Changing Trains

What are we to make of the tragic head-on collision between a Metrolink commuter rail service and a UP freight train at Chatsworth in California's San Fernando Valley on September 12, which killed 25 people and injured 135 in the worst US passenger train accident for more than 15 years?

As is all too common, the simple cause appears to be that Metrolink train 111, outbound from Los Angeles Union Station on the Ventura County line, passed a signal at danger. It forced the blades of a locked turnout to enter the occupied single line instead of waiting at Chatsworth, where the two trains regularly passed each day, accelerating to around 65 km/h before meeting the double-headed freight train on a blind curve.

Such was the force of the collision that the Metrolink loco was driven three-quarters of the way back into the leading bi-level car, causing most of the fatalities and serious injuries. The entwined vehicles toppled over, but the other two coaches remained upright.

After testing signals, brakes and other equipment, National Transport­ation Safety Board investigators determined that the signal had been working correctly. NTSB calculated that the trains would come into sight of each other just 4 sec before the impact; the UP crew braked, but Metrolink driver Robert Sanchez, who was among the dead, did not.

Federal regulations require drivers who are alone in the cab to report every signal aspect by radio to their conductor, but NTSB member Kitty Higgins said the last two signal calls from train 111 were missing from the data, video and audio recordings recovered from the shattered loco. It was subsequently confirmed that Sanchez had been sending a text message on his mobile phone shortly before the collision.

Southern California Regional Rail Authority had already ordered a fleet of new coaches with Crash Energy Management following the 2005 Glendale collision, which led to questions over the safety of push-pull operation (RG 8.06 p440). However, the severity of the Chatsworth crash suggests that CEM might not have had much effect.

With much more intensive passenger services, European and Japanese operators have focused heavily on preventing collisions through the use of automatic train protection or similar technology to prevent trains passing signals at danger. Questions are being asked in California why Metrolink has not adopted Positive Train Control, although it is not clear whether this is yet sufficiently developed or reliable for widespread install­ation. According to an SCRRA spokesman, the sprawling five-county com­muter network is too complex, and much of it is shared with heavy freight trains operated by UP and BNSF.

Nevertheless, California's US senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein introduced draft legislation to Congress on September 16 that would require the installation of PTC on all mixed freight and passenger routes, with planning to be completed a year after the bill becomes law. Lines designated as 'high risk' by the Department of Transportation would have to be equipped by the end of 2012, and all other major routes by December 31 2014.

Several variants of PTC are under dev­elopment, and widespread install­ation of a compatible system across the USA is estimated to cost up to US$2·3bn. But as the 1999 head-on collision at Ladbroke Grove in London showed, technology such as ATP is rendered useless if not all the trains oper­ating on a line have been equipped.

Whilst every accident is a tragedy, it provides valuable opportunities to learn. Eurotunnel staff and fire crews dealing with the September 11 fire in the Channel Tunnel (p779) were able to draw on the experience of a similar fire in 1996, evacuating everyone from the train within 8 min. And the spectre of the horrific derailment at Eschede in 1998, caused by a broken wheel, led Germany's Federal Railway Office to intervene decisively when an ICE3 axle broke under a slow-moving train at Köln in July. Fortunately neither of these high-profile incidents resulted in any fatalities.

The railway industry enjoys a deserved reputation for safety, which compares well with the estimated 1·2 million deaths on the world's roads every year, causing a knock-on loss of economic productivity valued at US$100bn or more. This reputation has been hard earned over almost 200 years, as operators, authorities and regulators have sought to learn from successive incidents with different causes. Safety management regimes are improving all the time, yet accidents still happen. When one does, it remains as important today as ever before to challenge established practices, and consider whether technical advances offer opportunities to enhance safety at an acceptable cost.

September 1 saw the official publication of a new study of the world railway market, conducted for UNIFE by Roland Berger Strategy Consultants and produced by Eurailpress. Updating an earlier study, the report finds that ‘the industry has grown tremendously’ since 2006.

Driven by several large orders in the rolling stock sector, the average annual volume of the world market has increased by €19bn in two years, or a nominal growth rate of 9%. And despite worries about a global economic downturn, the consultants predict that ‘robust growth will continue for the foreseeable future’. From today’s estimated €120bn a year, the market is expected to grow by between 2·0 and 2·5% per annum to reach €154bn in 2016. Within this, the 'accessible' element will grow by between 2·5 and 3% a year from €86bn to €111bn.

According to Roland Berger, Europe, NAFTA and the Asia-Pacific region remain the dominant markets, with Asia-Pacific expected to overtake NAFTA to become the second-largest ‘accessible’ market by 2016. Eastern Europe and the CIS region will also see above-average growth.

As an example of the current optimism and buoyancy in the rail sector, we need only to look at the forthcoming InnoTrans trade fair in Berlin on September 22-26, which has attracted more than 1900 exhibitors from 41 countries. And this is not to mention the REMSA and RSI events taking place in the USA at the same time.

I have remarked before on the fact that major investors are taking a greater interest in the rail sector, notably amongst the US Class Is as highlighted by the public battles between CSX and its activist shareholder TCI. But the phenomenon is not confined to the USA, nor to the bigger railways. Private-sector investment is flowing into many other railways, notably those serving mineral resources. When I talked discussed with him about the forthcoming sale of Central East African Railway, Railroad Development Corp Chairman Henry Posner commented that ‘the value of railways is significantly greater than it was’.

It is a far cry from a few decades ago when the very existence of railways was under threat. The death at the end of July of Sir David Serpell – at one time a senior civil servant in the UK’s Department of Transport – reminds me that it is 25 yeas since he chaired the Review of Railway Finances. This suggested - in all seriousness, that the British Rail network could be slashed from 16 000 to little more than 5 000 route-km in order to achieve profitability. Serpell never understood why his report was so roundly rejected, but the economic model he used was ‘pure’ to the point of lunacy. And although Serpell is reported to have recognised personally that rail offered wider social and economic benefits, they were not considered because they were not in his terms of reference.

Today almost all governments recognise that railway investment brings wider economic and societal benefits, which David Burns explores in the September issue of Railway Gazette International. It may be wishful thinking to believe that rising oil prices and environmental concerns are having a significant impact on modal choice, where the main drivers remain cost and quality of service, but looking further ahead, it seems likely that the rationing of carbon emissions and pressure on energy sources will have a fundamental effect on transport policy at the political as well as economic level.

Just how this will play out is by no means clear, but the scenarios developed by RSSB’s groundbreaking Foresight Studies project unveiled at the World Congress on Railway Research earlier this year present some possible directions. For rail to prosper, it needs to form part of a balanced transport strategy, and as the ongoing debate about the use of very large lorries in Europe highlights the risk that attempting to optimise each mode separately risks a seriously sub-optimal overall result.

Nevetherless, with market optimism and investment both running at high levels, it is, as Posner and others have remarked to me recently, ‘a good time to be in the rail industry’.

Making rail freight more competitive is an intrinsic element of the European Commission’s transport strategy, as most recently outlined in its official Communication on Greening Transport which was adopted on July 8. This sets out initiatives to 'make transport greener and more sustainable’, including measures to internalise external costs and changes to the Eurovignette lorry-charging rules – although ironically these do not address the crucial issues of road accidents and greenhouse gas emissions.

Boosting the market share of 'less congested’ modes like rail is seen as crucial if Europe is not to grind to a halt. According to EC figures, the demand for freight transport rose by 31·5% over the decade from 1995, and further growth is predicted. The Commission says it will 'come forward with actions that will have positive effects’ including legislative proposals on rail freight and revisions to the directive on infrastructure charging. Later this year we can expect legislation on reducing rail noise.

A belief in the efficacy of competition has underpinned European transport policy, with the presumption that this will provide better customer service. And it must be admitted that many of the former state railway monopolies do not score highly in this respect. Liberalisation saw small open access operators target specific niches, notably block trains of containers and chemicals. But three years after the EU rail freight sector was opened up to full competition, market forces are coming into play, and we are starting to see signs of consolidation.

This reflects experience in North America, and more recently Australia. Deregulation in the USA triggered a spate of mergers and spin-offs, leading to a marked polarisation between the seven big Class I railroads and a multitude of short lines providing local feeder services. In Australia, Pacific National is now effectively competing head-to-head with QR and there are few other major players in the general freight market.

Deutsche Bahn was early into the game with Railion’s takeover of NS Cargo and DSB Gods, followed by strategic expansion into the logistics and shipping industries that has made DB Schenker a global player. Having acquired EWS and Transfesa, DB is now increasing its stake in BLS Cargo to strengthen its place in the transalpine market. DB is also reported to be in talks with ÖBB to create a joint venture subsidiary known as RailSelect. Meanwhile, Rail Cargo Austria expects to receive approval from the competition authorities this month for its takeover of MÁV Cargo which RCA says would make it the third biggest rail freight operator in Europe handling almost 150 million tonnes a year.

DB’s purchase of EWS was driven by the desire to break into France through Euro Cargo Rail. SNCF is now starting to fight back, with President Guillaume Pepy putting freight at the heart of his 'Destination 2012’ vision unveiled last month. Fret SNCF is now expected to become profitable by 2010, with a 20% increase in traffic and a 15% to 20% improvement in productivity, raising its annual turnover to €10bn. Pepy wants to give Fret SNCF 'an international dimension’, with the re-purchase of logistics group Geodis and the acquisition of open access operator ITL 'just the start’.

Pepy would also like to see SNCF buying a US logistics group, and there are suggestions that he is courting Ferrovie Nord Cargo to expand in the Italian market. With Transport Minister Dominique Bussereau backing the creation of 'proximité’ operators to take on the local feeder business, Fret SNCF will be able to focus on more profitable long-haul flows.

Spain too wants a piece of the action, with RENFE’s freight business set to become a stand-alone company later this year. CD Cargo in the Czech Republic and ZSSK Cargo in Slovakia have also started merger talks, with the aim of forming a bigger and more competitive operation.

But without strong regulatory protection it is difficult to see some of the smaller national oper­ators surviving in an increasingly cut-throat market. If US experience is anything to go by, another decade could see European rail freight dominated by a handful of multinational operators, either state-owned or perhaps strong enough to break away from their national origins.

'Spring is a season of hope', began South Korea's transport minister Chong Jong-Hwan, inaugurating the 8th World Congress on Railway Research in Seoul on May 19. Welcoming delegates from more than 40 countries, Chong commented that the rail mode 'embraces great meaning for civilisation'. More prosaically, Korail's Acting President Park Kwang-Suk suggested that 'we are witnesses to a global change in the perception of railways - and I believe that it is research that has helped this to happen.'

With almost 300 presentations, WCRR explored a wide range of topics. Separate streams addressed infrastructure, rolling stock, system interaction, operations, and human factors, as well as 'global railway issues'.

As SNCF's Director of Research Alain Le Guellec pointed out, 'innovation is not just about designing new train concepts'. Focusing on customer service, he ran through areas such as touch-and-travel barcode ticketing, internet sales and distribution, freight telematics, scheduling, and management tools as just a few examples. But whilst innovation is all very well, 'it is up to the operators to implement the results'.

There was a strong focus on international projects bringing together infrastructure managers, operators, suppliers and academics, and evidence of more commercial developments with a clearly-targeted application. The reason was simple, suggested Joachim Meyer of Deutsche Bahn. 'Traffic is growing faster than we can build infrastructure to accommodate it, so we have to use technology to make the best use of what we have got'.

This point was picked up by Semih Kalay of TTCI, reviewing the 'huge drive' in North America on wayside monitoring and inspection to support the operation of longer, heavier and faster trains. Bringing together axlebox, bogie ride, wheel profile and a host of other detectors allows railways to track individual vehicle performance in near real time, but this poses a huge challenge in terms of 'changing data into actionable information'.

We have commented before about the challenges of climate change and energy consumption, and more than one speaker at WCRR suggested that sustainability - in its broadest sense - would be a major driver of railway research over the coming years. UIC Chief Executive Luc Aliadière looked at current demographic trends and pointed out 'a clear contradiction between globalisation ?and sustainability' - although he added that 'human philosophy is all about managing our contradictions.'

The UK's Rail Safety & Standards Board is working on some innovative 'Foresight Studies' to try and understand the implications of the changing shape of the global economy. Joanna Gilligan's prize-winning paper in the 'global rail' stream pictured four radically different scenarios based around energy resources, personal mobility and political direction, which she hopes will trigger a strategic debate about what they might mean for the rail sector over the next 50 to 100 years.

Summing up at the end of the congress, Aliadière said it was clear that rail 'has an important role to play in the future transport mix'. But he emphasised that 'continuous improvement is vital', adding that 'research and development are key to keeping the railway improving'. Sustainability 'should be a guideline for everything you do', he suggested, identifying three areas for future research:

• sustain rail's environmental advantage, as its competitors are improving all the time;


• face up to the increasing cost of energy, and all of the related implications;


• attract investment to develop the capacity and technology to handle growing demand.

However, we feel that it is important to highlight Aliadière's warning that 'people are not choosing rail because of its environmental advantages, but because the service quality is better.' With the emerging risk of a global economic slowdown driven by soaring oil prices and turbulence in the financial markets, railways must face up to the fact that potential customers are more likely to make their transport and logistics decisions on the basis of cost and quality than on global sustainability. And here there is still much for the researchers to do.

The long-awaited decision by the German government to push ahead with a partial flotation of Deutsche Bahn, followed by confirmation that its counterpart in New Zealand has decided to buy back the railway operations sold off a decade ago brings back into sharp focus the continuing debate over railway ownership.

Experience with privatisation over the past two decades has been mixed, to say the least. European opinion remains divided, whereas Japan and Australia seem convinced of its merits. Concessions in Africa and South America seem to be barely keeping their heads above water. But traffic figures seem to suggest that countries which have embraced the competitive ethos have benefited.

In many parts of the world, railways have been intrinsically linked with economic development and political control. And it is here that we find the greatest reluctance to release them fully into the private sector. The European compromise of private or state-owned operators competing on state-funded infrastructure seems to be a step forward, but some commentators suggest that vertical separation is only a half-way house, and this model may not prove sustainable in the longer term.

There are many privately-owned railways around the world, ranging from the huge Class I freight operators in North America to dedicated heavy-haul mining railways. The majority of them are freight operators, although the three biggest JR companies run profitable passenger businesses

We have commented before that one of the sticking points seems to be a reluctance amongst politicians to accept commercial reality — that a private-sector railway needs to earn profits to fund reinvestment and generate shareholder value, or it risks going out of business. A key factor behind the renationalisation in New Zealand is the perception that the private owners failed to invest in renewal of infrastructure or rolling stock, running down the value of the assets.

The importance of shareholder value is also highlighted by the ongoing dispute at CSX. The best way to make money is to identify market opportunities and exploit them — which may lie behind recent calls for reregulation from shippers in the USA reluctant to face the prospect of rising tariffs. But profitability is essential if a railway operator is to ensure access to capital for investment, and freight rates should be naturally constrained by competition if the market is working properly.

Last year’s study by the Association of American Railroads into future growth trends suggested that $135bn would have to be invested in capacity expansion on the US trunk network over the next 30 years. AAR estimates that the private railroads can raise $70bn of this through revenue growth and find another $26bn from productivity savings. But that still leaves a shortfall of $39bn to be addressed, and in this bastion of free market policy there is growing talk of seeking public money to reflect rail’s wider societal advantages.

To some extent, this change of attitude may reflect the growing awareness of environmental sustainability, with the perceived benefits of a modal shift from road to rail further complicating the balance between public and private control. Such societal benefits need to be properly valued, in order to avoid the risk referred to by CER Chairman Aad Veenman that mobility is seen as a ‘public good’ and under-valued. In a market economy, everything has a price. And if the public and politicians want their railways to provide services which are not commercially justified, they must be willing to meet the costs — whether the operator is publicly or privately owned.

We have always adopted the view that there is a place for both public and private operators, and neither should be seen as intrinsically better than the other. But it is vital to recognise that no railway — whatever its ownership — can deliver unless the underlying political and commercial framework within which it must operate is right for its market. Getting this right will be the biggest challenge for the railway industry in the years ahead.

Environmental considerations are assuming an increasing importance in shaping global transport policies. Such is the potential impact that delegates to the UIC Highspeed 2008 congress in Amsterdam agreed by a substantial margin that environmental concerns and global warming were the biggest single issue to emerge in the rail sector over the past three years.

There are many unanswered questions about the science of climate change, but there is a growing concern about the use of fossil fuels, which account for 80% of global energy production, and pressure to develop alternative sources of renewable energy. Figures suggest that the transport sector now accounts for 30% of total energy use.

Earlier this year the European Environment Agency published Climate for a Transport Change, looking at the impact of transport across 32 countries. The report warns that 'greenhouse gas emissions in the transport sector continue to increase steadily', with rising demand for freight and passenger movement outweighing any gains from improved energy efficiency and the introduction of non-fossil fuels.

EEA believes that measures to reduce the environmental impact of transport ‘must go beyond the sector itself’ to address wider economic issues, although ‘the transport sector must raise its game’. Rail is seen as more sustainable than other modes, but whilst both freight and passenger traffic are rising in absolute terms, the report finds that rail’s market share is continuing to fall. And UIC’s Senior Adviser, Environment & Energy, Raimondo Orsini warned in Amsterdam that ‘in some areas public perception is very different from the real data’.

I believe that there are three main ways in which the rail industry needs to address environmental issues – competitiveness, innovation and campaigning.

There is certainly much that can be done right now to encourage greater use of rail. As we have remarked before, if high speed trains are to compete effectively against air there is an urgent need to improve the customer interfaces, particularly in terms of information and ticketing. To compete with the flexibility of the private car, rail operators must offer fast, reliable and cost-effective transport, plus better integration with other modes to provide convenient door-to-door service. Freight shippers also demand reliability, quality of service and competitive rates, alhough recent surveys suggest that when it comes to modal choice environmental issues are still some way down their list of priorities.

As Eurostar CEO Richard Brown told us earlier this year, the operator’s Tread Lightly campaign not only includes a pledge of carbon-neutral operation, but addresses other aspects such greater use of recyclable materials, rainwater harvesting, and cutting paper consumption by 25%. Barely six months after the campaign was launched, a survey found Eurostar was perceived as one of the top 20 environmentally-aware companies in the world.

Research is needed into emissions, energy and noise, as well as operational innovations such as freight telematics. Prof Roger Kemp addressed the energy questions in the January issue of Railway Gazette International, and recent concerns over rising prices and food shortages seem to confirm his warning that biofuel production may not be as ‘green’ as its proponents believe.

Noting that some governments are imposing environmental obligations or increased taxes on the rail sector, but perversely not on its less-sustainable competitors, UNIFE Chairman André Navarri pointed out in Amsterdam that ‘the EU needs a legal framework where rail is not penalised in taxes and aviation gets away scot-free’.

The European rail industry continues to campaign for a level playing field, driven in part by a remit for the European Commission to bring forward proposals by June for revisions to the Eurovignette Directive on road tolls for heavy lorries. Suggesting that the EU needed a policy that would ‘achieve emissions reduction without damaging the economy’, which implied ‘a modal shift to rail’, UNIFE Director General Michael Clausecker insists that ‘as an industry we do not believe in dirigiste measures’. Nevertheless, he is concerned that the proposals envisage a marginal rather than full-cost approach to meeting the external costs that road users impose on society.

With the external costs of European transport as a whole put at around 7% of GDP, it is clearly important to address policy imbalances and campaign for fairer treatment. However, there is inevitably a risk that the rail sector will be seen as lobbying for its own interests, unless it is seen to be making efforts to put its own house in order.

There is still much to do, but if the industry can get it right, as Navarri told congress delegates in Amsterdam, ‘we are only at the beginning of a railway renaissance throughout the world.’

A DRIVE to position rail as the natural mode for international travel across Europe came on July 2, when the Railteam alliance of high speed train operators was launched in Brussels.

A year of detailed negotiations has shaped the Railteam concept since a provisional accord was signed last year (RG 10.06 p659). With Europe's high speed network expected to grow from around 5 000 km to more than 15 000 km by 2020, the opreators believe that the time is right to present international rail travel as 'a real alternative' to air or the car in an era of growing environmental awareness. The Railteam partners predict that international travel by high speed train will reach 25 million passenger-journeys by 2020.

As well as the current four high speed operators DB AG, Eurostar UK, SNCB and SNCF, the founding partners include NS Hispeed, whose plans hinge on completion of HSL-Zuid, ÖBB of Austria, where the Railject concept is steadily taking shape, and SBB. The international joint venture passenger operators Thalys (SNCF-SNCB-DB), Lyria (SNCF-SBB) and Alleo (SNCF-DB) are associate members. Eurostar CEO Richard Brown said other high speed operators would be welcome to join the alliance if they met the membership criteria.

Asked about competition issues, DB Board Member for Passenger Services Karl-Friedrich Rausch confirmed that Railteam has kept DG COMP and DG TREN fully informed, and has 'good backing' from the European Commission. Railteam sees itself as comparable to the airline alliances such as OneWorld or Star Alliance, where members co-operate on sales and marketing but compete in terms of service delivery.

Railteam's first projects include the creation of five interchange hubs at Brussels, Köln, Lille, Frankfurt and Stuttgart with dedicated multi-lingual information centres and lounges accessible by members of any partner's frequent traveller programme. Other hubs may follow. The 'hop' facility will allow passengers who miss a connection to continue on the next available train regardless of operator, without the need to re-book or change reservations.

To be developed over the next 18 months, the Railteam Broker will provide an online ticket distribution system where travellers can 'find an attractive combination of prices, make a reservation, pay and receive their ticket in one transaction'. Intended to overcome the fragmentation of international ticketing that has developed with the introduction of market pricing, it is intended to work for any combination of origin and destination. But the inclusion of connecting services beyond the high speed network will make the Broker an order of magnitude more complex than most airline booking offices.

SNCF CEO Guillaume Pepy summed up the vision by explaining that Railteam's goal is 'to position the train as the natural choice for every European business journey under 4 h and every leisure journey under 6 h'.