DeggestyBalt, I like your enclosing "paperless" in quotation marks. A few years before I retired, I saw that the Stores Stocking Request that was being used when anyone (with authority) used when requesting that Stores stock a new item was woefully inadequate, for it did not have space for all the information that our new system of keeping track of all sorts of things in the plant called for. I created a new request that had the required categories on it--and it was available on line in the plant (perhaps also in the company; I never heard from headquarters about it). Paperless? NEVER!
A few years before I retired, I saw that the Stores Stocking Request that was being used when anyone (with authority) used when requesting that Stores stock a new item was woefully inadequate, for it did not have space for all the information that our new system of keeping track of all sorts of things in the plant called for.
I created a new request that had the required categories on it--and it was available on line in the plant (perhaps also in the company; I never heard from headquarters about it).
Paperless? NEVER!
I wish I has access to what CSX spent for paper in 1985 and 2015. 1985 was a paper world. 2015 'paperless'. Doubt there is much difference once inflation is accounted for.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
ruderunnerThey don't understand that they need to keep our (basic) system functioning and insist on "upgrading" it.
I wouldn't necessarily blame the IT guys (and gals). The major vendors are a driving force on upgrades. My Chrome web browser will no longer update because I'm still on Vista. I'm happy with Vista, but now I'm several generations behind what the vendors have come up with. I can't watch the Rochelle webcam on Chrome any more because the flash player won't update now, either.
I'm not sure where these people do their research for "upgrades." It seems like every time they come out with a new product, they leave out those tools I find most useful...
I was lucky - when my employer decided to upgrade from W95/98, I somehow got overlooked and didn't have to deal with NT, which was a major PITA.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
The simplicity of a PTC 'Quick Reference Guide'
Simplicity?
Many years ago, there was in Trains, on occasion, a page of photographs with interesting captions. One was of a brakeman by a handbrake who was puzzled by the instruction how to brake; he was asking "What in tarnation is "counterclockwise?"
Johnny
DeggestySimplicity? Many years ago, there was in Trains, on occasion, a page of photographs with interesting captions. One was of a brakeman by a handbrake who was puzzled by the instruction how to brake; he was asking "What in tarnation is "counterclockwise?"
It is simple compared to the 130 page PTC instruction manual I have.
Yes, Balt, I was referring to your post, with your The simplicity of a PTC 'Quick Reference Guide' just when I posted my reply.
ruderunnerMy personal belief is that IT employees should not exist full time. Contract workers only.
ruderunnerMy company has had 4 it guys in 2 years. They don't understand that they need to keep our (basic) system functioning and insist on "upgrading" it.
There are plenty of mature, U.S. based, underemployed system and network admins out there to run and update your mission critical systems. Partial solution - Kill the H1B visa program Now! </endofrant> Now, back to topic.
Links to my Google Maps ---> Sunset Route overview, SoCal metro, Yuma sub, Gila sub, SR east of Tucson, BNSF Northern Transcon and Southern Transcon *** Why you should support Ukraine! ***
I am writing the PTC code as part of a program for myself and wish I had the actual ptc rules. The little detailed and technical information that you fined is not that much of a help. I worked in the IT field for 45 years and was a programmer, systems analyst and systems engineer for about 15 of them. Yes, I agree that you need experienced system engineers to design the system, systems analysts to analyze and create the data flow and experienced programmers to write the code. Writing this code is real challenge even for me.
caldreamerI am writing the PTC code as part of a program for myself and wish I had the actual ptc rules. The little detailed and technical information that you fined is not that much of a help. I worked in the IT field for 45 years and was a programmer, systems analyst and systems engineer for about 15 of them. Yes, I agree that you need experienced system engineers to design the system, systems analysts to analyze and create the data flow and experienced programmers to write the code. Writing this code is real challenge even for me.
And when it comes to PTC you need Tech knowledgeable Locomotive Engineers to reign in all the Techies as they take their flight of programatic fancy and get it grounded in the real world of operating trains over the road - Safely within the rules and not set up any traps for the unwary operate into catastrophy. After all the Locomotive Engineers are the END USERS of all this effort.
BaltACD caldreamer I am writing the PTC code as part of a program for myself and wish I had the actual ptc rules. The little detailed and technical information that you fined is not that much of a help. I worked in the IT field for 45 years and was a programmer, systems analyst and systems engineer for about 15 of them. Yes, I agree that you need experienced system engineers to design the system, systems analysts to analyze and create the data flow and experienced programmers to write the code. Writing this code is real challenge even for me. And when it comes to PTC you need Tech knowledgeable Locomotive Engineers to reign in all the Techies as they take their flight of programatic fancy and get it grounded in the real world of operating trains over the road - Safely within the rules and not set up any traps for the unwary operate into catastrophy. After all the Locomotive Engineers are the END USERS of all this effort.
caldreamer I am writing the PTC code as part of a program for myself and wish I had the actual ptc rules. The little detailed and technical information that you fined is not that much of a help. I worked in the IT field for 45 years and was a programmer, systems analyst and systems engineer for about 15 of them. Yes, I agree that you need experienced system engineers to design the system, systems analysts to analyze and create the data flow and experienced programmers to write the code. Writing this code is real challenge even for me.
Since we seem to be forming sides and pointing fingers at each other, I'm on Balt's side. When I was working, I got fed up with being pressured to alter reality to fit the computer model.
_____________
"A stranger's just a friend you ain't met yet." --- Dave Gardner
Shadow the Cats ownerOh crap that reminds me I have my biannual refresher coming up in Feb on Compliance with DOT regulations. I would rather give birth again without pain meds while having my wisdom teeth extracted than sit thru that class again.
Why not hit the trifecta - all three at the same time.
oltmannd RME NS is not using GPS to determine which track a train is on. That will come from through the dispatching system and be verified by a human.
RME
NS is not using GPS to determine which track a train is on. That will come from through the dispatching system and be verified by a human.
Where the train is supposed to be has nothing to do with the safety part of a PTC system ... that is, it shouldn't. The system needs to KNOW what physical track a train is on, whether or not it has some supposed track number (recent Amtrak high-speed collision with MOW equipment?) or even dispatcher 'verification' (NYC West Side accident in 1967?)
I'm sure there is some weaseling about lack of local GPS coverage due to restricted constellation or 220 interference. Local beacons would need to be installed (and kept maintained) where that is the case, and of course this increases the cost and complexity, but imho it is pointless to have a "safety" system that is compromised by exceptions known to breed precisely the chances for accident, in precisely the same proportion, as were present before the whole expense of PTC was undertaken...
RMEI'm sure there is some weaseling about lack of local GPS coverage due to restricted constellation or 220 interference. Local beacons would need to be installed (and kept maintained) where that is the case, and of course this increases the cost and complexity, but imho it is pointless to have a "safety" system that is compromised by exceptions known to breed precisely the chances for accident, in precisely the same proportion, as were present before the whole expense of PTC was undertaken...
Tell it to Congress. Present technology has it's limits, always has and always will. The limits may change over time as technologies benefit from further development, but there will always be limits.
BaltACD Shadow the Cats owner Oh crap that reminds me I have my biannual refresher coming up in Feb on Compliance with DOT regulations. I would rather give birth again without pain meds while having my wisdom teeth extracted than sit thru that class again. Why not hit the trifecta - all three at the same time.
Shadow the Cats owner Oh crap that reminds me I have my biannual refresher coming up in Feb on Compliance with DOT regulations. I would rather give birth again without pain meds while having my wisdom teeth extracted than sit thru that class again.
Why Balt because after my last child I had my tubes cut tied burned and hubby had the snip done. I deal with over 200 kids at work aka my drivers that think their world is ending if they do not get their way. Sorry I have enough kids.
RME oltmannd RME NS is not using GPS to determine which track a train is on. That will come from through the dispatching system and be verified by a human. Where the train is supposed to be has nothing to do with the safety part of a PTC system ... that is, it shouldn't. The system needs to KNOW what physical track a train is on, whether or not it has some supposed track number (recent Amtrak high-speed collision with MOW equipment?) or even dispatcher 'verification' (NYC West Side accident in 1967?) I'm sure there is some weaseling about lack of local GPS coverage due to restricted constellation or 220 interference. Local beacons would need to be installed (and kept maintained) where that is the case, and of course this increases the cost and complexity, but imho it is pointless to have a "safety" system that is compromised by exceptions known to breed precisely the chances for accident, in precisely the same proportion, as were present before the whole expense of PTC was undertaken...
Sure, but it won't. Any more than it will really know what the true train consist and weights are...
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
Shadow the Cats ownerOh crap that reminds me I have my biannual refresher coming up in Feb on Compliance with DOT regulations.
Ah, yes... Rules Class.
BaltACDTell it to Congress. Present technology has it's limits, always has and always will. The limits may change over time as technologies benefit from further development, but there will always be limits.
The thing is that there are two considerations here, both independent of the assumption Congress made up to 2008 that 'piling on the safety mandates' in a single Act didn't involve complexity or contradictions - which of course was sadly mistaken.
The first thing is that even obsolescent GPS technology will give you "enough" discrimination to resolve trains on adjacent tracks. One method is to provide accurate local differential sources (and fast enough lockup in the GPS receiver to include them). It doesn't matter if there is still a few cm variability or jitter - it's a long way between track centers, and (ideally, at least) the receive antenna location net of all sway and tilt, etc. is over the relevant track center (I spec it over the geometric yaw center of the lead truck, but YMMV).
Now if you don't have the differential set up for better than 'ordinary GPS' quality, things are different - ask MC or refer to one of his previous posts for some good explanations of GPS precision and effective state-of-the-art in GPS technology. "Accuracy" of the sort you get from a network of crApple phones, all with different drift due to overheating of the internal components, talking to each other is not usable in a safety system, no matter how 'astoundingly good' it may be most of the time. It NEEDS to be a reliable, or at least dependable, backup to a dispatcher's skill and knowledge, comparable to the automatic part of an ABS giving a reading that is independent of train-order or track-warrant information.
There are also limits to the systems that have been built for "positive" train control, some of which we've discussed in threads here (and many more of which come up in a discussion of proper software-engineering methodology applied to the subject!) One useful thing about 'railroading' (as opposed to much of the autnomous-vehicle field) is that there is little downside to "failing safe" by bringing trains to controlled stops and then using a properly safe manual procedure afterward; this might get irritating if some common-mode problem like 'diamond snow' or contaminated ballast started causing false-positives, but predicting those is part of a good design process and coping with the inevitable ones that constitute 'contact with the enemy' is another part of it.
What we see, in Congress and out of it, is that much of the coordination of the "PTC mandate" is not as designed as it should be, and that no small part of that is because the scope of the initial requirements was not made either knowingly or well. I do remain confident that PTC functionality as covered by the 'mandate' is technologically 'reasonably achievable' (although perhaps not with some of the very expensive systems and approaches that have been rolled out so far!) and that control supersets may make much of the existing stuff actually work for what is intended. (Hopefully without too much more consternation like the various things leading up to the Amtrak 188 accident!)
oltmanndSure, but it won't. Any more than it will really know what the true train consist and weights are...
Note that I'm not being argumentative to BaltACD, who has both the wisdom and distinctive professional competence to be particularly respected in discussions of how PTC and dispatching are interrelated.
One thing that a PTC system "can" (or should be designed to) know is where all trains ARE at all times. If there is a problem with one sensing methodology losing track of equipment (as with the Australians and sand making EMUs 'invisible' at critical times) or providing false indications (as with drift in GPS abruptly causing the system to 'think' a train has crossed over between tracks when it hasn't, or with equipment crossing over when and where it shouldn't, as with the recent MOW train/M8 sideswipe) some intelligent combination to provide redundancy in the systems-design sense can and should be made. If there is uncertainty, do what the rules would call for in a similar situation: hold the train until someone with proper knowledge and authority releases it.
The consist and weight issues are different, and more complex. Under most circumstances I think they are likely to be less critical than position information, and they are certainly not things that require continuous update for 'mandated' reasons. I'm sure Sarah or her successor would be interested in an 'automated capability' within PTC to detect if hazmat cars are losing their loads, or if some buffoon has shoehorned 100 tons of trona into cars waybilled at 60 tons, or reliably recognizing cars that have had their brakes released by teenagers to roll downhill into parked switchers.
But most of this is not on the same level as determining reliably where trains are when they are at risk of coming into contact, and I think they come into the same category as ECP in providing poor 'bang for the buck' implemented as default, continuous, mandated systems.
RME we have the most current GPS civilian level tech in our trucks. Our margin of Error in loactions is still 20 Meters even when we have 3-4 sats giving signals to the units for the trucks location. That is 66 feet or the length of one of my tractor trailers in error. Then when the location system has a brain fart it will show we have equipment that is in our yard 40-50 miles away at times. Heck we had one driver make his delivery and our Top of the line system still claimed he was in the freaking yard. Why did it never update us on his location our mechanics had forgotten to plug his GPS unit back in after working on the truck. He was only hauling Acid BTW.
Shadow the Cats ownerRME we have the most current GPS civilian level tech in our trucks. Our margin of Error in loactions is still 20 Meters even when we have 3-4 sats giving signals to the units for the trucks location. That is 66 feet or the length of one of my tractor trailers in error. Then when the location system has a brain fart it will show we have equipment that is in our yard 40-50 miles away at times. Heck we had one driver make his delivery and our Top of the line system still claimed he was in the freaking yard. Why did it never update us on his location our mechanics had forgotten to plug his GPS unit back in after working on the truck. He was only hauling Acid BTW.
Track centers in multiple track territory are normally between 15 & 20 feet - with equipment nominally occupying 10'6" on each track - while the military may have the precision necessary to differentiate tracks - I don't know if that level of precision is available to civilian projects.
Furthers on Tehachapi Loop
Sources indicate what UP did was activated PTC from the north south to the south switch of the Woodford siding, reinitiating PTC from the new two-track intermediates between CP WALONG and CP MARCEL, in essence, leaving a block on each side of Tunnel 9 at the Loop. PTC is thus in limbo at the Loop until such a time as the powers that be figure out some kind of hocus pocus.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- K.P.’s absolute “theorem” from early, early childhood that he has seen over and over and over again: Those that CAUSE a problem in the first place will act the most violently if questioned or exposed.
RME oltmannd Sure, but it won't. Any more than it will really know what the true train consist and weights are... Note that I'm not being argumentative to BaltACD, who has both the wisdom and distinctive professional competence to be particularly respected in discussions of how PTC and dispatching are interrelated. One thing that a PTC system "can" (or should be designed to) know is where all trains ARE at all times. If there is a problem with one sensing methodology losing track of equipment (as with the Australians and sand making EMUs 'invisible' at critical times) or providing false indications (as with drift in GPS abruptly causing the system to 'think' a train has crossed over between tracks when it hasn't, or with equipment crossing over when and where it shouldn't, as with the recent MOW train/M8 sideswipe) some intelligent combination to provide redundancy in the systems-design sense can and should be made. If there is uncertainty, do what the rules would call for in a similar situation: hold the train until someone with proper knowledge and authority releases it. The consist and weight issues are different, and more complex. Under most circumstances I think they are likely to be less critical than position information, and they are certainly not things that require continuous update for 'mandated' reasons. I'm sure Sarah or her successor would be interested in an 'automated capability' within PTC to detect if hazmat cars are losing their loads, or if some buffoon has shoehorned 100 tons of trona into cars waybilled at 60 tons, or reliably recognizing cars that have had their brakes released by teenagers to roll downhill into parked switchers. But most of this is not on the same level as determining reliably where trains are when they are at risk of coming into contact, and I think they come into the same category as ECP in providing poor 'bang for the buck' implemented as default, continuous, mandated systems.
oltmannd Sure, but it won't. Any more than it will really know what the true train consist and weights are...
The PTC regs already allow for unequipped trains to mix with equipped ones in certain covered areas. Slow, transfer runs, for example. This seems to be a worse problem than having some sort of postive system for dark territory (in CTC territory, the "which track" problem is pretty well covered by track circuits.
BaltACDAfter all the Locomotive Engineers are the END USERS of all this effort.
And the END they are at is the one that's going to run into something that shouldn't be there.
Shadow the Cats ownerRME we have the most current GPS civilian level tech in our trucks.
Yes, but what you likely have is GPS for vehicle tracking, perhaps through a service like Comserv (which is what my wife's much smaller company uses). Even when these use something like a SIRFstar chip that can track up to 24 satellites in the constellation, they don't have either the internal temperature precision or clocking to achieve reliable high accuracy, and of course they likely don't have a network of reliable fixed differential beacons (yet).
If you look over on the surveying side, or at some of the potential GIS applications, there is equipment (not cost-effective, of course, for installation on trucks in general commerce) that can resolve well enough that receivers on both ends of a road-grader blade can control it to achieve 'finish' grade automatically in operation.
I had quite a bit of fun a couple of years ago trying to explain to a disbelieving sales "associate" at a company manufacturing miniaturized atomic clocks that I had an application that would potentially require several thousand of them...
I wonder if there will be something like "PTC Lite" that will allow use of a portable package on equipment that doesn't regularly need it.
It might also serve an an interim measure until installation of PTC equipment is universal. A shortline with trackage rights on PTC track and several locomotives would be an example, if the rest of their operation didn't require PTC (yet).
tree68 I wonder if there will be something like "PTC Lite" that will allow use of a portable package on equipment that doesn't regularly need it. It might also serve an an interim measure until installation of PTC equipment is universal. A shortline with trackage rights on PTC track and several locomotives would be an example, if the rest of their operation didn't require PTC (yet).
I think there is an exeception for short lines that need to use PTC equipped tracks of another company but otherwise don't need PTC. IIRC, it is for distances of not more than 20 miles. There may be other items included, like needing an absolute block, etc.
Jeff
oltmannd RME (which is, again, one of the nominal functions that differential GPS is supposed to assure for track-to-track resolution in places like multiple-track mains or passing tracks for yards). NS is not using GPS to determine which track a train is on. That will come from through the dispatching system and be verified by a human.
RME (which is, again, one of the nominal functions that differential GPS is supposed to assure for track-to-track resolution in places like multiple-track mains or passing tracks for yards).
To my knowledge no one using the WABTEC system (and except for the NEC that's almost everyone) is using GPS for track differentiation. I sure wonder where some of this "information" comes from?
.
Why not simply put axle counters at both ends of the critical track and use those to determine track occupancy? Surely there is a way to integrate conventional signalling resources with GPS-based PTC systems, as is done in the ETCS Level 2 systems, although ETCS doesn't use GPS to detect the position of trains, but vehicle-mounted dead-reckoning equipment regularly updated by position beacons (see the Wikipedia article "European Train Control System", section "Levels of ETCS").
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.