Rolling stock designs.

You jest, surely?

Fire extinguisher. CCTV. Information screens giving LU-specific travel information, e.g. stations closed, delays. Wi-fi router for internet access.

Russ

You would then need to make the wheels smaller. On tube stock the tops of the wheels are above floor level: there is a slot for them beneath the longitudinal seats. Which is why all tube stock has had longitudinal seats above the bogies.

Large vestibules, in car CCTV viewable from the cab, monitors in cab for platform, 240v ac power socket, cup holders in cab, display that indicated the distance to the next station, the ability to display a typed in destination.

Reliable cab to control and cab to passanger communication (that the passengers can hear, but preferably not be deafened by).
Vandal-proof (or at least resistant), comfortable seating that can be replaced quickly in the event of damage.
sufficient space and sufficiently large doors to allow easy wheel-chiar access.
If possible, also ideal would be sloping/extending ramps at the doors to minimise the gap between the train and the platform edge. See the (not to any semblance of scale what-so-ever) diagram below

The platform is black and the train is blue. Below each door is sensor (red blob) that measures the distance between the train and the platform at that point, and therefore knows how far out to extend the ramp.
For height my first thought was to install a strip along the platform lip that the sensor could work out the angle to, but then I thought that as the platform height is constant and if the train knew for other reasons what station it is at, that the difference between train floor height and platform height could be programmed in, so that the floor could be angled apropriately.
To avoid delays in this operation, the extending and angling and retracting should be as quick as possible. I think the technology exists to measure and extend the apropriate distance in the same time it takes the doors to open, introducing no extra delay. If the height difference is known then any angle change required of the internal floor could be done as a gradual process while the train is travelling between stations. If the movement would disrupt passengers standing on it, then you just don't do it if there is any weight (or more than a certain amount) on the moveable portion. If done gradually enough then it isn't likely to topple people, and if you make a feature of it people with balance difficulties will not stand there. If you surround the moveable area of the floor with the black and yellow hatching then other than when necessary, people are likely to stand elsewhere. When it is fully loaded, there are enough people about to balance against anyway. I don't know for certain but I would have thought that those who will benefit most from this are less likely to be travelling at times of peak loading anyway.
In terms of potential problems, if you design it so that the floor returns to a neutral height in the event of failure then you are no worse off than at present. The only potential problem I see is if the extending portion gets stuck out then the train might be out of gague. This could be minimised by designing it sucht that in the event of a power failure it retracts, and in the rare event that that fails it only needs something like a member of staff to manually wind it back in or even just provide a solid application of boot.

Chris

Aparently if the wheels are too small, you get heat build up.
It's amazing what you learn from the Discovery Channel

There's also a technical problem. Small wheels are less able to go around sharp bends: the flange tends to climb over the outer rail.

I realise this, which is why I'm trying to make it unliekly that if they do break they will be stuck out. Possibly by having them pushed out by air pressume against a spring or something, so that if the air pressume is lost then they spring back in. All that would be required if they then did get stuck out would be to turn off the air, perhaps by use of a switch next to the ramp accessed by the control key. If it still didn't go back then it must be be jammed out - just kick it. Worst case scenario the train is delayed leaving the station, but no more so than if one of the many other potential faults that render a train unable to move had happened. The most likely failure is that they get stuck in the in position, which doesn't affect the trains ability to operate a service and can be fixed next time its in the depot.

Chris

In that case I happily stand corrected.

My apologies to Sidneynick

This is I think more to do with bearing design rather than the heating of the flange owing to excessive wheel to railhead speed. For this reason the HST (125mph) sets of c 1975 were fitted with 40" driving wheels, whereas much smaller wheels are now regularly fitted to high-speed vehicles owing to recent improvements in bearing design. Heat from disc brakes is a far more significant factor in modern wheel design, so yes, there is a point at which small wheels become problematic from the heat point of view.


As with most engineering matters, this is a question of degree, but in general, for the wheel diameters relevant here, that is not the case - small wheels are less prone to railhead climbing than larger ones (all other things in the suspension department being equal of course). Very large wheels, as on steam engines, have a long 'interaction length' between flange and railhead, to the extent that on sharp curves, the front inside edges of the flanges can come into contact with the inside of the railhead, a situation called 'flange grinding'. With older flange contours, this will typically occur if the angle of the wheel to the tangent of the curve is greater than 3 degrees, although with more modern contours, the wheel to curve angle can be marginally more before flange-grinding occurs I believe. Extremely small wheels will of course have a very small interaction length and area, and thus will greatly increase the pressure of wheel to railhead (not good), and the shape of the interaction area becomes less than optimum for reliability, so in extremis, railhead climbing could be more likely. Railhead-climbing is not a problem either for 3'0" diameter wheels as fitted to traditional surface stock or the 2'8" (2'7"?) diameter wheels on tube stock, but sharp curves will of course present potential dangers for either of these diameters, even on bogie stock.

The interaction of a flange to the railhead is quite complicated, but it goes something like this:


Russ

The first time I had to go firkling about under the seat and covering plates on a 59 it was a bit of a suprise to discover that the floor I was standing on was below the top of the wheel.

The idea of bulging the car sides is an interesting one, but the space it would occupy is currently used by the signals and signalling relay boxes etc.

Which would very likely lead to even more trackside boxes full of gubbins.

So OK: dig a suicide pit the whole length of the track and use it for signals, relays, gubbins, dead rats, whatever...