO said:


> The BBT and new Verona-Innsbruck line will be electrified with 25 kV 50 H; Innsbruck-München will remain at 15 kV 16,7 Hz:
> 
> List of BBT documents, Section IV Ausrüstung/Attrezzaggio, 6.3 Traktionsstrom/Trazione elettrica 25kV, 50Hz
> Traffic analysis for Trento bypass, page 5.
> ...


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

A+B: see Trudering–Grafing - Bahnprojekt Brenner-Nordzulauf, planning in process since last year, with ETCS.
C: I suppose this is about extra tracks past Grafing, this is the only part for which no route has been chosen yet (see Vier mögliche Trassenverläufe zwischen Grafing und Ostermünchen in der Auswahl - Bahnprojekt Brenner-Nordzulauf for the four alternatives).
D: no idea, can't immediately find it on the project website.
E+F: route chosen last year (see Variante Violett liegt vorne: Streckenverlauf steht fest - Bahnprojekt Brenner-Nordzulauf).


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

PippO.SkaiO said:


> Do you know if ETCS will be ever installed on Grafing-Kufstein of the Nordzulauf?


The EU mandates that all railways in the EU that are required to be fitted with a train protection system have to switch to ETCS at some point. 
However the EU does not yet mandate when that will be, resulting in some countries choosing to only replace existing systems once the lifespan of those existing systems has run out. So don't be surprised that existing systems will remain in use for the next 30 to 40 years either.


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## Brystar27 (May 7, 2014)

As a foreigner from the United States, I want to thank you, @TM_Germany, for the post on the projects. It's fascinating to see Germany invest in its infrastructure Transportation networks; I am intrigued with Stuttgart 21 project since its cool to see how transformative the project will be and allow more thorough service to other destinations within Germany and in neighboring countries such as France, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Belgium, Italy, Austria and more. I am glad to see Germany upgrading its Railways networks. Even though a lot of it is not much High-Speed Rail, it's still very High Speed compared to a lot of the Railways in the United States besides a few corridors. Luckily, in my neck of the woods, we are getting an HSR like train service to Orlando, but it will be like the Intercity Train services speeds in Germany. I have not been to Germany before, but I do want to go there, and Europe in general, but this Pandemic has hampered my chance to explore Europe.

The problem I have is that I want to see more videos of these projects on Youtube. While I find them the most are German, There are not many English-speaking folks on Youtube covering for Germany Infrastructure projects for Aerospace, Railways, and such. The only ones I can think of are channels like RM Transit, David Finkel, Railways Explained (Great Channel even gets into the history, organizational management of these massive agencies like DB, and more). And among others. I am from the United States, and I am working on my Master's Degree in Aerospace, but Railways have always interested me, and I say both Aerospace and Railways go together. But I want to get more in-depth of these projects, but the information and progress are more challenging for me to know since I am not well versed in German.

Also, greetings to everyone from Germany! One of my favorite European Countries, hopefully, I can visit the country once I am a professional in the industry and travel frequently.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

TM_Germany said:


> 4) Rhine Valley
> The Netherlands connection is quite pathetic and will only receive a third track, although the speed increase to 200 km/h is nice.
> 
> 
> ...


The problem between Oberhausen and the Dutch border is capacity, because it is a major corridor for freight trains (most will be routed to/from the Betuwe route just across the border).
They're trying to mix 160 km/h passenger trains with 80..120 km/h (mostly 80-90 km/h) freight trains. The third track is meant to solve that. Increasing some of the passenger traffic to 200 km/h (only the ICEs) would throw that extra capacity out of the door instantly. If they really wanted to increase speeds as well they would have had to build four tracks to separate fast and slow traffic.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

A third track does basically nothing, as you always have the bottleneck in on direction. It really either needs a complete 4-tracking or either a purpose built HSL or freight line.


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## Slagathor (Jul 29, 2007)

It's OK, we expect nothing from you guys in terms of infrastructure. We spent 20 years hoping you'd do what you said you'd do and then roughly a decade ago we just gave up.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

TM_Germany said:


> A third track does basically nothing, as you always have the bottleneck in on direction. It really either needs a complete 4-tracking or either a purpose built HSL or freight line.


In the current timetable the ICEs cross each other between Emmerich and Wesel, so on that stretch one of the two will have to leave the centre track.

Emmerich, Dinslaken and Wesel will be 4-tracked stations and thus the natural place to switch tracks if necessary.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

TM_Germany said:


> A third track does basically nothing, as you always have the bottleneck in on direction.


Four tracks would have been better, but also more expensive and would there be enough space for four tracks?
Keeping with three tracks you can approach the problem in several ways.
You could treat the third track as a separate single track. You can send trains onto this track in block distance, but you have to choose in advance in which direction you want to use it. That does mean you have to buffer trains on both sides, before using it in either direction or use it suboptimal.
You could also treat it as very long sidings and have trains switch track in between. Unless you lay higher speed switches (at least 80 km/h when diverging) everywhere, that's not optimal.
In the Netherlands they are currently thinking of a connection from Zevenaar (just across the border where the Betuwe route ends) North towards the Oldenzaal - Bad Bentheim border crossing to increase freight capacity. Just because Germany doesn't deliver on their promise for extra track capacity and the crossing at Venlo is also pretty much maxed out already.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

It's ridiculous to connect the Betuweroute to a mixed used- three track railway. If there is no space for 4 tracks, a dedicated ROW should have been built. This is just half-assed.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Well I think it's what the Netherlands and Germany agreed many years ago.

A connection towards Bad Bentheim would serve a different market - freight towards the north of Germany (-Scandinavia/Poland) that has no reason to go through the Ruhr area. These trains are already going through Bad Bentheim. The current route to get there from Rotterdam (via Woerden-Breukelen-Diemen Zuid-Hilversum etc.) is just very congested and freight trains are hard to schedule there.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Railways in the Netherlands are pretty similar to this stretch: The country is filled with track sections that are at or over capacity and plans to relief that are either non-existent or executed at a snails pace. Added to that are the poor soil conditions that further limit capacity expansion (but that's a subject for a different thread)
In line with what @AlbertJP states the Northern branch would serve two purposes. It would increase usage of the Betuwe route, because the line into Germany only has three tracks and, as a result, relieve congested tracks elsewhere in the country. But could the German network even handle routing more trains via Bad Bentheim?


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

A third track isn't useless. You just need to design the timetable structure such that up and down overtaking requirements are on different sections of the line. It does probably mean your timetable ends up being asymmetrical e.g. a connection that's easily made in one direction might not be in the other.

The fundamental question is, whether the third-track intervention is fully timetable informed (the Swiss and Austrian approach) or are they just slapping a third track down and hoping for the best.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Sure, there is _some _use. But you have the lions' share of the cost for four tracking and only a fraction of the benefit.


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## davide84 (Jun 8, 2008)

M-NL said:


> The Japanese concept of building a high speed station on the outskirts and providing a shuttle train to the city center isn't that bad a concept. In fact the location of that new station will often turn into a new business area over time.


In Milan and Rome that concept is not working. When they try, people keep switching to the trains going to the center.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

I think building greenfield stations is fine as long as the city is still growing and it is possible to transform the surrounding area into an urban hub as well as build all the connecting public transport infrastructure. That's basically how the central stations were originally built as well. However, since German cities are hardly growing and are terrible at building new urban districts and public transportation infrastructure to boot, I don't think it work well here.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

davide84 said:


> In Milan and Rome that concept is not working. When they try, people keep switching to the trains going to the center.


It should be an all or nothing switch. Either you transfer all long distance and high speed trains or none. Otherwise, like you state, it will not work. The sad thing is that that happens quite often.
And it only works for long distance and high speed trains, not for commuter and regional. Those services need to go there where the passengers want to go.


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## davide84 (Jun 8, 2008)

M-NL said:


> Those services need to go there where the passengers want to go.


Agreed, and passengers want to go to the center, as they clearly demonstrate whenever they can choose.
If you do "all or nothing" you basically force them to buy an inferior product than what they have today. Of course "it works", if it's the only service there is, someone will take it. But we should make railways more appealing to passengers, not less, if we want them to grow.
I am not saying that the model can't be good in some situations, but in a few cases it was already tested and it's not what passengers want.
Remember that the goal is to efficiently move people, not trains per se.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

Honestly I wouldn't take Amsterdam Zuid as an example of main station in the outskirts: taking the whole of Amsterdam (including Amstelveen etc.), it might actually be more central than Centraal itself.
But that's a very peculiar case: many cities were born on a coast, so modern development happened all inland oriented (Genoa, Barcelona, Lisbon...) but I can't think of another large European city with the main through railway being built between the old town and the sea. All of them developed railways on the inland side and thus in a more central position, compared to the modern urban extent.
(I can think of maybe Dublin and Belfast, and in fact both developed main stations away from the coastal line)
In a country less eager to build over water 😅 in 1889 they would have built a Sloterdijk - Weesperpoort line and Centraal would have been located on Leidseplein, and today's situation would probably not include a Zuid.

All this to say, Amsterdam Zuid doesn't really apply to European cities. Relocating main stations outside city centers never worked well in Europe.
What's really good of German transports is how they work as a network, and the hub and spoke model well with centrally located stations.
Of course this means a huge capacity is needed to route all traffic there, but we know how to make it happen.

There are two issues right now with "fast" services in Germany:

capacity can't cover the high demand (few trains/few tracks), so: overcrowded trains, long dwelling times, high prices, poor reliability
absence of an actual HS network: Sprinters are seen as a fancy extra while they should be a full blown offer layer, and HS lines are mostly disconnected segments running through minor cities

The problem is not having long distance trains running through _major_ stations... God bless if they were ONLY the major ones!

Anyway, the case of Leipzig is a bit extreme: despite being large enough to deserve a stop, it's too much offset from the main Berlin - Munich corridor to reasonably consider it a stop along the way. It's simply not along the way.
If they wished Leipzig to actually be along the way, they should have built the way _there_, not 30 km away. That would have meant not going via Bamberg and Erfurt at all, and instead follow A9 and build another tunnel under Leipzig. Then Leipzig would be a reasonable stop along that corridor.
They chose a completely different corridor, they can't force an illogical routing now.

Also I don't get at all the reasoning behind a Hamburg - Berlin - Munich service: why going via Berlin in the first place? The logical route is via Hannover.
Hamburg - Berlin - Prague is right, Hamburg - Berlin - Leipzig too, but that's it. Hamburg to anything beyond Leipzig - definitely not via Berlin.

Given that Hamburg has nothing to do with that area, I would set services this way:









Anyone going anywhere with no silly detours or useless stops (no Fulda, no Halle, no Gottingen...). A couple of cross-platform meetings in Erfurt and Berlin and you're also doubling the frequency at the same price...



TM_Germany said:


> You would be massively degrading the service frequency for everyone along the route. I agree there should be more sprinter services, but no way would Leipzig-Berlin be able to sustain the same level of frequency as Munich-Berlin via Leipzig, track capacity issues not even included.


This is a tricky concept. If improving a direct connection degrades the service to an intermediate city, it means that city today is piggybacking at the others' expense. They have good services only because they're too expensive to be skipped, not because they deserve it.
I don't see this as a situation worth defending.

In reality, I think Leipzig would lose nothing, it would actually support a decent frequency on its own. But the others would gain a lot...


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

^^ well, let's agree to disagree then, at least with current infrastructure.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Wilhem275 said:


> capacity can't cover the high demand (few trains/few tracks), so: overcrowded trains, long dwelling times, high prices, poor reliability


But if trains are overcrowded and at maximum possible length, why did Germany never develop double deck high speed trains, like Japan did? (Yes, there are also TGV Duplex, but their capacity is just 508 passengers, compared to 460 for a Velaro D and 499 for an 7 car ICE4 set, so the TGV concept is useless for extra capacity)


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

I think the double decker Shinkansen need a larger loading gauge, which doesn't exist in Germany.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Normally, faster ICE trains Hamburg - Munich are routed via Göttingen. I believe they might be down due to reconstruction at the moment, making Hamburg-Berlin-Munich the fastest choice at the moment, but not forever. Normally, operating trains Hamburg-Berlin-Munich is not intended for end-to-end usage. but so both Hamburg to Leipzig and Berlin to Munich passengers will use it and DB does not have to run two separate trains for them. Within the same logic, there are still trains Berlin-Stuttgart-Munich, which are also not intended for end-to-end usage and where the final destination is often omitted from displays, in order not to confuse passengers who for example in Berlin want to take the fastest route to Munich and might otherwise end up on a 7 hour ride instead of a 4 hour one. 

As for the routing, the Berlin-Leipzig/Halle-Nuremberg-Munich route was designed so it would make three routes shorter at the same time:
Berlin-Munich
Berlin-Frankfurt
Dresden-Frankfurt/Munich
Because of this, and to also link up Erfurt better within the existing grid, the route chosen lies far west from what would be geographically the best connection Berlin-Munich, which could have run Berlin-Lepizig (underground)-Gera-Hof-Regensburg-Munich. A more ambitious HSR development program would have built Berlin-Erfurt-Frankfurt and Berlin-Regensburg-Munich as two separate lines. 

Be that as it may, I agree that the main problem nowadays is the decision taken in the 1990s not to develop a dedicated HSR system, but to add short sections of 250-300 kmh sections to the existing grid, which was upgraded to 160-200 kmh on major routes. While this might have been feasible in the 1990s, when rail usage was still limited, since a few years it has become evident that this cost-effective approach plus the saving measures introduced into operations when the government was still trying to make DB a stock market company have led DB to a point where it cannot continue. Serious investments and rapid planning for new infrastructure plus a more robust approach to operations is called for. I seriously hope the new DB leadership and the government act accordingly.

As for doubledeckers, they do not really help. After experimenting for a while with doubledeckers on smaller IC lines, DB has announced that they will not go for doubledeckers for the next generation of ICE. Doubledeckers would seriously hamper operations. At present, DB schedules allow for very few minutes for stops at stations. This is because unlike TGV doubledeckers or AVEs, every ICE has two doors per single floor carriage. A doubledecker carrying decisively more passengers per carriage would need more time for getting on and off through just two doors, and as the schedule would have to allow for doubledeckers and single deck trains to operate alternately, the ripple effect throughout the schedule would be considerable.. Compare stopping times of ICEs and TGVs at major stations (say Hannover or Lyon) and you will see the difference.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

Baron Hirsch said:


> ... but so both Hamburg to Leipzig and Berlin to Munich passengers will use it and DB does not have to run two separate trains for them.


That would work so well, if only Leipzig happened to be on the Berlin - Munich line 😁 
No really, they are forcing an unreal model. It's 40 km extra, mostly at urban speed, plus reversing in Leipzig, in no way it can be considered a stop on the same line.

The case for separating services is strong here.

As for capacity, we're not that far to apply the concept I showed.
Running separate services would mean a doubled load on two sections:

Erfurt to south of Halle
Bitterfeld to Berlin Hbf (tief)

But in fact two services would run closely coupled on those sections, not eating up a double amount of capacity. What is needed is a independent access to Erfurt Hbf for the Frankfurt service.

Imagine this sequence:
1) Munich to Berlin and Frankfurt to Dresden enter Erfurt Hbf in parallel, and perform a cross-platform change (you can swap Munich and Frankfurt, same concept)
2) M-B departs and is immediately followed by F-D
3) At Planena Junction they split towards their own destinations
4) Meanwhile the Leipzig to Hamburg service departs from Leipzig Hbf
5) At Bitterfeld L-H joins the line right after M-B
6) In Berlin Hbf M-B stops and then leaves towards Gesundbrunnen; passengers travelling from Erfurt to Hamburg wait for the L-H train immediately following (and also a Dresden - Rostock, for example).

This scheme allows direct or immediate connections for everyone, but still isn't very taxing on the infrastructure.
And it works with what we have now. It can later be evolved with Frankfurt - Erfurt HSL and the Halle bypass without changing its logic.

The only limit here is DB wishing to cheap out on trainsets...



Baron Hirsch said:


> As for the routing, the Berlin-Leipzig/Halle-Nuremberg-Munich route was designed so it would make three routes shorter at the same time:
> Berlin-Munich
> Berlin-Frankfurt
> Dresden-Frankfurt/Munich
> Because of this, and to also link up Erfurt better within the existing grid, the route chosen lies far west from what would be geographically the best connection Berlin-Munich, which could have run Berlin-Lepizig (underground)-Gera-Hof-Regensburg-Munich. A more ambitious HSR development program would have built Berlin-Erfurt-Frankfurt and Berlin-Regensburg-Munich as two separate lines.


Personally, I don't think it was a wrong choice to couple the Munich and Frankfurt branches with a Y forking in Erfurt; this also improved the Nurnberg - Berlin connection.

But now they need to build a proper Frankfurt - Erfurt HSL. And I mean a true one, not taking a panoramic tour of Fulda or some extra 60 km to touch Bebra.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

Unfortunately, that decision (Fulda-Erfurt) has been made. A real direttissimo was abandoned very early on in the process, as supposedly too expensive and too environmentally harmful. The variants investigated all followed the existing network closely. In March, the successful variant was presented to the public. It was lauded for serving the great metropolis of Bad Hersfeld (you do not know? It is the new Berlin, London, and Milan all wrapped in one). The new lines only briefly disengage from the current route and were also praised for being environmentally and habitat-friendly due to many tunnels. See Vorzugsvariante - Fulda-Gerstungen 
It says there that this line will shorten Berlin-Frankfurt by 10 minutes! May the lord be praised.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

Jesus Christ 🤦‍♂️


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Here's a diagram of a sort of service pattern I have in mind (apologies for the shadows, this was the best I could muster with the lighting here. Also I slightly messed up the cartography outside Hamburg). Each line represents one service per hour. The basic principle is having half-hourly point-to-point 'sprinters' between the major city pairs. What you end up with is the sort of service intensity on UK main lines and HS2.










Slower services are not shown. For example there may well be slower services (IC rather than ICE) between Berlin and Hamburg which would operate on top of what's shown. Rhine-Ruhr - Bielefeld - Minden - Hanover and Rhine-Ruhr - Munster - Osnabruck - Bremen - Hamburg services are also not shown (these would operate 2tph to each of Dusseldorf and Cologne).

The west side of the map does assume infrastructure that does not currently exist:

Hamburg - Dortmund / Essen high-speed line going between Osnabruck and Hanover
Wuppertal - Dortmund HSL
Hanover southern bypass for Berlin - Rhine/Ruhr services

With current and committed infrastructure, I still think a reduced version of my service pattern is possible (and still desirable). If half hourly is too ambitious, then hourly ought to be doable. Hanover wouldn't have its own services currently and Rhine-Ruhr routing would remain constrained by current infrastructure capability. I assume Stuttgart 21 in my plan so have only given it mainly through services. You may need to boost frequencies through Stuttgart.

Germany's local and regional service frequency and capacity tend to be more generous than UK equivalents. I simply refuse to believe that Germany has a lower unsuppressed inter-city trip rate than the UK. If London - Nottingham justifies two trains per hour, Leipzig justifies its own trains to Berlin and Munich. Leipzig starters would call at Lutherstadt-Wittenburg, Bamberg, Erlangen and Inglostadt.

Generally, each major city has two stations on each corridor (London Euston + Old Oak Common model):

The Hautbahnhof has terminating services, where there is generally at least 30 minutes of layover for disembarking, cleaning/restocking and boarding.
The outer station served by services calling again or through services calling. Through stations calls are designed such that normally you have no more than 10 boarders and 10 alighters for each door.

How this works in practice:

Berlin: services 'terminate' at Hbf (in this slightly special case most services will actually terminate in Ostbahnhof or Gesundbrunen, but Hbf dwells need to be 10 minutes). All services make secondary calls at Spandau or Sudkreuz.
Frankfurt: services start/terminate at Hbf. Through services only serve Airport and/or Sud. (All eastbound services may call at Hanau - I haven't decided, not shown on the map)
Cologne: services start/terminate at Hbf. All services passing Messe/Deutz call.
Hamburg - services 'terminate' at Hbf (in reality they start/end at Altona, but give Hbf 10-minute dwells). All southbound services call at Harburg (neglected to show on map).
Munich - all services start/terminate at Hbf. All services call at Passing

Rhine/Ruhr is another exceptional case due to its polycentric nature. There are generally two

Secondary cities are served by all through services calling: Halle, Kassel, Erfurt, Nuremberg. I'm in two minds about Fulda but I think it might as well be an all-services-call station. This might represent an overprovision for these places but my reasoning is two-fold:

At the service frequency I'm proposing, the only way to preserve line capacity is if all services do the same thing (in this case, all call)
You want to provide enough services to those locations so that relatively few people leave/join your train at each door, so you maintain precious 2-minute dwells.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Uneccessary terminus services are hugely inefficient are to be avoided at all cost. Leaving trains just waiting around 30 minutes at main stations would massively decrease capacity for no reason whatsoever, platform capacity doesn't come free. There is a reason why Berlin Hbf was built as an underground through station instead of rebuilding some of the terminus stations. They are the same reasons why Stuttgart 21 is being built and why Frankfurt ist getting an underground through station. Why would you have trains from Hamburg and Leipzig both terminate and idle for 30 minutes there and occupying two platforms when you can just run one train and run through and merely occupy one platform for a couple of minutes.
You are creating a solution that doesn't solve the underlaying problem of lack of capacity. If there is too much crowding just add trains. You can also add more point to point services, but there is no need whatsover to cut longer distance through services with several major stops, they also serve a market and are much more operationally efficient. 
Also, by my count the busiest lines on your diagram would have 22 tph, one train every two and half minutes or so, on lines that also carry freight and regional services.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

Just to clarify my point of view, I don't advocate for short point-to-point relations.
When I speak of Hamburg - Leipzig it is just to simplify, to me it might be a Hof - Westerland, just as "Frankfurt" might mean Basel or Paris.

In my view, separating Leipzig is not "intentional", it's just to speed up the Munich - Berlin relation.

But as NCT, I too believe DB's long distance offer is often too timid with frequencies. In my book, if it's not at least hourly we can't even talk about frequency...


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Wilhem275 said:


> Just to clarify my point of view, I don't advocate for short point-to-point relations.
> When I speak of Hamburg - Leipzig it is just to simplify, to me it might be a Hof - Westerland, just as "Frankfurt" might mean Basel or Paris.
> 
> In my view, separating Leipzig is not "intentional", it's just to speed up the Munich - Berlin relation.
> ...


I absolutely agree. The "Deutschlandtakt" basically pursues the goal of achieving 30min frequencies. While I don't agree with several facets of the project, if at least the infrastructure projects to support such frequencies are realized, it's a positive.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Great informative video if the Stuttgart-Ulm line. English subtitles are available, but are a little rough.


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## TER200 (Jan 27, 2019)

M-NL said:


> Yes, there are also TGV Duplex, but their capacity is just 508 passengers


556, and soon more than 600 in the typical 2-class + bistro layout.



Baron Hirsch said:


> every ICE has two doors per single floor carriage


No... the ICE3 BR407 has only 10 doors, meaning than most cars have only one.



Baron Hirsch said:


> Compare stopping times of ICEs and TGVs at major stations (say Hannover or Lyon) and you will see the difference


I compared the said ICE3 with TGV Duplex in the same station (Strasbourg) and didn't really see a difference. Boarding is slow anyway, because the people looking for their assigned seat clog the aisle (something that happens less in Germany because not all passengers have a reservation).

also you could check in Switzerland how _inefficient _the IC2000 and Twindexxes are...


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

TM_Germany said:


> I think the double decker Shinkansen need a larger loading gauge, which doesn't exist in Germany.


Obviously, but it was the only example of a high speed double deck train that doesn't use power cars I could come up with.


TER200 said:


> 556, and soon more than 600 in the typical 2-class + bistro layout.
> 
> I compared the said ICE3 with TGV Duplex in the same station (Strasbourg) and didn't really see a difference. Boarding is slow anyway, because the people looking for their assigned seat clog the aisle (something that happens less in Germany because not all passengers have a reservation).


Where does that extra space come from, because the train itself is not getting any longer. I hope they're not reducing seat pitch in second class, because it already sucks (at least in a Thalys). And even then, the difference in capacity between a single deck and double deck train is just not that big, the amount of doors roughly the same. That's actually the reason they stopped using them in Japan.
The Duplex also has the major disadvantage that all passengers to the upper deck from a small vestibule must make a turn onto a narrow curved staircase and then make a turn again into a narrow aisle, where the luggage racks are the first thing they encounter.
Talgo promotes a variant of the Avril with wider coaches (3,2m) and 5 abreast seating. I don't know if that's a good idea either. On a Shinkansen (3,34m) 5 abreast works, but only because it's wider again. At least the Talgo will have more doors per side.


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## wbrm (Sep 9, 2008)

The new TGV M will have shorter powercars resulting in an extra carriage for the same overall trainset length. That doesn’t solve the low number of doors though. Something a wide Talgo would also suffer from I suppose.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> Uneccessary terminus services are hugely inefficient are to be avoided at all cost. Leaving trains just waiting around 30 minutes at main stations would massively decrease capacity for no reason whatsoever, platform capacity doesn't come free. There is a reason why Berlin Hbf was built as an underground through station instead of rebuilding some of the terminus stations. They are the same reasons why Stuttgart 21 is being built and why Frankfurt ist getting an underground through station. Why would you have trains from Hamburg and Leipzig both terminate and idle for 30 minutes there and occupying two platforms when you can just run one train and run through and merely occupy one platform for a couple of minutes.
> You are creating a solution that doesn't solve the underlaying problem of lack of capacity. If there is too much crowding just add trains. You can also add more point to point services, but there is no need whatsover to cut longer distance through services with several major stops, they also serve a market and are much more operationally efficient.
> Also, by my count the busiest lines on your diagram would have 22 tph, one train every two and half minutes or so, on lines that also carry freight and regional services.


Define unnecessary and hugely inefficient.

As things happen the majority of ICE services in Berlin terminate in Berlin, just that terminus activities take place at Ostbahnhof or Gesundbrunen. You spend 10 minutes detraining, 10 minutes running to Ostbahnhof/Gesundbrunen, however many minutes for servicing activities, 10 minutes back to Hbf, 10 minutes of dwell, then onwards for its return journey. The runs to/from Ostbahnhof and Gesundbrunen carry fresh air because these trains can't be used by BVG ticket holders. Trains terminating at Berlin Hbf low-level from the north reverse out to Gesundbrunen anyway, so the station still operates as a terminus station when it was intended to be so. The reality of demand patterns has overtaken infrastructure design fantasies. It would have been better to have kept Lehrter, Hamburg, Potzdammerplatz and Anhalter as terminating stations with standardised parallel moves. Potzdammerplatz low level is an underused white elephant - the money for building Hbf low level would have been better spent on accelerating S21.

What is built is built. I have no problem with using Berlin Hbf as a through station for appropriate pairings as marriages of convenience. Hamburg - Dresden is probably best done as a through service, but the dwell at Berlin Hbf needs to be 15 minutes, as current Hamburg - Munich runs demonstrate. 5 minutes for disembarking, 5 minutes boarding, 5 minute delay insurance as a minimum. It would then be good to have standard operating principles for Berlin Hbf, e.g.:

Fast Hamburgs are paired with Dresdens with 15-minute dwells (2tph)
Slow Hamburgs are paired with Leipzigs with 15-minute dwells (2tph)
Spandaus from Hanover go to high level and terminate at Ostbahnhof (7tph, 4tph in an hourly version)
Sudkreutzs go to low level and terminate at Gesundbrunen (5tph, 3tph in an hourly version)
Which I don't believe is a million miles from what is done currently.

Similarly I'm not averse to some services joining up at Hanover


Where intermediate calls at major stations with high passenger turnover have less than a 15-minute dwell they are just not sufficient. This is the single biggest reason for ICE's poor performance (which started well before current problems).

If a major origin-destination pair fills a 400m train every half hour (or every hour as interim) then it makes sense to give them their own trains with 30-minute layovers for the following reasons:

They have plenty of time to get on - it's better for the train to arrive before the bulk of passengers then you avoid passenger concentration on the platform;
The train they are getting on is clean - even with generally good behaviour from German passengers you still get crumbs on seats and spilt beer on the floor;
The train they are on is on time - on-time departure at origin is much easier to deliver than from a service that's lost dwell at 5 previous major stations;
They have plenty of time to get off at the other end without a sea of boarding passengers impeding their progress.

German main cities are big enough to allow the majority of passengers to start or end their journeys at origin and terminus station calls. This way you maximise passengers' on-time departure and destination arrivals are usually under 5 minutes late. This compares with 15 minutes late on departure and 30 minutes late on arrival that's so commonplace today.

A 30-minute reversing layover for a typical 2-4 hour service is not inefficient, it's the minimum required that reflects the necessary activities at the beginning and end of a train journey. It's the minimum required to offer passengers the minimum level of inter-city experience. By combining services into through services with insufficient dwell you are baking in a structural deficiency into the German intercity timetable. Even if DB manages to address chronic overcrowding, a country as big as Germany will always have some acute crowding, and timetabling (dwell time) should reflect reasonable worse case acute conditions to avoid delay propagation across the network. The ICE timetable is currently structurally deficient. An even less charitable way of putting it is ICE is being run on the cheap.

For Leipzig there are good economic reasons for services to simply terminate and go back. There's also a good timetabling reason. The Erfurt, Berlin and Dresden platforms operate independently with metro-rhythm parallel moves to the great extent possible with as few services as possible crossing the entire station throat. It's good for keeping driver/crewe and train diagrams together as much as possible too. Waiting for the driver to turn up has become all too common a reason for trains starting at their origin late.

Very long services with a lot of intermediate major calls, much shorter typical passenger lengths and several driver diagrams are not only inefficient but also hugely vulnerable.

The final consideration is journey time. It's usually economically sound to ask through passengers to suffer a low-penalty call at a parkway station on a straight through alignment, but not a high-penalty call at a central station on a slower alignment (which costs more to construct). Your Frankfurt Airport call can get away with a dwell of under 5 minutes but your Hbf one in your future tunnelled scenario will need 15. Considering dwell differential and alignment differential, the combined penalty of a through arrangement vs a parkway arrangement is in the order of 20 minutes. When your major city pairs justify 2tph centre-to-centre services in their own right, it's not worth chasing additional frequency (by running all services through city centres) at the expense of journey time. That journey time difference is the difference between killing and not killing domestic aviation.

Germany needs to set its eyes beyond its own borders too. A Hanover bypass may not be required to kill Hamburg - Frankfurt flights, but it is very much required to kill Copenhagen - Frankfurt aviation.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

TER200 said:


> I compared the said ICE3 with TGV Duplex in the same station (Strasbourg) and didn't really see a difference. Boarding is slow anyway, because the people looking for their assigned seat clog the aisle (something that happens less in Germany because not all passengers have a reservation).


That comparison is moot. Of course Strasbourg Station will not shorten its dwelling times, just because an occasional ICE will arrive in between TGV doubledeckers and TGV single floor trains. Also, tickets are checked when passengers get to the platform, and in Strasbourg, the power system has to be switched from German to French grid or vice versa. Because of all of these things, Strasbourg has especially long stops for intercountry trains here. That is why I suggested comparing Hanover and Lyon, as two major stations, but each completely operating within the respective national parameters.

@NCT: This seems very much over the top. 15 minute stops? Before DB was so run down, reversals out of Frankfurt, Leipzig, or Stuttgart worked within 6 minutes (they are still scheduled to); train crew handovers worked within 3. There is no point in adding bypasses and leaving out intermediate stops if the time advantage is then blatantly wasted by being overcareful with schedules. 
I agree though that there should be sufficient time at end stations to avoid delay at departure and vacuum clean the trains. It is rather ugh what they expect you to travel in sometimes.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Baron Hirsch said:


> @NCT: This seems very much over the top. 15 minute stops? Before DB was so run down, reversals out of Frankfurt, Leipzig, or Stuttgart worked within 6 minutes (they are still scheduled to); train crew handovers worked within 3. There is no point in adding bypasses and leaving out intermediate stops if the time advantage is then blatantly wasted by being overcareful with schedules.
> I agree though that there should be sufficient time at end stations to avoid delay at departure and vacuum clean the trains. It is rather ugh what they expect you to travel in sometimes.


Those 6-minute reversals barely worked on very good days, they didn't work on average let alone reasonable worst-case days. You shouldn't write your timetable based on best days - they should be written for reasonably worst days. Progressively losing dwells was already a routine feature of ICE trains even before the current meltdown.

In fact the current loadings should only be seen as reasonable worse-case scenarios. Trains can get around 110% loaded (sometimes you still have bags on seats even with people standing in vestibules), and people still manage to get on. The fact that trains are getting catastrophically delayed means the timetable was never honest to start with.

By-passing major city centres allows you to precisely eliminate station stops with 15-minute dwells. You end up with two broad kinds of station calls:

Terminus stations: ~30-minute turnarounds
Through stations with 10 alighters and 10 boarders per door: 2- to 3-minute dwells with possibly up to 5 for airport stops.


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## TER200 (Jan 27, 2019)

Baron Hirsch said:


> Of course Strasbourg Station will not shorten its dwelling times, just because an occasional ICE will arrive


The duration of the stop is not always the same, as the timetable is not strictly repeated.
And I wasn't talking about the scheduled stop duration, but the time it takes in real life.


Baron Hirsch said:


> Also, tickets are checked when passengers get to the platform


Not systematically.


Baron Hirsch said:


> and in Strasbourg, the power system has to be switched from German to French grid or vice versa


No. This is done on the Rhine bridge.


Baron Hirsch said:


> Because of all of these things, Strasbourg has especially long stops for intercountry trains here.


Not really, it's about 5 minutes. Sometimes it can be more, for example when a TGV is coupled or detached from a second trainset.


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## kokomo (Sep 29, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> Great informative video if the Stuttgart-Ulm line. English subtitles are available, but are a little rough.


I was watching it and two topics raised my attention
1) is the line designed for 300 kmh speed BUT commercial services will only run at 250? why? 
2) what is Stuttgart 21 project? a new central station?


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

kokomo said:


> I was watching it and two topics raised my attention
> 1) is the line designed for 300 kmh speed BUT commercial services will only run at 250? why?
> 2) what is Stuttgart 21 project? a new central station?


1) It's only designed for 250 unfortunately. I'm not entirely sure why, I guess it's for cost reasons.
2) yes, including sevaral tunnel approavhes etc










https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Karte_Stuttgart_21_aussen_Kartenwerkstatt.svg


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

TM_Germany said:


> It's only designed for 250 unfortunately.


What are the limiting factors? It looks straight enough and the tunnel diameters are big enough. Is it something that was said to be 250 for political reasons that can easily be upgraded to 300 later?


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

33Hz said:


> What are the limiting factors? It looks straight enough and the tunnel diameters are big enough. Is it something that was said to be 250 for political reasons that can easily be upgraded to 300 later?


I wouldn't be too sure of the tunnel diameters being emough. Usually 300km/h lines need twin bores or avoid head to head contact by timetabling. I also don't know if the curve radii are enough, but in any case I'm pretty pessimistic of it ever being upgraded.


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## kokomo (Sep 29, 2009)

Thanks for the input. 
It sounds shameful, on a country with existing HSLs, to build a new one aimed with a 250kmh cap. I do not know what could have been done different in order to raise the limit. But, IMHO, having such a beautiful brand new track suitable only for 250kmh and not 300 (when clearly Germany already has such as well as EMUs) looks a bit sad


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Don't worry, it get's even worse! Right now there are several brand new lines planned for speeds of 230km/h only!


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## kokomo (Sep 29, 2009)




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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

If the "Deutschlandtakt" will work, like in Switzerland, the benchmark for this idea, then it doesn't matter if the lines are fast o slow, it matters that trains reach the system node within the given time-window.
Normally nodes have an 0/30 o 15/45 simmetry, so it won't really matter if one train arrives 5 minutes earlier, connections will then just be longer. So speed is only a matter of coordination, not a feature on it's own.
If You want to speed up a line than You must take care that the new schedule fits into the pattern of the nodes, and this typically means: save 1/4h or multiples, or the effort isn't worth the trouble.

That's why Germany doesn't pursue a high-speed network able to connect larger cities in shortest times, but just what is needed to have the right schedule simmetry and distancing, to make the network work.
Passengers will get faster from A to C over B because connections are short and timetables respected, even if those traveling from A to B or B to C with no connections, will not have the fastest journey possible on their respective routes.

It works for Switzerland, will it work for Germany? Time will tell.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

I don't really like the Deutschlandtakt concept anymore. It feels way too unambitious and once those targets are reached, it will be almost impossible to archieve any improvements, since you instantly need to speed up travel by 30 or 60 minutes to make it work. Which means that Berlin-Munich willl always be 4 hours, even if it should be at least 3, Frankfurt-Berlin will be at best 3,5 h even though it should be 2,5, Hamburg to Munich will at best be 5 hours instead of 3,5h etc etc.


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## kokomo (Sep 29, 2009)

If that's the way it works, then it is not ambitious and doesn't seem to gain improvement maintaining the statu-quo for ever and ever. Quite mediocre from my perspective


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> I don't really like the Deutschlandtakt concept anymore. It feels way too unambitious and once those targets are reached, it will be almost impossible to archieve any improvements, since you instantly need to speed up travel by 30 or 60 minutes to make it work. Which means that Berlin-Munich willl always be 4 hours, even if it should be at least 3, Frankfurt-Berlin will be at best 3,5 h even though it should be 2,5, Hamburg to Munich will at best be 5 hours instead of 3,5h etc etc.


Yes, that's the downside of the idea. If You want to travel in 3.5 hours from Munich to Hamburg (as an example of may possible point-to-point routes), take the plane (or a Hyperloop). There are not enough tracks to satisfy every purpose, and so You will have to stop also in Nürnberg, Würzburg, Hannover, at least.
But if You think that Munich-Hamburg "non-stop" will transport such a huge number of pax*km to justify a dedicated line, than it should be done. Otherwise You need to compromise.


kokomo said:


> If that's the way it works, then it is not ambitious and doesn't seem to gain improvement maintaining the statu-quo for ever and ever. Quite mediocre from my perspective


"In medio stat virtus". Trains are not planes. Their major improvement is the network, not the speed for itself.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Speed is not the biggest problem at the moment, rather frequency (and of course, reliability.) Many ICE trains through the west of the country are very full, with the Munich - Hamburg via NRW route being the busiest.

Once Wendlingen-Ulm opens in December, an additional ICE from Dortmund will be routed to Munich every 2h which now terminates at Stuttgart. This means that there will be a roughly hourly connection to NRW along this route (on top of the ICE to Berlin that offers a connection to NRW in Mannheim.)


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Speed definitely is a problem. Most of the time is spend travelling on sub 160 km/h heritage lines and on slow approaches to cities. It's not even about reducing the number of stups, but just about building an actually complete HSR network. That would solve the problems with capacity, reliability and frequency as well.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Speed becomes an issue if you want to attract passengers out of other transport modes. But in a system that is already running at capacity, there aren't that many passengers that you can get out of cars or planes to take an ICE.

With a higher frequency, you can also start to skip stops. You can't realistically skip my home town Ulm if the connections to major cities (anything beyond Mannheim or Munich) only run every two hours.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> Speed definitely is a problem. Most of the time is spend travelling on sub 160 km/h heritage lines and on slow approaches to cities. It's not even about reducing the number of stups, but just about building an actually complete HSR network. That would solve the problems with capacity, reliability and frequency as well.


But it will cost a huge amount of money without the necessary revenue. No, sorry, I must disagree: speed is not the issue and looking for speed won't solve problems of capacity and reliability, maybe just frequency. That's the major fault of what we have now in Italy: many super fast trains (3h) between Milan and Rome (and I guess not a single relation between major cities in Germany will have the same potential of passengers), but the capacity of the nodes in Milan and Rome still suffers, and the reliability of the rest stays neglegible.
3 words: networking, networking and, again, networking. Whatever it costs!


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

pccvspw999 said:


> But it will cost a huge amount of money without the necessary revenue. No, sorry, I must disagree: speed is not the issue and looking for speed won't solve problems of capacity and reliability, maybe just frequency. That's the major fault of what we have now in Italy: many super fast trains (3h) between Milan and Rome (and I guess not a single relation between major cities in Germany will have the same potential of passengers), but the capacity of the nodes in Milan and Rome still suffers, and the reliability of the rest stays neglegible.
> 3 words: networking, networking and, again, networking. Whatever it costs!


Yes it solves the issues of capacity and reliability! There aren't enough tracks, which means you can't put enough trains on them. So build an HSR network with seperated slow and fast services and you suddenly have a lot more capacity. Then you can also significantly increase frequency as well.


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

TM_Germany said:


> Speed definitely is a problem.


The main problems are, I agree with Albert, capacity and reliability. Speed, i.e. travel time, may be Problem No. 3.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> Yes it solves the issues of capacity and reliability! There aren't enough tracks, which means you can't put enough trains on them. So build an HSR network with seperated slow and fast services and you suddenly have a lot more capacity. Then you can also significantly increase frequency as well.


The result will be that You fill up the HS Lines with dedicated point-to-point services, but still have to manage intermediate stops with a further service (intercities), and the old lines stay busy and unreliable as before. Still unable to fill the bulks of HS trains you have to run, just to keep the offer attractive.
The math doesn’t add up.


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

And, I think, it must be considered, that Germany is not so centralized like Spain or France. You simply can not have direct services from anywhere to anywhere, so changes, ie. scheduled key points are important. In my opinion there are more important than 5-15 minutes shorter travel time. 
But they only work of course, if trains arrive on schedule...


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

ahh yes, I see the art of explaining why it can't be done is international. I didn't think it would be that hard to understand something so simple.



pccvspw999 said:


> The result will be that You fill up the HS Lines with dedicated point-to-point services, but still have to manage intermediate stops with a further service (intercities), and the old lines stay busy and unreliable as before. Still unable to fill the bulks of HS trains you have to run, just to keep the offer attractive.
> The math doesn’t add up.


Who's talking about just having point to point services? The service patterns wouldn't need to change much, just add some point-to-point services on top if you want.



Attus said:


> And, I think, it must be considered, that Germany is not so centralized like Spain or France. You simply can not have direct services from anywhere to anywhere, so changes, ie. scheduled key points are important. In my opinion there are more important than 5-15 minutes shorter travel time.
> But they only work of course, if trains arrive on schedule...


Try 1-2 hours...


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Well I do kind of see the point that you can speed up ICE trains and let people from smaller stations take a regional train to a bigger station first. Here in Ulm it's already quite common to take the regional train to Stuttgart or Munich to save some money (as long as they are not overfull.) However, the people on the branch lines out of Ulm are very outspoken against any timetable change, as they are used to being in the ICE with one quick change of train.

Apparently, the idea of one change to get to the ICE is stuck in people's heads, which makes it hard to scrap ICE stations even if there is a good regional service (which in the case of Ulm only exists westwards, as the RE9 to Augsburg/Munich is much slower than the ICE.)

As DB Fernverkehr is run without subsidy, I think it is the most economical for them to serve many stations. That means more potential passengers without running more trains. So unless frequency can magically increase a lot, we're probably going to stick to the current stopping patterns. New-built lines can bring an improvement though, after the construction of the Frankfurt-Mannheim NBS it is planned to have one ICE route call at Darmstadt while the others skip it. This could be the model for other stations as well if frequencies are sufficient.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Again, who is talking about scrapping stops? Where did I ever mention that?


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

I'm sorry, that is probably a Pavlov reaction when someone proposes point-to-point services because of the inability to add more services on the current infrastructure.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

There seem to be two philosophical problems with how rail is approached in Germany.

We are talking in terms of railway rather than in terms of transport
We are talking too much in domestic terms only and forgetting the international dimension.

Any railway system worth their salt should have its eyes on killing domestic and other European short-haul aviation. Speed, capacity and reliability go together. The surest way to have a high-capacity and reliable inter-city railway is to have a simple point-to-point system with few intermediate calls. As my service specification diagram shows, once you have your eyes on killing domestic aviation then you do have the frequency to justify predominantly dedicated infrastructure. If the French and the Italian can do it, Germany can. Germany is displaying an unnecessary and unreasonable amount of conservatism.

The Italians seem to get it right. Milan - Naples trains only call at Bologna and Rome. Bologna is a small city where all trains call, and they do 10+10 passengers at each door with a 3-4 minute dwell. Rome dwells (including a reversal) I think are 10-15 minutes. Trains run to time and are not stupidly crowded. The only thing I don't like about the Italian system is the compulsory reservation.

I'll say something that might be controversial. I think Italian HSR provides an overall better offer than ICE in Germany.


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## kokomo (Sep 29, 2009)

Well, Italy offered the first private HS railway operator in Europe many years ago. That might give you a hint.
I feel a bit puzzled sometimes why Germany, being the #1 Economy in Europe and with vast population, does not have a high speed dedication similar to France, Italy or Spain. 
I am aware of the mixed use of high speed lines, something not applied that much on other parts, but clearly Germany does not seem to be THE example of high speed (although I love those Velaros honestly)


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

First time I read about Deutschlandtakt plan. Looks interesting and ambitious from what I could read using Google translate.


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## 33Hz (Jul 29, 2006)

NCT said:


> We are talking too much in domestic terms only and forgetting the international dimension.


Exactly this. Wendlingen - Ulm is part of the so-called "Magistrale for Europe", so to build something with a 100+ year design life that is a bottleneck from day 1, even if it is an improvement on the status quo, is really unforgivable. People are arguing over local services when the rest of Europe wants to see better international timings and Germany is in the middle of that.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

kokomo said:


> I feel a bit puzzled sometimes why Germany, being the #1 Economy in Europe and with vast population, does not have a high speed dedication similar to France, Italy or Spain.


Yes, if passenger analysis reveals that you can fill an entire train with (as an example) just Hamburg to Munich passengers, why not have a direct train on that route (and a direct route)?
Contrary to France, Italy and Spain the vast German population is not mainly concentrated in a few big cities, but over several smaller cities, that all find themselves important enough to demand an ICE stop. Also those smaller cities are all over the country instead of concentrated or more or less in a line. But even then, the German high speed network is pathetic, when compared to other countries.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

The Swiss system doesn't work for big countries where journey times are important. If you need find 30 minutes of savings in a 4-hour journey chances are you need to find 5 minutes in 6 places. That 30 minutes could be the difference of killing and not killing domestic aviation.

Planned nodal arrivals and departures only work when you have a small number of trains and a small station footprint. All your arrivals are between 50 and 57, and all your departures are being 03 and 10. Note the maximum interchange time is already 20 minutes - the minimum 6 isn't achievable with stations more than about 8 platform faces. The only places in Germany where nodal interchanges make sense are the likes of Lubeck, which is incidentally the same sort of size as Bern.

At major city nodal interchanges are both impractical and unnecessary.

You've got too many trains to arrive and depart within a 10-minute window. When you queue your trains up on minimum headways you end up with a uniform distribution of arrivals and departures in all parts of the hour
You have frequent services - 30 minutes or better. You'd be unlucky to have interchanges that are more than 25 minutes.

Germany will have S-bahn systems remaining on 20-minute cycles, and the RRX will offer a combined 15-minute service between Dortmund and Cologne. There will also be trains in the 'wrong' parts of the hour.

Trains arrive and depart in all parts of the hour at Zurich HBf, and the sheer size of the station means 5-minute interchanges are not recognised. You end up with risking a 5-minute interchange vs 35-minute planned interchange anyway, so you don't gain anything over random arrivals and departures where all services run half hourly.

The 'Germany is polycentric' or 'people live in lots of small cities' lines are overused. You just have two classes of services. Hamburg - Dusseldorf services have no business calling at Munster, Osnabruck and Bremen. Once your long-distance sprinters are moved to a dedicated high-speed line, you have released capacity on the existing lines to run 4tph Hamburg-Bremen-Osnabruck-Munster, then 2tph each Dortmund/Wupper/Cologne and Essen/Duisburg/Dusseldorf.

Don't be a bigger version of Switzerland. Be a bigger version of the Netherlands. Have a national metro.


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

M-NL said:


> Yes, if passenger analysis reveals that you can fill an entire train with (as an example) just Hamburg to Munich passengers, why not have a direct train on that route (and a direct route)?


Because, constructing that direct route, has astronomical costs, hardly justified by the amount of direct HH to M passengers. And, what is much more important: you'll never get building permits for that direct route, every single mayor, every single regional politician, and the prime ministers of Lower Saxony, North-Rhine-Westphalia and Hesse will see preventing this construction as their main political mission. The chance for constructing that route equals to zero.
And if that direct train has to use existing tracks and run through existing stations, it won't be significantly faster than it's now. But it has to share the tracks and stations with existing trains, what causes capacity issues and delays. Huge delays.
A quite complex situation. Lose-lose.

But even in Italy: there are no direct MI-RO trains bypassing BO. Do TGV trains bypassing Lyon exist? How could an ICE bypass Hanover or Nuremberg?

And you can say, Fulda does not justify an ICE stop. But with no stop in Fulda there is not possible to change there, so you need more trains...


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

NCT said:


> Trains run to time and are not stupidly crowded


German trains are. And the service is very, very unreliable, because all important railway lines are oversaturated. So, basically, demand exceeds supply even at the current speed and travel times! We can not talk about trains that run empty because of slow speed!
Example: if Cologne - Berlin or Dusseldorf - Berlin air passangers (there were ~ 40 fligths per directions from these airports to Berlin daily pre-Covid) want to travel by train, they simply can not, because there is no free capacity for them. No matter if these trains are slow, or fast, or whatever, when you can't get a seat on them. Travel time from both K and D to B are ~ 4:20. It may be discussed wether it's OK or not, but basically, even if travel time could be decresed to 0:00, no passengers could take the train instead of flying, because the trains are full. 
A new high speed line Hanover - Hamm is heavily needed, but it can't be built although Deutsche Bahn has tried it for decades. 
As for me, the main issue is that this line does not exist. It it could be built, 330, 250 or even to 200 km/h, it would be great.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

Sure, speed matters, but it matters as a result of the average speed of the complete network, speed matters for any single person in the country. There is no goal to link directly 10000 passegers per day from A to B (is there any route carrying that many passegers in Germany?) in less than 3-4 hours, the goal is to increase the distance that can be travelled from any point to any point in a given time (shorten distances between isocronus lines), maximising the population served. If travelling by plane for 500-600km distances, or even 800km, isn't sustainable anymore, this can't be replaced by rail connections having the same performace anyway. 500-600 km in 4-5 hours is perfectly suitable for most passegers, why aiming a 2,5h journey? At what costs? It wuold be easier to invent teleportation, and more cost effective


33Hz said:


> Exactly this. Wendlingen - Ulm is part of the so-called "Magistrale for Europe", so to build something with a 100+ year design life that is a bottleneck from day 1, even if it is an improvement on the status quo, is really unforgivable. People are arguing over local services when the rest of Europe wants to see better international timings and Germany is in the middle of that.


A bottleneck is caused by filling a line with 10 trains at 250km/h (or 8 at 300km/h) instead of 20 trains at 80km/h, where do You see any bottleneck in that project? Not in lack of speed.


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## PippO.SkaiO (Nov 5, 2021)

Attus said:


> But even in Italy: there are no direct MI-RO trains bypassing BO. Do TGV trains bypassing Lyon exist? How could an ICE bypass Hanover or Nuremberg?


Actually both Italo and Trenitalia offer a "non-stop" Milan-Rome service which call only at Milano Centrale, Milano Rogoredo, Roma Tiburtina and Roma Termini.
Not calling at Bologna, the railway hub of Italy, is indicative of how much point-to-point demand there's on Milan-Rome.

PS: "Every road lead to Rome" but "every railway lead to Bologna"


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Attus said:


> Because, constructing that direct route, has astronomical costs, hardly justified by the amount of direct HH to M passengers.


Obviously a 100% direct route just between HH to M makes no sense, it was just an example. You have to optimise you lines with the actual demand. 
But think of it like an Autobahn, with on and off ramps in between, so that you can go past cities at high speed, instead of having to go through them at lower speed. The thing is that the current high speed network in Germany is not a continuous network, but a high(er) speed line here and there. Currently the fastest route from HH to M is via Berlin, even though a route via Wurzburg and Hannover is much shorter:








Source:High-speed rail in Germany - Wikipedia


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

pccvspw999 said:


> A bottleneck is caused by filling a line with 10 trains at 250km/h (or 8 at 300km/h) instead of 20 trains at 80km/h, where do You see any bottleneck in that project? Not in lack of speed.


This is simply false. The same number of tph takes up roughly the same amount of capacity as long as they all travel at the same speed. There's no real difference between 18tph at 300km/h or at 80km/h. Where you have capacity killers is where you mix services with different stopping patterns and trains with different performance characteristics.

As for aviation replacement - you have to offer passengers something attractive to effect behavioural change. Telling them to stop travelling or travel slower will not cut it with passengers or voters. 3 hours is the magical watershed between train and plane attractiveness, with some pricing incentives you can increase this to about 4 hours, but beyond that you are testing voters' patience


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Attus said:


> But even in Italy: there are no direct MI-RO trains bypassing BO. Do TGV trains bypassing Lyon exist? How could an ICE bypass Hanover or Nuremberg?


Bologna is a small city where (almost) all trains stop. It gets more trains than it technically deserves, so the result is you manage to limit the numbers of boarders and alighters per door to around 10.

TGV trains between Paris and Marseille do by-pass central Lyon. They may make a stop at Lyon St Expuery which the airport/parkway station on the LGV main line.

Why couldn't an ICE bypass Hanover when LGV Sud-est bypasses Lyon, The Italian HSL main line bypasses Florence, HS2 bypasses Birmingham and Manchester, and GWML bypasses Bristol? Germany is the exception in not bypassing anywhere.

In my model Nuremberg is a through station where all trains stop, so you don't get more than 10 alighters + 10 boarders per door. Whether a medium-sized city gets bypassed and served by its own trains, or gets a through alignment where (potentially) all trains stop, depends to a large extent on how well aligned the through alignment is. Nuremberg station is well aligned on a north-west / south-east axis with relatively straight approach tracks on all sides so a through arrangement probably makes sense. Hanover station is on an orthogonal orientation to main through traffic flows (station is north west - south east but the main through flows are north east - south west), so the stopping penalty is high and a by-pass gives you a lot of journey time savings.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Attus said:


> German trains are. And the service is very, very unreliable, because all important railway lines are oversaturated. So, basically, demand exceeds supply even at the current speed and travel times! We can not talk about trains that run empty because of slow speed!
> Example: if Cologne - Berlin or Dusseldorf - Berlin air passangers (there were ~ 40 fligths per directions from these airports to Berlin daily pre-Covid) want to travel by train, they simply can not, because there is no free capacity for them. No matter if these trains are slow, or fast, or whatever, when you can't get a seat on them. Travel time from both K and D to B are ~ 4:20. It may be discussed wether it's OK or not, but basically, even if travel time could be decresed to 0:00, no passengers could take the train instead of flying, because the trains are full.
> A new high speed line Hanover - Hamm is heavily needed, but it can't be built although Deutsche Bahn has tried it for decades.
> As for me, the main issue is that this line does not exist. It it could be built, 330, 250 or even to 200 km/h, it would be great.


Building a dedicated high-speed network bypassing major cities with spurs to city centres give you both speed and capacity in the cheapest way. Bypass + connecting into existing central stations is a lot cheaper than doing Stuttgart 21s everywhere.

As for whether the city pairs generate enough demand to warrant point-to-point hourly or half-hourly services, I'd eat my hat if they didn't. The Swiss run 2tph 16-car trains between Zurich (2 million metro population) and Geneva (1 million metro population) (Bern and Lausanne are town-sized so can be considered rounding errors). German 5m metro areas will generate the numbers if the capacity can be created to accommodate them.

It sounds to me like most people understand the need for both speed and capacity and are at least sympathetic to the idea of high-speed sprinters connecting the large cities only on top of the existing slower pattern, but there's a strong sense of resignation that German political culture just isn't conducive to making such a system a reality. This political constraint seems uniquely German, the French, Italians and even British (for goodness sake) all manage it. There's a political impasse but I don't see any alternative to getting over this impasse, apart of accepting the status quo of mediocrity..


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## davide84 (Jun 8, 2008)

kokomo said:


> Well, Italy offered the first private HS railway operator in Europe many years ago.


But only after completing the first phases of the independent HS infrastructure. They provided a lot of capacity and they were intended to let the trains run fast (although the concept got lost recently).
France of course has something similar and Spain as well, but from what I read the German network is just "clogged" almost everywhere with no clear corridor where private operators could play like they do in Italy.

(Ok, in Italy it's also easier, one single corridor from North to South plus the branch to Venice. But still...)



NCT said:


> The Swiss run 2tph 16-car trains between Zurich (2 million metro population) and Geneva (1 million metro population)


And these cars are often double-decker.
And they're working to increase the frequency to 4tph on the stretches Geneva-Lausanne and Zurich-Bern...


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

M-NL said:


> Obviously a 100% direct route just between HH to M makes no sense, it was just an example. You have to optimise you lines with the actual demand.
> But think of it like an Autobahn, with on and off ramps in between, so that you can go past cities at high speed, instead of having to go through them at lower speed. The thing is that the current high speed network in Germany is not a continuous network, but a high(er) speed line here and there. Currently the fastest route from HH to M is via Berlin, even though a route via Wurzburg and Hannover is much shorter:


1., It's almost impossible to get building permits for new motorways in Germany...
2., OK, I see in some exmples I was wrong. However: if the railways before and after Hanover are oversaturated, you can only start HH - M direct services if you reduce the amount of services calling in Hanover. Do you think the prime minister of Lower Saxony will support it? Never.


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

NCT said:


> It sounds to me like most people understand the need for both speed and capacity and are at least sympathetic to the idea of high-speed sprinters connecting the large cities only on top of the existing slower pattern, but there's a strong sense of resignation that German political culture just isn't conducive to making such a system a reality. This political constraint seems uniquely German, the French, Italians and even British (for goodness sake) all manage it. There's a political impasse but I don't see any alternative to getting over this impasse, apart of accepting the status quo of mediocrity..


Correct. Germanyi is not one country but 16, what makes such investitions significantly more difficult. 



> The Swiss run 2tph 16-car trains between Zurich (2 million metro population) and Geneva (1 million metro population) (Bern and Lausanne are town-sized so can be considered rounding errors). German 5m metro areas will generate the numbers if the capacity can be created to accommodate them.


Both Shanghai and London are well above 10M, and I dare to say there are much less than a thousand passengers between them hourly. There are much less personal and business connections between M and HH than between Zurich and Geneva or Basel. 
But, what is musch more important: for me, the question is not, whether it can be justified to run a direct service between HH and M hourly, but, if it can be justified to build a new direct line (or at least some bypasses) between them? Because it's quite simple: at the moment there is no capacity for additional trains.


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

davide84 said:


> But only after completing the first phases of the independent HS infrastructure. They provided a lot of capacity and they were intended to let the trains run fast (although the concept got lost recently).
> France of course has something similar and Spain as well, but from what I read the German network is just "clogged" almost everywhere with no clear corridor where private operators could play like they do in Italy.
> 
> (Ok, in Italy it's also easier, one single corridor from North to South plus the branch to Venice. But still...)


Both France and Spain are (outside of Ile de France and Madrid are, respecitively) much more sparsely populated than Germany, what makes building new rail lines easier. The line Madrid - Zaragoza runs basically through a desert... Building a new high speed line through the Rhine-Ruhr area is a hard challenge. And getting a building permit is impossible.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Attus said:


> Correct. Germanyi is not one country but 16, what makes such investitions significantly more difficult.
> 
> 
> Both Shanghai and London are well above 10M, and I dare to say there are much less than a thousand passengers between them hourly. There are much less personal and business connections between M and HH than between Zurich and Geneva or Basel.
> But, what is musch more important: for me, the question is not, whether it can be justified to run a direct service between HH and M hourly, but, if it can be justified to build a new direct line (or at least some bypasses) between them? Because it's quite simple: at the moment there is no capacity for additional trains.


Oh behave. I’m talking primarily about things like Hamburg to Rhine-Ruhr and Frankfurt-Munich that are or could be around 3 hours or 4. Don’t forget my service patterns do generally have a small number of intermediate stops that generate Lausanne and Bern kind of numbers. Of course they’ll justify half hourly services.


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## PippO.SkaiO (Nov 5, 2021)

NCT said:


> This is simply false. The same number of tph takes up roughly the same amount of capacity as long as they all travel at the same speed. There's no real difference between 18tph at 300km/h or at 80km/h. Where you have capacity killers is where you mix services with different stopping patterns and trains with different performance characteristics.


NO

Capacity is a function of space between trains and the more fast you run the more headway you must put between vehicles due to braking distance increasing.










http://www.railway-technical.com/books-papers--articles/high-speed-railway-capacity.pdf


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

Attus said:


> 1., It's almost impossible to get building permits for new motorways in Germany...


Nobody wants a new motorway/railway/airport/[insert major civil project] in their backyards, right? 


Attus said:


> 2., OK, I see in some exmples I was wrong. However: if the railways before and after Hanover are oversaturated, you can only start HH - M direct services if you reduce the amount of services calling in Hanover. Do you think the prime minister of Lower Saxony will support it? Never.


The only thing that really works to ease oversaturated lines is new extra lines.
The point I originally made is that you could cut the current train in half, keep the current service pattern and run the other half on the new built line.
I can totally understand that you oppose a line from which you do not have any benefits yourself.
Hannover is an interesting case. It's the 12th biggest city in Germany, so it would not make sense to skip it on a Hamburg to Munich connection, but all other cities seem much smaller to me.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

PippO.SkaiO said:


> Capacity is a function of space between trains and the more fast you run the more headway you must put between vehicles due to braking distance increasing.


To some extent this is true - but you can tweak the signal distances to get an optimal capacity for a specific speed. Mixing trains with different velocity profiles is much more limiting though. If you have a slow train that takes 15 minutes longer to cover a certain length of track (due to calling at many stations, for instance) you have a 15 minute gap in your timetable in which you can't schedule any fast train unless you can let the fast train overtake the slow one somewhere.

There is some light at the end of the tunnel - at the moment, a bypass for Mannheim is being seriously considered along with the construction of the Mannheim-Karlsruhe NBS. Mannheim managed to block the bypass when the NBS Frankfurt-Mannheim and Mannheim-Stuttgart were planned, with the argument that they'd lose ICE stops if it were built. However, now the prospect of more freight trains through the city made them do a 180 and beg for a bypass, and they seem to get it anyway this time (although, it will probably only connect to Karlsruhe, not Stuttgart, at the southern end this way.)


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## Slagathor (Jul 29, 2007)

NCT said:


> The Swiss run 2tph 16-car trains between Zurich (2 million metro population) and Geneva (1 million metro population)





davide84 said:


> And these cars are often double-decker.
> And they're working to increase the frequency to 4tph on the stretches Geneva-Lausanne and Zurich-Bern...


Out of interest: do you guys know the make and type of trains that the Swiss are running on that corridor? Especially the double-deckers. I'd like to look them up in light of the Dutch railway's recent tender for new double-deckers.


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## PippO.SkaiO (Nov 5, 2021)

AlbertJP said:


> To some extent this is true - but you can tweak the signal distances to get an optimal capacity for a specific speed. Mixing trains with different velocity profiles is much more limiting though.


It's silly but my point was you can squeeze more train per hour in the same line if you run them at walking speed bc you can waste less space
Nobody are going to use them but who cares, you maxxed train capacity!  


Slagathor said:


> Out of interest: do you guys know the make and type of trains that the Swiss are running on that corridor? Especially the double-deckers. I'd like to look them up in light of the Dutch railway's recent tender for new double-deckers.


SBB RABe 502, a Bombardier TWINDEXX?
SBB use also ETR 610 and a lot of Stadler products


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

M-NL said:


> Nobody wants a new motorway/railway/airport/[insert major civil project] in their backyards, right?
> 
> The only thing that really works to ease oversaturated lines is new extra lines.
> The point I originally made is that you could cut the current train in half, keep the current service pattern and run the other half on the new built line.
> ...


Hanover is the same size as Bristol. If Bristol can have its own trains to London, Cardiff and Birmingham, Hanover can have its own trains to Hamburg, Berlin, Rhine-Ruhr, Frankfurt and Munich. 

Or put it this way, Hamburg-Frankfurt trains don’t need Hanover punters to be viable.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

NCT said:


> This is simply false. The same number of tph takes up roughly the same amount of capacity as long as they all travel at the same speed. There's no real difference between 18tph at 300km/h or at 80km/h. Where you have capacity killers is where you mix services with different stopping patterns and trains with different performance characteristics.


You're right.
But in reality You're not able to run 18 tphd at high speed even on a line made for only that purpose.
In any case the point was that 250km/h or 300km/h (homotachous service) do not represent a bottleneck due of lower speed.


NCT said:


> As for aviation replacement - you have to offer passengers something attractive to effect behavioural change. Telling them to stop travelling or travel slower will not cut it with passengers or voters. 3 hours is the magical watershed between train and plane attractiveness, with some pricing incentives you can increase this to about 4 hours, but beyond that you are testing voters' patience


But there is no matter of choice: if flying is a possible choice, then it must be available. If flying is no more sustainable, than simply it cannot be offered as a a possible choice.
But trying to reduce the behaviour trying to reduce travel time by train, is not worth the effort. It's only waste of money.
If flying shall be impossible, than You have to accept longer travel times. It's a matter of fact, "baggers can't be choosers".
That's why the time flyers were losing must be absorbed by time gained by others, so that the avarage speed of all travels will be increased. And when I say "all travels", I mean any travel by every means of trasport, even Your feet. That's the gain we shall aim to.


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

M-NL said:


> The only thing that really works to ease oversaturated lines is new extra lines.


It's exactly what I say. And I say, too, that constructing those lines is much more important than the actual speed they would be built for. Even a ridiculous 160 km/h would be useful, since Germany has a serious capacity issue. Capacity and reliability are, in my opinion, more important than speed itself.
However, I can't see those extra lines to be constructed ever.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

I made an attempt to draw a "complete" HSR network for Germany. The darker the color, the more important I think it is, from purple being "this should have been built 20 years ago" to dashed light blue being "this is nice but the cost/benefit of this is realistically the same as burning cash to heat your home". Even just the purple and dark blue parts would seperate fast and slow traffic on almost all important corridors and massively increase capacity, reliability and speeds. Unfortunately, only a fraction of that is being planned and most of that is in the usual half-assed German way. It would be quite ambitious, the network would then be about the size of Spain's, but it would certainly be doable if the administrative processes around getting building permits would be changed. 
Another serious issue would then be the stations themselves, though. Major hubs like Cologne or Hamburg don't have any spare capacity and can hardly be expanded. Many cities would proably have to be reworked into multi-station hubs to increase capacity.


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## LtBk (Jul 27, 2004)

There is better chance of those plans being realized in Germany than in the USA.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

LtBk said:


> There is better chance of those plans being realized in Germany than in the USA.


I wouldn't be so sure about that. Even though it has it's problems, CAHSR in it's final form is comparable in scope to what I've drawn there.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> I made an attempt to draw a "complete" HSR network for Germany. The darker the color, the more important I think it is, from purple being "this should have been built 20 years ago" to dashed light blue being "this is nice but the cost/benefit of this is realistically the same as burning cash to heat your home". Even just the purple and dark blue parts would seperate fast and slow traffic on almost all important corridors and massively increase capacity, reliability and speeds. Unfortunately, only a fraction of that is being planned and most of that is in the usual half-assed German way. It would be quite ambitious, the network would then be about the size of Spain's, but it would certainly be doable if the administrative processes around getting building permits would be changed.
> Another serious issue would then be the stations themselves, though. Major hubs like Cologne or Hamburg don't have any spare capacity and can hardly be expanded. Many cities would proably have to be reworked into multi-station hubs to increase capacity.
> 
> View attachment 3754725


Not a million miles away from what I'd propose - in fact you propose quite a few more lines in directions that are not current typical rail routes, like Rhine-Ruhr to Erfurt. The only thing I'd add is Hanover west (and south) bypasses - south potentially less critical but it's obvious Hamburg to Rhine-Ruhr via Hanover carries a significant alignment penalty on top of the stopping penalty, whereas Nuremburg doesn't represent a significant alignment penalty.

I'm not worried for terminus stations like Munich and Frankfurt with plenty of terminating platforms, nor am I worried about Berlin - I think I've established general operating principles with services terminating and Ostbahnhof and Gesundbrunen. Hamburg will be ok with Altona. 

Cologne will be tricky. As far as I can make out, the track layout to the west of Cologne HBf is, from north to south:

S bahn westbound
S bahn eastbound
to Dormagen
to Aachen
to Bonn
from Dormagen
from Aachen
from Bonn

This layout isn't conducive to having terminating services. I wonder if such an arrangement could be sensible:

2tph services from the Frankfurt direction to Aachen
2-4tph services from Hamburg/Berlin directions go to Bonn and/or Koblenz

There is a lot of yard space west of Cologne Hbf - are they capable of turning around trains?

Then if you have services with 12-minute dwells (a compromise position from my 15 minutes: 12-minute dwells plus 3-minute platform reoccupation gives you 4tph per platform), the 9-platform station should still be able handle quite a lot of trains. You might have 5 minutes for terminating services and 10 minutes for originating, but that gets into timetable asymmetry which may or may not be a problem. It's too late in the day to count up all the services (and all the regionals) to see if all the platforms are enough. I've got a funny suspicion that the ordering of lines west of Hbf and east of Messe Deutz may not be entirely symmetrical ...


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

There is a sketch of the lines around Cologne Hbf on page 6 of: https://fahrweg.dbnetze.com/resourc...96481b8f9bfd0b167f4/PEK_Koeln_220113-data.pdf

This asymmetry is also made clear with a few examples of regional trains in figure 12 (page 14). Besides, this document contains a lot of measures that will be taken (or have recently been taken) to improve the flow of trains in the Cologne area.

A significant part of the traffic at Cologne consists of high-speed trains that come from Frankfurt, reverse in the station on the central platforms 4/5/6, and then go on to Düsseldorf or Wuppertal (or the other way around). Trains to Bonn/Koblenz carry much less passengers. There are 1-2 IC/ICE trains an hour via Koblenz and they aren't full: you can often cut the price of your trip across Germany in half by taking the detour via Koblenz. The west side is thus not nearly as problematic as the east side.


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## Baron Hirsch (Jan 31, 2009)

I don't believe this whole ghost debate. 
For the record: there ARE point-to-point ICEs. Since a year or two, DB is operating a non-stop ICE Berlin-Cologne, which then peters out to Bonn, but that can be considered part of the same agglomeration. They were added in addition to the hourly all-stops ICE, departing 5 minutes before them. I have taken them mainly during lockdown, but from what I have seen, they are doing quite well. Unfortunately, they hardly save time, only 15 minutes, as most of the route is not on HSR, and as there are no bypasses or the bypasses are busy with other trains, the non-stop ICE passes through Hannover and Dortmund Hbf's at a crawl. One could maybe open the doors and allow people to jump off... Nonetheless, it is a much more chilled atmosphere, without half the carriage jumping up and leaving every half hour or so, and to my impression, they manage to keep to their schedule, which the all stops ICE often do not. 
So yes, it can be done. Problem being, without dedicated through tracks, which exist in only a few and rather minor stops on the dedicated HSRs, the time gain is minimal. And as said above, it is difficult to route them through an already busy network. 
And you guys can draw your fantasy maps as much as you like. Of course the country would need more serious infrastructure, but we can be happy if the few improvements, many of which are half-hearted compromises with NIMBYs or budget-conscious planners, are ever implemented. Yes, things could get better, as awareness for the benefits of rail has improved. But this country will not become the next China, no matter how many fantasy maps you draw.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> Again, who is calling for a direct route Berlin-Munich that bypasses everything else? Why are you debating such non-exisitent points?


You. Because when You write this:


TM_Germany said:


> I don't really like the Deutschlandtakt concept anymore. It feels way too unambitious and once those targets are reached, it will be almost impossible to archieve any improvements, since you instantly need to speed up travel by 30 or 60 minutes to make it work. *Which means that Berlin-Munich willl always be 4 hours, even if it should be at least 3*, Frankfurt-Berlin will be at best 3,5 h even though it should be 2,5, Hamburg to Munich will at best be 5 hours instead of 3,5h etc etc.


the only consequence is a direct route point-to-point. Travelling the distance under 3h in can be achieved with only one or two calls at stations along the HS line. There is no way around.


TM_Germany said:


> 4 hours is a terrible travel time, with an average speed of only about 170 km/h, it's hardly competetive with air.


Sure, it's a treshold time, but there is no competition: air travel will be prohibited or it will stay the best solution to travel that distance for 50% of the journeys. The other will take the train also with 4 or 4,5 hours.
Claiming 3h is simply unfeasable if You want to serve the most people along the line (and You can't fill the trains otherwise). Also making the missing bits You can safe just 15 min, but there is no need for that: 200/230km/h on a ABS (Ausbaustrecke/improved old line) are enough, and 4 tracks are far from being saturated then, the only reason to build another 2 tracks in a not foreseeable future.


Dase said:


> Umm, there is a highspeed-line between Erfurt and Nürnberg, it's the one we are talking about.


Partly. Between Nueremberg and Bamberg, and a little strech further, DB is building a "improved old line", doubling tracks and increasing speed up to 200-230km/h.
The HS-line (in German: SFS "Schnellfahrstrecke" or NBS "Neubaustrecke") ends north of Ebensfeld, after having crossed the "Mittelgebirge" coming from Erfurt


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Dase said:


> Umm, there is a highspeed-line between Erfurt and Nürnberg, it's the one we are talking about.


No, there is a high speed line between Erfurt und Ebensfeld, which is only half the way to Nuremburg. The rest is a regular old line with 160 km/h. It's being upgraded to 230km/h now, which is better than nothing, but it's ridiculous both in time frame (because apparantly this couldn't have been done in the 20 years it took for the rest to be built) and because there should just be real HSL all the way.



Dase said:


> Which is not being done, because all the money was spent on infrastructure. Seriously, have a look at train connections that do not go via Madrid in Spain, it's ridiculous.


Buying trains is downright pocket change compared to building infrastructure. Your argument is BS and I hope you know it too, but are merely too proud to concede it.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

There may be a case of having bitten off more than it could chew, but the lack of train services on Spain's network is primarily a function of Renfe's lack of commercial acumen. Spain's main cities are big, trains that do run are full and fares are not that low. I'd be extremely surprised if they couldn't run more trains and still stay in surplus. The 'all the money was spent on infrastructure so there's no money to run trains' point doesn't hold.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

I disagree that Germans look down on France and don´t want to learn as it is assumed in the article. It´s more that federal thing. No county (Länder) should have the feeling of being left behind and so they do a little here and a little there. They simply don´t think the core-network in a national way like it´s done in France and say: Oh we realize that Frankfurt-tunnel and surrounding HSR is they key to a massive improvement in the whole of Germany.

It would be a great idea if a poltical party would create a Verkehrsprojekte Deutsche Einheit 2.0, call it projects for climate change or whatever. Sum up 20 HSR-projects and give them a special status to speed up planning and building. I´m old enough to remember how expressive those projects were back in the 1990s.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

pccvspw999 said:


> You. Because when You write this:
> 
> the only consequence is a direct route point-to-point. Travelling the distance under 3h in can be achieved with only one or two calls at stations along the HS line. There is no way around.


You misunderstood me. Deutschlandtakt prevents faster travel times because every node needs to be reached at a certain clock time. So, as a theoretical example, if we devided the journey into even 4 parts: Berlin-Erfurt-Nuremberg-Munich, under the Deutschlandtakt they would each need to be an hour long, so that trains arrive in each station at every full hour or every half hour. However, in many cases you could rather easily upgrade the infrastructure to shorten the legs to something like e.g. 50 minutes, which would shorten the total travel time to e.g. 3:20, however since that would destroy the "clockface" aspect, it wouldn't be done.




pccvspw999 said:


> Sure, it's a treshold time, but there is no competition: air travel will be prohibited or it will stay the best solution to travel that distance for 50% of the journeys. The other will take the train also with 4 or 4,5 hours.
> Claiming 3h is simply unfeasable if You want to serve the most people along the line (and You can't fill the trains otherwise). Also making the missing bits You can safe just 15 min, but there is no need for that: 200/230km/h on a ABS (Ausbaustrecke/improved old line) are enough, and 4 tracks are far from being saturated then, the only reason to build another 2 tracks in a not foreseeable future.


I don't think "we should accept mediocrity because the competition will be banned anyway" is a great argument.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

tunnel owl said:


> I disagree that Germans look down on France and don´t want to learn as it is assumed in the article. It´s more that federal thing. No county (Länder) should have the feeling of being left behind and so they do a little here and a little there. They simply don´t think the core-network in a national way like it´s done in France and say: Oh we realize that Frankfurt-tunnel and surrounding HSR is they key to a massive improvement in the whole of Germany.
> 
> It would be a great idea if a poltical party would create a Verkehrsprojekte Deutsche Einheit 2.0, call it projects for climate change or whatever. Sum up 20 HSR-projects and give them a special status to speed up planning and building. I´m old enough to remember how expressive those projects were back in the 1990s.


I agree. I think we should move away from doing piecemeal projects here and there and actually propose a nationwide and trans-european HSR network. That way you can also write it into law and get rid of significant hurdles. It beceomes much less of "why should we have to suffer the construction of a line when the train doesn't stop here" but a "you lose some but win much more"


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

NCT said:


> There may be a case of having bitten off more than it could chew, but the lack of train services on Spain's network is primarily a function of Renfe's lack of commercial acumen. Spain's main cities are big, trains that do run are full and fares are not that low. I'd be extremely surprised if they couldn't run more trains and still stay in surplus. The 'all the money was spent on infrastructure so there's no money to run trains' point doesn't hold.


We will see with their network opened to competition what will happen, but still, Spain isn't Germany.


tunnel owl said:


> [...]No county (Länder) should have the feeling of being left behind and so they do a little here and a little there.[...]


There is a reason why Germany is a federation, because You can't leave behind the single "Länders". It's a given fact that will not change. And it would be a really bad idea to change this fact.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

pccvspw999 said:


> There is a reason why Germany is a federation, because You can't leave behind the single "Länders". It's a given fact that will not change. And it would be a really bad idea to change this fact.


I can only think of a single instance where Germany being a federation of states has ever actually had an impact in an HSL, it being the Montabaur station on the Cologne-Frankfurt HSL, since it briefly runs through Rheinland-Pfalz. Usually, every state has at least one sizeable city that benefits directly from a HSL, so they have no reason to complain. Every other problem stems from local (town level) politics, where it really wouldn't be different whether Germany was a federation or a centralised state.


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

tunnel owl said:


> It´s more that federal thing. No county (Länder) should have the feeling of being left behind and so they do a little here and a little there.


In Spain this is no different, with every province wanting to have a fast service from its capital to Madrid. This lead to heated debates when the line from Vigo to Santiago de Compostela (and onwards to Orense) was built via Pontevedra, because people in Vigo believed that this detour was taken to satisfy the provincial capital Pontevedra and felt insulted that they got a non-direct high speed line, even though connecting them to Santiago at the same time made a lot of sense from a network perspective.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> You misunderstood me.


Pardon me, I understood You quite well. You used that argument to blame on "Deutschaldtakt", but Your statement, You claim is *"...Berlin-Munich...should be at least 3..."*, and this has nothing to do with "Deutschlandtakt", it's Your proposition. And this proposition means as a inevitable consequence, and I repeat myself:


pccvspw999 said:


> ...is a direct route point-to-point. Travelling the distance under 3h in can be achieved with only one or two calls at stations along the HS line.


There is no way around as travelling around any other city in between.


TM_Germany said:


> I don't think "we should accept mediocrity because the competition will be banned anyway" is a great argument.


There is nothing "mediocre" to have the best overall performance getting every people from any point to any point in the country the fastest way possible, means the highest "average speed", including connection times and feeder times, and not only by train, but including every other means of transport. "Mediocrity" is thinking that "top speed" is the best.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

pccvspw999 said:


> Pardon me, I understood You quite well. You used that argument to blame on "Deutschaldtakt", but Your statement, You claim is *"...Berlin-Munich...should be at least 3..."*, and this has nothing to do with "Deutschlandtakt", it's Your proposition. And this proposition means as a inevitable consequence, and I repeat myself:


How about you get off your high horse for a moment. I think a 3 hour travel time can be quite well realized following the general routing they take today, if only the infrastructure were up to standards. Some services would stop at many stations along the line, some would stop only in a couple places, just as is the case today. There is no need to build an entirely seperate Berlin-Munich HSL for that purpose, so please just calm the f down



pccvspw999 said:


> There is nothing "mediocre" to have the best overall performance getting every people from any point to any point in the country the fastest way possible, means the highest "average speed", including connection times and feeder times, and not only by train, but including every other means of transport. "Mediocrity" is thinking that "top speed" is the best.


You don't need a clockface schedule to achieve high frequence and good connections between trains. Having your trains stop at 10:18 rather than 10:30 might be less aesthetically pleasing, but if it gets you to your destination (including connecting passengers) 12 minutes faster, I'd take it.


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## tunnel owl (May 19, 2013)

I don´t want to change the federal system and it´s impossible. But it helps to keep in mind how other countries act, to see the disadvantages of the own system. It would definetely help to have a national strategy for HSR in Germany now. If I take the 20 important projects in Germany, nearly any county would have a project on that list, but there must be priorities.

Decades ago the decision for the first HSR was made for Hannover-Würzburg instead of Cologne-Frankfurt which should have been the first one initially. The main reason was, that there was more benefit for the whole country of West-Germany as Cologne-Frankfurt would have been an isolated project for a longer time. So we have this system with it´s obscure gaps in it, but each new HSR did improve journey-time at least a little bit for many passengers. This strategy was ok but ICE is a victim of it´s own success and now it´s necessary to create a metro-like HSR-cervice with dense intervals on a core-network with dedicated tracks. Another thing is to have such a dedicated network for freight-traffic as Germany is a transit-country. Now they talk about Deutschlandtakt. I still remember Netz 21. Sadly, it was silently buried, but the idea we talk about isn´t a new thing.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

TM_Germany said:


> I can only think of a single instance where Germany being a federation of states has ever actually had an impact in an HSL, it being the Montabaur station on the Cologne-Frankfurt HSL, since it briefly runs through Rheinland-Pfalz. Usually, every state has at least one sizeable city that benefits directly from a HSL, so they have no reason to complain. Every other problem stems from local (town level) politics, where it really wouldn't be different whether Germany was a federation or a centralised state.


There is nothing to complain, in fact. But it's also the reason because Germany has not, and in my opinion shall not have, an HS network like France or Spain.
Frankfurt-Köln is the one and only line build accordigly to those who claim faster connections, and it works only because the corridor in between these two cities is highly served, with a demand form travelers coming from every part of Germany and by plane, who have the need to use that corridor. Montabaur has no "networking effect" but it discloses to rail travel a poorly served region with a difficult orography. And it's only 1h travel.


TM_Germany said:


> How about you get off your high horse for a moment. I think a 3 hour travel time can be quite well realized following the general routing they take today, if only the infrastructure were up to standards. Some services would stop at many stations along the line, some would stop only in a couple places, just as is the case today. There is no need to build an entirely seperate Berlin-Munich HSL for that purpose, so please just calm the f down


I'm absolutely calm, and You are wrong: You cannot travel in 3 hours from Munich to Berlin calling at "a couple of places", if this two places are inside the cities. It's a matter of fact, even with an "infrastructure up to standard" (Which standard? There is no "standard", 200-250-300 is commonly accepted to be "up-to-date").
Milan-Rome is aprox the same distance between Munich and Berlin. The traveltime of "at least" 3h is acheived by skipping Bologna and Florence, and the complete line is almost "up-to-date".
The same would be necessary for the route Munich-Berlin: no stops, neither ad Nuremberg (are You nuts?) nor at Halle (that means also Leipzig). And these train serve only Milan and Rome, no connections, no system, no coordination with regional trains. Medium cities like Reggio, Parma and Modena are left behind. But Italy isn't Germany, it's long and narrow and Rome is exactly in it's middle. Everything travels through or around Rome and Milan is the major hub for all northern Italy, followed by Bologna.
3h are a point-to-point connection from Milan to Rome. The same will be needed to make Munich-Berlin in 3h.
And I'm sure: even if the traveltime from Milan to Rome will increase to 4h in case of an "Italiatakt", no one will return to air travel, even if Milan has the best located airport of any of these cities: Linate, 10 minutes from city centre by U-Bahn (when it is open)


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Germany's regional trains are quite good and I don't believe there's a case for worry,

Having long-distance services hived off to new HS tracks should mean there's capacity on the classic network to run 4tph Milan-Placenza-Parma-Modena-Bologna regional metro services - this is a Rhine-Ruhr-Express equivalent market. That this isn't done is a failure on Italy's part and there's no reason to believe the same would happen to Germany.

On the contrary if Sprinters are allowed to operate half-hourly services largely segregated, then the existing network can handle more regular and more frequent all-principal-station RE or IC services.

When you have services running half hourly or 4tph as standard, meeting nodal times becomes much less critical. Your connection is never more than 30 minutes away (in practice mostly under 20) and in a large interchange station you appreciate having that time anyway.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

tunnel owl said:


> I don´t want to change the federal system and it´s impossible. But it helps to keep in mind how other countries act, to see the disadvantages of the own system.


I understand that You wan't to change the federal system, but there is no gain in "seeing the own disadvantages", because these are a consequence of the system itself. So, or You change the system, or You keep the disadvantages. The strategy of what is planned is exaclty what the system allows, and this means: 4h from Munich to Berlin, 5h (at best, now it is either 7h) from Hamburg to Munich, aso..
Add another 30min due to "Deutsclandtakt" (it's only a "worst scenario" suggestion), but these 30 minutes mean: hours spared for those who have not fast connections at their front door.

If it works, of course. I have many concerns that it will work on the huge scale of an entire nation, of the size and complexity like Germany. It would probably work in Spain: sparse cities distributed on a large country, connected together with performing, new railway lines (there was no railway network in Spain before HS, there were railway lines with a different purpose), interconnecting with local "Cercanias/Rodalies". 240 inh./sqkm against 94inh./sqkm, it's a huge difference, it makes the difference.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

If a service runs point-to-point, or provides a small number of bonus calls in secondary locations (non-hub stations), and the service washes its own face, then what does it matter whether the service passes through intermediate location in the wrong part of the hour? Such a service exists over and above the national clockface timetable.


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## pccvspw999 (Aug 13, 2009)

NCT said:


> Germany's regional trains are quite good and I don't believe there's a case for worry,
> 
> Having long-distance services hived off to new HS tracks should mean there's capacity on the classic network to run 4tph Milan-Placenza-Parma-Modena-Mologna regional metro services - this is a Rhine-Ruhr-Express equivalent market. That this isn't done is a failure on Italy's part and there's no reason to believe the same would happen to Germany.
> 
> ...


Whishful thinking, nothing more. And wrong: new tracks are needed, but not VHS (Very-high-speed: >250km/h). 200-250km/h, and somewhere may be a streck with 300km/h, are enough but in a functioning network.
In "northern" Italy it may work, what You suggest, but it doesn't for a couple of reasons. In Germany not, just Frakfurt-Köln (but there is already a VHS-line, who complains?). You are undermining the idea of network itself, to have two separate level of services, like planes and trains are today. But if You have money to spare, and it's an arkward amount of money btw., You're wellcome. Not my concern.


NCT said:


> If a service runs point-to-point, or provides a small number of bonus calls in secondary locations (non-hub stations), and the service washes its own face, then what does it matter whether the service passes through intermediate location in the wrong part of the hour? Such a service exists over and above the national clockface timetable.


It doesnì't matter, but then You have to answer another question I already posed: is there any relation in Germany that achieves this kind of result? Is there any relation by plane that will provide the necessary, additional demand?


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## PippO.SkaiO (Nov 5, 2021)

Dase said:


> Which is not being done, because all the money was spent on infrastructure. Seriously, have a look at train connections that do not go via Madrid in Spain, it's ridiculous.


That's true but RENFE isn't the only one offering high speed services in Spain now. They choosed to build lines leading to Madrid first spending very little on other routes that's why HSR services which bypasses it are impractical (for now).


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## TER200 (Jan 27, 2019)

PippO.SkaiO said:


> It's silly but my point was you can squeeze more train per hour in the same line if you run them at walking speed bc you can waste less space


Don't forget trains are long, and when driving really slow they can take minutes to pass entirely and clear a piece of track.


pccvspw999 said:


> But in reality You're not able to run 18 tphd at high speed even on a line made for only that purpose.


This is the pretension of the British HS2.


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## Stuu (Feb 7, 2007)

PippO.SkaiO said:


> NO
> 
> Capacity is a function of space between trains and the more fast you run the more headway you must put between vehicles due to braking distance increasing.
> View attachment 3753913
> ...


Certainly that means the distances are greater, but that makes no practical difference. A train travelling at 300 km/h is doing 3km every minute, they can easily stop within 4-6km from that speed so there is no practical reason why a 300 km/h railway couldn't run at two minute headways. The real constraints are the stations and the passengers

No one is going to run 360 km/h trains being driven manually, and even if they were, a response time of 20 seconds would see you fired from any train driving job on the planet


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Yeah, I can see stitching tunnelled eastbound S-bahn lines back up with the complex junctions east of Hbf (flyovers towards Hammerbrook almost immediately) would get extremely messy.

It's not really the Lubeck/Berlin side of HBf that's constrained - it's the Harburg side that needs relieving (my platform occupancy calculations shows a level of use too intense to be comfortable all day, and that's already with a degree of rationing of service level).

I do see the attraction in burying the S-bahn west of Hbf so the Lubeck/Berlin lines have their own lines west. In my service pattern 22tph going west of Hbf from the Harburg side already leaves insufficient room for everything else.

I'm not sure running RB/RE8 series services (from Bad O) through helps matters. Currently these and RB/RE7 series (from Eidelstedt way) terminate in two platforms which is already pretty efficient - if there was a reason to run them through they would already, so terminating them must have advantages.

I don't see the appeal in Harburg - Eidelstedt and Bad O - Altona pairings. Services (especially ICEs) to Harburg travel a long way, so you want to ensure on-time departure and freshly prepared trains for passengers as much as possible, that means starting them fresh in Hamburg (at Altona). There is such an imbalance in traffic between the Harburg side and the Eidelstedt side that numbers just don't match up.


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

Wasn't there a plan to relocate to Eidelstedt the ICE operations now based in Altona? Actually IIRC they wanted to relocate there the entire station, except for the S part.
Their point would be to avoid the ICE reversal in Altona, just going straight from depot through a "western main node" (being Eidelstedt) and then continuing towards Hbf.

That's why I'm considering those pairings, it's just a mix of DB's intentions and what Altona's junctions would allow without massive rebuilding. I don't consider Eidelstedt particularly attractive either, but it is what it is...

Given that, I'd just keep Altona as a regional terminus for both Harburg and Lubeck lines (can be done, flyovers wise), hoperfully relieving some pressure from the S corridors by allowing more passengers to reach the west side without a change in Hbf. Not millions of people but still a new connection within the city.
Some extra works would be needed to properly connect the Lubeck lines to Eidelstedt, but that might be not necessary at all: as you said Hbf's Lubeck platforms have some spare capacity, so an ICE from Berlin might just reverse there without much fuss.

An interesting feature of moving the S corridor underground is to move the Sternschanze stop a bit north to Schlump, intercepting both U2 and U3. Not a deal maker but still nice.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

Altona will be completely replaced by an expanded station in Diebsteich


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## PippO.SkaiO (Nov 5, 2021)

*ICE3 neo (class 408) starts service between Frankfurt and Cologne*








Neuer ICE 3 neo ist unterwegs: Was ändert der Zug für Bahnreisen?


Der neue ICE der Deutschen Bahn ist unterwegs. Der ICE 3 neo sieht dem Vorgängermodell zwar ähnlich, doch er hat einige Neuerungen und Verbesserungen für Reisende. Wir verraten, welche das sind.




www.reisereporter.de




ICE3 408 class will be certified only for Germany, Belgium & Netherlands (407 was certified also in France and Switzerland).


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

They don't even care to hide their inability to line up windows and seats. They even showcase it in the presentation, they must be really proud.


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## Xorcist (Jun 18, 2006)

Wilhem275 said:


> They don't even care to hide their inability to line up windows and seats. They even showcase it in the presentation, they must be really proud.


This is the toddler compartment. A protected space specially designed to meet the needs of families with children of breastfeeding and crawling age (0 to 5 years). With space for crawling and playing, a fold-out changing table, extra space for prams and an *additional separate 5th seat where mothers can breastfeed in peace or baby carriers can be securely fastened.* The spacing of this single seat makes perfect sense.


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## TER200 (Jan 27, 2019)

I think Wilhem's post was about the second picture, where we see a first-class seat with basically no view outside.
As a French I'm quite used to that ; however seeing those quite narrow seats with so much emptyness on each side looks strange (I know it's not very different from the current ICEs)..


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## JB Colbert (Jul 23, 2009)

Stuu said:


> Presentation here. The plan is to remove the S bahn from the ground level so the platforms can be reused for longer distance trains. Given German planning, I doubt any of us will be alive to see it happen


It depeds on how old are you!


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## Wilhem275 (Apr 7, 2006)

TER200 said:


> I think Wilhem's post was about the second picture, where we see a first-class seat with basically no view outside.


Exactly:


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## AndreiB (Dec 2, 2009)

Those seats could be way wider - so much wasted space.


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## robbo2k (Feb 25, 2004)




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## TER200 (Jan 27, 2019)

AndreiB said:


> Those seats could be way wider - so much wasted space.


It seems once again DB decided to use the same seats in both classes, with just a little more foam and cover in first class.


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## M-NL (Sep 18, 2012)

AndreiB said:


> Those seats could be way wider - so much wasted space.


Wide enough is wide enough. I'd rather have wider armrests or more space in between then a wider seat. Yes, it may look weird, but in the end, it is seating comfort that matters most, not seat width.


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## AndreiB (Dec 2, 2009)

M-NL said:


> Wide enough is wide enough. I'd rather have wider armrests or more space in between then a wider seat. Yes, it may look weird, but in the end, it is seating comfort that matters most, not seat width.


I think TGV gets it right. Best 1st class train seats imho:


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## PippO.SkaiO (Nov 5, 2021)

M-NL said:


> Wide enough is wide enough. I'd rather have wider armrests or more space in between then a wider seat. Yes, it may look weird, but in the end, it is seating comfort that matters most, not seat width.


I thought this was an american-only problem


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

Badly aligned seats in First Class is really poor.


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## TCM_091 (May 18, 2021)

neuromancer said:


> Y vamos con lo más interesante que había por allí que no sé si es novedad:
> 
> 
> View attachment 4261023
> ...


From the spanish Forum. The first ICE-L are already waiting on the factory.


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## TM_Germany (Nov 7, 2015)

With relatively little fanfare, the 60km segment between Wendlingen and Ulm of the high speed line that will continue to Stuttgart, has opened to revenue service yesterday. DB made a documentary about the project for anyone who is interested.


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## yc1000 (Apr 7, 2020)

PippO.SkaiO said:


> *ICE3 neo (class 408) starts service between Frankfurt and Cologne*
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Will all ICE 3neo be able to drive in Belgium and the Netherlands or only a subset of these?


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

All of them are the same, there are no different versions for abroad like with the ICE3(M).


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## Attus (Jul 9, 2010)

There is the Nuremberg cross. That means, a train from the North and one from the West arrives at the same time, calls at the opposite sides of the same platform, waits several minutes so that passangers can change. After that one of them runs towards souths and one towards east. It happens in every second hours (and additionally at 13:30 as well). Wunderful, isn't it?
However ... it does only work if both trains arrive on time (or they have accidentally the same delay), what is everything but usual.
And, you know, a lot of passengers change trains there, or at least they try to. So a lot of passengers are (or could be) happy with the current schedule, speed and travel times if the trains were reliable. But they are not. Yet, they are full. So we need reliability and capacity. Now.


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## NCT (Aug 14, 2009)

There are no quick wins, and improvements in reliability and capacity have to be planned and delivered systematically. Frequencies need to be higher, and to accommodate higher frequencies new tracks are needed. The best way to operate an intensive service reliability is to separate out services at different speeds, the cheapest way to provide new capacity is to build new lines away from settlements - i.e. high-speed tracks between the major cities only without going through every town and village in between.

Nuremburg should be having 4tph each towards Erfurt, Fulda and Frankfurt, 2tph to Vienna and metro-frequency to Munich.


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## JB Colbert (Jul 23, 2009)

Hi folks, which new HS lines are foreseen in the near future?
Is there a plan, if any, where the new lines are depicted?

BR


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## AlbertJP (Aug 28, 2018)

Check these posts which were made a year ago in this topic:









GERMANY | High Speed Rail


It is true though, that most of these projects are still relatively far away. I'll try to order some of these projects according to how far along they are at the top of my head: Category A: Ongoing 1) Stuttgart 21 supposed to be finished in 2025, it's not really a HSR project in the...




www.skyscrapercity.com





(From "category A" there, the Wendlingen-Ulm route has meanwhile opened.)


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