Post by Deleted on Apr 25, 2006 21:23:02 GMT
I have just got back from a week or so in Thailand, and had quite a few rides on the new(ish) completely elevated Skytrain and completely underground Subway system in Bangkok.
There are 2 Skytrain lines, the busier running 2min15sec headways. There is one Subway line running 4min30sec headways. The Skytrain lines seemed much busier than the Subway. The lines cover the newer part of the city, including the financial, shopping, and hotel districts. However they do not cover the old part of the city, where many of the tourist attractions such as the Grand Palace are located. There are plans to build many new lines, and extend the existing ones.
Both systems are run by different companies, and thus have seperate fare systems. If a journey involves taking both the Skytrain and Subway, then 2 fares have to be paid. Even though the fares are cheap for Westerners (approx 25-50p), it is still cheaper to take a taxi or tuk-tuk if there is more than one of you, instead of taking a Skytrain and Subway journey. The fares are apparently very expensive for most Thai people. The Skytrain fare machines annoyingly don't take notes, which requires many a visit to the ticket office to get change. The Skytrain uses paper tickets, whilst the Subway uses rather unusual RFID tokens.
Both systems run 3-car 65m long trains, but are designed to take 6-car 130m trains in the future. The Siemens built trains are air conditioned (thankfully as it was 37degrees!), very spacious, clean, and have continuous corridors. The acceleration and decceleration was surprisingly lower than many other modern systems. The trains are automatic using Siemens LZB700M signalling, but still have drivers to supervise operations.
At 3/4 Skytrain termini the trains reverse automatically without driver supervison (whilst the driver changes ends) in one of two sidings. This reversing procedure takes approx 100secs. The other Skytrain terminus (on the less frequent line) has trains reversing in one platform. I only visited one of the Subway termini, where trains reversed in two platforms via a scissors crossover. The Subway has platform edge doors, and there seemed to be quite a long delay between doors closing and train departing (about 3-4secs). Dwell times were usually either 20 or 30secs. The dwell times are 40secs at Siam Central station on the Skytrain which has cross platform interchange between the two lines (and trains are times to connect, which they do with amazing precision). The dwell times are also 40secs at the terminus arrival platforms.
One other thing of note was the huge staff presence on the lines, particularly on the Subway which seemed to have more station staff than passengers! These staff were always very helpful, often pointing us in the right direction (even though we always knew where we were heading anyway). The trains were also always checked by security staff at the termini.
There are 2 Skytrain lines, the busier running 2min15sec headways. There is one Subway line running 4min30sec headways. The Skytrain lines seemed much busier than the Subway. The lines cover the newer part of the city, including the financial, shopping, and hotel districts. However they do not cover the old part of the city, where many of the tourist attractions such as the Grand Palace are located. There are plans to build many new lines, and extend the existing ones.
Both systems are run by different companies, and thus have seperate fare systems. If a journey involves taking both the Skytrain and Subway, then 2 fares have to be paid. Even though the fares are cheap for Westerners (approx 25-50p), it is still cheaper to take a taxi or tuk-tuk if there is more than one of you, instead of taking a Skytrain and Subway journey. The fares are apparently very expensive for most Thai people. The Skytrain fare machines annoyingly don't take notes, which requires many a visit to the ticket office to get change. The Skytrain uses paper tickets, whilst the Subway uses rather unusual RFID tokens.
Both systems run 3-car 65m long trains, but are designed to take 6-car 130m trains in the future. The Siemens built trains are air conditioned (thankfully as it was 37degrees!), very spacious, clean, and have continuous corridors. The acceleration and decceleration was surprisingly lower than many other modern systems. The trains are automatic using Siemens LZB700M signalling, but still have drivers to supervise operations.
At 3/4 Skytrain termini the trains reverse automatically without driver supervison (whilst the driver changes ends) in one of two sidings. This reversing procedure takes approx 100secs. The other Skytrain terminus (on the less frequent line) has trains reversing in one platform. I only visited one of the Subway termini, where trains reversed in two platforms via a scissors crossover. The Subway has platform edge doors, and there seemed to be quite a long delay between doors closing and train departing (about 3-4secs). Dwell times were usually either 20 or 30secs. The dwell times are 40secs at Siam Central station on the Skytrain which has cross platform interchange between the two lines (and trains are times to connect, which they do with amazing precision). The dwell times are also 40secs at the terminus arrival platforms.
One other thing of note was the huge staff presence on the lines, particularly on the Subway which seemed to have more station staff than passengers! These staff were always very helpful, often pointing us in the right direction (even though we always knew where we were heading anyway). The trains were also always checked by security staff at the termini.
