Autonomous Rail Cars

[zugmann]

I would rather some answers be thought about before we commit the billions of tax dollars  (you know the gov't will be the ones footing the bill one way or another) in a failing enterprise. 

A to B is the easy part.  Yarding, switching, delivering, inspecting, etc is the part that will be a bit more difficult. 

[jeffhergert]

Obviously the way to get freight lost to trucks back on the rails is to act like a truck.  Only without the flexability, convenience, and maybe once all is said and done, the cost of a truck.

One other thing not mentioned.  In the last 30 years or so many facilities, either production or distribution, have been built away from a railroad.  Some locations with rail service have developed industrial parks away from the railroad, but with great highway access.

This is a system that will either completely change the way that railroads are structured and operated (unlikely) or be such a small part of the transport picture that it's almost irrelevant (more likely).

Jeff  

[BaltACD]

jeffhergert

Obviously the way to get freight lost to trucks back on the rails is to act like a truck.  Only without the flexability, convenience, and maybe once all is said and done, the cost of a truck.

One other thing not mentioned.  In the last 30 years or so many facilities, either production or distribution, have been built away from a railroad.  Some locations with rail service have developed industrial parks away from the railroad, but with great highway access.

This is a system that will either completely change the way that railroads are structured and operated (unlikely) or be such a small part of the transport picture that it's almost irrelevant (more likely).

Jeff  

21st Century railroads are not interested in car load customers.  Train load customers are all they really are looking for.  Car load customers create the requirement for too much terminal support and thus too much cost.

21st Century railroading is all about cost avoidance more that it is in revenue enhancement.  They want a much higer percentage of all revenue generated brought straight to the bottom line without incurring costs along the way.

[Erik_Mag]

That's why I think that the role, if any, for autonomous railcars is in the terminal (think self assembling and self disassembling trains). Individual railcars traveling down a line break two advantages of a train: first is more efficient use of track space/time; second the frontal area of a single car is about the same as a train. The trains would most likely be locomotive hauled.

Side note about braking: From what I've read, the highest reliable factor of adhesion for braking is 10%. At 30mph, this translates into a 300' stopping distance from when the brakes take hold (I'm in no way saying that a 100 car freight train is going to stop in 300' from 30mph). At 15mph and 25% factor of adhesion, stopping distance would be 30' assuming the brakng effort was applied instantly. I would expect an autonomous rail car to use very quick acting regenerative braking, but that assumes the sensors are up to snuff (right now, they're not).

Railroading as mass transportation, is not a new concept, Martin Stevers 1933 book, Steel Trails, makes frequent mention that railroading works best with large scale transportation, i.e. wholesale, not retail. OTOH, the problem with not pursuing revenue enhancement is that it may enventually lead to revenue declines.

[greyhounds]

I like mine with lettuce and tomato

Heinz 57 and french fied potatoes

Big kosher pickle and a cold draft beer

Well, good God Almighty, which way do I steer?

 

That’s what I feel like. Which way do I steer? As in, what do I reply to first?

 

I guess I’ll start with the incompatibility issue. As I opined, Parallel Systems is probably wiz bang good with computers, AI, sensors, engineering, etc. But I think they lack the needed experience and knowledge of operating on the North American rail network. And that’s just what we have, a network.

 

Networks and incompatible equipment just don’t play well together. I had more than enough experience with RoadRailers to forever reinforce that in my mind. It was a near religious belief at RoadRailer that their equipment should not be operated in trains with other intermodal equipment.  I strongly disagreed. Two things happened: 1) I got fired, and 2) RoadRailer failed.

 

What I proposed was a modification of the Parallel Systems concept that carried T’d up containers in small unit trains. These trains would be powered by small autonomous battery electric locomotives. The containers would be circus loaded on modified TOFC flatcars (like the old Exxpressway Cars) that would be fully compatible for interchange. Or the containers could be taken off their chassis at a regular intermodal terminal and double stacked. There is no compatibility issue with such a system.

 

Let’s see, what else?

 

“I’m not using any of Parallel Systems intellectual property.” 1) I disagree and, 2) who cares? The most important technological breakthrough here is autonomous operation.  This should reduce costs enough to make quality intermodal service viable for origins and destinations such as Cedar Rapids. Such service does not currently exist, leaving a whole lot of freight on the highways. If the intellectual property for the autonomous operation doesn’t belong to Parallel Systems, it can be sourced elsewhere.

 

“I haven’t produced any cost savings.”  See the preceding paragraph.

 

I do agree with Jeff that the hard part will be getting this accepted by the railroads’ corporate bureaucracies. And the government bureaucracies will have absolutely no reason to allow it.

 

I think the technology will work and customers will be willing to try it. But those bureaucrats will be a challenge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Overmod]

Frankly, even if greyhounds' approach were to be implemented only on the scale of CP Expressway, it would be worth trying -- if he could secure the financing to build the specialized equipment and put it in place, and if he can secure enough ongoing, regular business willing to pay for its extra cost (or its cost over autonomous electric trucking, which is the 'default alternative').  Note that a suitable 'power car' could be made low-deck, to match rakes of flatcars on either side (like the arrangement in some of the British Autocoach trains) with hardpoints to mount an appropriate guidance sensor suite on the ends of the set.  As he said, none of the technology that would have to be used, aside from the guidance, has to be reinvented under conditions of uncertainty.

In my opinion, what Parallel Systems proposed, and what they now seem to be doing, have more operational and logistic holes than moldy and rat-gnawed Swiss cheese.  It doesn't take the scientific method to establish that the fundamental engineering can't make the fundamental economics work.  Keep in mind this is with level 4 autonomy for road vehicles stipulated as practicable by the time any commercial adoption of a Parallel Systems-style operation is actually marketed.

Exactly how did the RoadRailer people propose their equipment would be used with other intermodal consists, other than appended onto the back end as with other conventional equipment?  (Something I confess I was hoping to see with that Canadian module thing was the use of a 'hostling' module at the head of the RoadRailer segment, where the transition truck would be, that could be used to allow cutting-off and moving of the RoadRailers if the end of a train of intermodal flats needed to be exposed quickly to back it to a ramp...) 

[Backshop]

Where are the battery-electric locomotives going to be charged?

[Euclid]

For what Greyhounds describes, the whole system should be sketched with notes and diagrams capable of showing others exactly what it does and how it does it.  It does not require full cad models and videos at first.  But without the credible sketches, callouts, notes, and diagrams, very few people will grasp any understanding of it just by a verbal description. 

 

In the concept that Greyhounds describes, draw a map of the route and the customers’ locations.  Show all of the trackwork including sidings, spurs, and switches.  Show the new autonomous service, its equipment; and its timing of operation in relation to the existing traffic.  Show all of the travel of both the new autonomous service and the existing service.  Show how it makes money and how much it makes.

 

When this is complete, don’t show it to the railroads or the Government.  Show it to their vendors.  If you can show the equipment manufacturers a viable new service, they will develop it under their own motivation to manufacture and sell the system to the railroads.  Don’t expect the railroads to hear the idea, finance its development, and put it into operation.  Show it to railroad suppliers or private investors.  Show it to the railroad shipping customers.  Maybe show it to Elon Musk.