Alan Drake is the man with a plan--to "Make things not as bad as they would otherwise have been." How's that for a winning campaign slogan? All we can do is to be ready with a credible plan when the rest of the country realizes what Alan realized a long time ago, that the path to the future is on an electrified rail system.

I suggest that you work toward setting up speaking engagements for Alan in your local community (I am doing precisely that Dallas). If nothing else, stress a four letter word, J-O-B-S.

The 31 billion Swiss franc TransAlp and related projects should increase passenger modal share for rail (240 kph trains) but the Swiss are planning on an 80% modal share for rail freight vs. heavy trucking.

Much of the portion of the 31 billion that was borrowed (much was "pay as you go" with taxes) will be repaid with new tolls on trucks after two major new rail tunnels are opened.

One tunnel will provide a level, straight rail path from Zurich to Milan using 58 km, 20 km and 10 km tunnels (from memory) for up to 300 trains/day and trains up to 1.5 km long and at speeds to 240 kph (150 mph).

SBB uses 16.7 Hz electricity (1/3rd of 50 Hz so they can convert from grid if need be, but they prefer making their own power in their own hydroelectric plants).

Best Hopes for SBB,

Alan

PDF document (in English) here - but it is from 2002/2003.

We need rail, but we also need restructured cities which make it possible to largely minimize the use of any transportation system, except bicycles and walking.

Best Hopes for more pedestraian zones, more compact cities, more localized goods and services, and more people who live closer to where they shop,work, and recreate.

Denver is overlaying an extensive rail and bus system on their existing sprawlapolitan area, but I fear that this will be a very inefficient approach as people will still be commuting long distances. If they don't rein in exurbia, people will be able to move even further out and still take advantage of the new rail systems.

Railways handle 32% of Swiss freight traffic and 16% of passenger traffic, but they use only 3% of the total energy required for all transportation.

Hi Alan,

I went and had a look at the document you referenced...

http://mct.sbb.ch/mct/en/umweltbericht_02-03.pdf

...and found it disappointingly lightweight. All ratios, very few hard numbers. At one point the author confuses terajoules and petajoules (Page 26), at another point he confuses energy consumption and efficiency (Page 27 commentary on freight traffic trends).

Nevertheless, 3% of total transportation energy for 16% of passenger traffic (more damn ratios) looks impressive. What doesn't look impressive, oddly, is their claimed passenger transport energy consumption of about 9 kWh/100 passenger km - at least in comparison with the numbers given by David McKay in his analysis of energy needs in the UK. This study is a huge PDF, but probably worth the time needed to download it from here...

http://withouthotair.com/ look at pp. 135-140

...where he quotes a best in class for rail of 3 kWh/100 passenger km - the SBB claimed number is more like what McKay quotes for a tram system.

I'd be genuinely interested in your critical review of McKay's statistics. I'm sure he would be grateful for your feedback as well, given your more specialized sector knowledge. That PDF is a draft and he explicitly invites public input.

Returning to SBB, I'm wondering about that huge discrepancy between 3% energy usage and 16% passenger traffic/32% freight traffic, especially given their apparently low energy efficiency. I'm wondering if there might be something about the Swiss economy that distorts transport useage patterns. Export of financial services, drugs and tourism balanced by imports of food and finished goods? Unusually high per-caput air mileage? Double or null accounting for freight-miles in neighbouring countries and tourist air-miles? Unfortunately that ratio-ridden PDF doesn't have enough raw data to let me decide.

Best Hopes for Accurate Statistics,

The Plucky Underdog