Wow. In Tokyo a train comes about every 5 minutes, on every line. You need a line map but not a schedule. You might have to wait 15 minutes out in the boonies of metro Tokyo. There are no ticket collectors, the ticketing is automated at the station. That was 40 years ago.
They actually use the train in Japan. I've lived in Ohio for 25 years and just found out today that people still use the rails for transit around here. I thought it was nothing but subways and historical steam train tours.
@@Dis_Dis "hyper capitalism" business model. Sell more cars (depreciating liability) that has to be replaced every few years....(I'm joking, but only sort of...) LOL In reality, distances in USA are relatively huge..and the co-evolution of "passenger car craze" enabled urbanized sprawl (huge sprawl - see for example square area of greater LA area?). Added in is the limitations of American perceptions/political influence on urban "rent control" and it trends towards exodus from commerce centers....and the tendency of urban housing authorities to be incompetent and ineffective at best, and hopelessly corrupt at worst....?
I took this everyday for over a year, my dad took it everyday for like 10 years I never realized our double decker train cars were weird. I love them cause I can always have a single seat to myself on the upper level
Tbh this video seemed like an armchair New Yorker with no American rail knowledge (not tryna be rude to New Yorkers or the guy who made this but alot of facts were simply ignored)
As a Swiss citizen, I have always been fascinated by the fact that a country is able to launch people into space just for fun and at the same time have a third-world transport network
@@blackhole9961 OK, but even when you go to the rural areas in the Swiss Alps, the transport seems to be better than the American suburban transport. Just look at the canton of Graubünden: any lost village (e.g. S-chanf) has one train per hour from 5am to 11pm. Lines with 3 trains a day don't exist, not even in the countryside. In the USA there is this kind of thing in the city
@@fabswisss why is everything and everyone so close together? It is small however. What Americans describe as rural as everything spread out. Now imagine that everyone in the small municipality was much more spread out including amenities over that area instead of then all being in one place, then do you think public transit would serve it?
@@eurobrowarriormonk7182 So it's not a question of money. Electricity cost Between 0,20$/kwh (day) and 0,11$/kwh (night) in Switzerland. And the Median revenu is about 1000$/month higher in Switzerland than in the USA. The issue is that the USA are stupidely governed. You spend gigantic sums on security and despite that there are still kids being killed in their schools every week (but at least you have 10 aircraft carriers and that's what counts), you're very good at having gigantic cars driving over bridges that collapse in front of the president who makes a speech on infrastructure, you have the biggest pharmaceutical companies while your hospitals are overflowing like those in the third world, etc. That's the problem. It's not about freedom or money. It's about the fact that your country does shit
The US has about the best freight railway system in the world, moves more freight per capita, faster, and at a lower price than anywhere else. A lot of Euro railways still use four wheel cars (small and slow), doesn't have automatic couplers, and doesn't run unit trains. Japanese freights are all narrow gauge mountain railways. Your freight container can run west coast to Chicago (or NY) for less than half the cost of trucking and get there sooner. Admittedly our passenger trains suck, but remember, they are run by de gobermint, freight is handled by private industry.
As a suburban of Chicago, when I saw the title of the video, my first thought was " oh hell no - this guy is not about the shit on my Metra." But as the video progressed I couldn't help but realize he's right about everything on the list 😅 nonetheless some of my fondest memories growing up were taking the train to Chicago being a train lover when I was a kid
You hit the nail on the head, it's not Chicago's job to make Suburban Travel great, that's the job of the suburb and that's the role that Metro plays. Chicago's commuter rail is the CTA and our trains run every 5 to 7 minutes on various train lines it's Traverse about 90% of the city
@@davidty2006 not only britain, but even that old stuff seems better than that wagons designed by pencilpushers and also: european railroad companys at least buy never locos and not convert old freight locomotives
Another core problem with Metra is that Metra and CTA are run as completely separate agencies with separate constituents and separate goals despite the fact that the people of Chicagoland travel within the region and often need both services. As such, unlike in European cities, there is little connectivity between the commuter and local rail services. These systems are not integrated very well at all. The downtown Metra terminals don't even directly connect with the CTA rail lines downtown (except Millennium Station). This severely limits the options of Metra commuters to transfer to CTA rail for destinations not in the Loop as well as Chicago commuters going into the suburbs. There are only a few direct connections between Metra and CTA rail. This just underscores the lack of regional planning, vision, or purpose between Metra and CTA politically and functionally to the great disservice of the people of Chicago.
The lack of integration between CTA and Metra was annoying when I visited. I (foolishly) figured that since the Blue line and BSNF line had a station called 'Cicero', it would be a transfer station. Appearently they're actually 3km apart. It was a good learning experience, I guess
Same in SF Bay Area. I can bike to a Caltrain station but to get to anyplace up in SF besides those two or three inconveniently located stations I need to get on Muni (bus or car) or Bart. Plus of course the East Bay is only accessible from Bart plus some other unconnected local transit option.
CTA even tries to "compete with Metra" and many of its project and operations, particularly on the south side aimed to take riders off the Metra electric district
@@robo1p I'll give you that it could be confusing due to naming, but in Cicero's case in particular it would be obvious that's it's not a transfer station if you were to check a map of the BNSF line in general. Metra's Cicero stop is located in the middle of a marshalling yard with storage and terminal tracks on both sides, as the main line runs through the center of the yard rather than off to one side. There would be no room for a CTA track at that station.
@@zaydansari4408 One of the reasons for that is at the behest of South Side residents who don't like paying a fare on Metra only to get downtown that can't be used to transfer to CTA to finish their trips. They have to pay the CTA fare to use a bus or L train. If CTA service extended further into the South Side, they could use the L and easily transfer to other L lines or the bus to get to where they need to go without having to pay twice. Metra is basically only for commuters that go to the Loop and that's it.
I live in Japan and here we have "tourist railways" that are only famous for how irrelevant and obsolete they are. It has better schedule than Heritage Corridor.
In the UK, some heratige railways like the great central have better timtables than the ‘pretty good’ servie in metra, and my local, the NLR has an hourly service, it’s staffed with volunteers, and uses ~50y old stock
As a German, I was already very upset with our own railway, but now after watching this video I think its actually amazing! Thanks a lot Edit: Wow thx for all the likes, just to explain for those who didnt know if I meant that last bit sarcastically: Yes I did.
@@bonda_racing3579 Well we're often annoyed with delays that make us miss connecting trains as this happens a lot while prices keep getting higher and higher. But in the grand scheme of things it's probably not the worst thing to deal with as we have generally a pretty good public transport system.
@@cobralyoner pretty similar situation in my area. Am from New England so we're pretty fortunate to have modern amtrak electric trains running. while the rest of the country still uses p42 diesels from the 90s that goes top speed of 130 or 140 km/h. But yeah pretty similar with our trains they get delayed for multiple reasons while fares continue to rise. Especially for coach class. But atleast rail infrastructure in North America is finally getting better in general with newer trains being built. The Canadian and U.S government are working with siemens train company (I think ÖBB has siemens trains). So European trains are coming to us soon.
As a German former living in acity called karlsruhe, which is often pointed to as very innovative in Local Passenger Service, i can tell you that one lesson learned is: demand comes with frequency. You need to run your service at least any 20 Minutre, and you need to expand the dayly operating hours, than you will notice a massive increas in usage.
At the farthest end stations for commuter trains in Stockholm don't go more than once every 30 minutes. But still it's twice an hour until after midnight, even on weekends. And closer to the city it's doubled so every 15 minutes.
I can't imagine the infuriating rage Alan will get into, if he even glances at the road history of my country, Nepal. It took us a decade to build 40mile of highway on a hilly terrain 😭😭
Austrias longest "in planning" road project: 9 km of road to relieve smaller streets. The S34 ("Traisentalautobahn") was planned in 1974 and it is still not built. :D
I can't blame them for liking 2 stroke EMDs so much. Once you've worked on one, they're pretty much all the same. Parts availability is great and they're simple.
To make a big correction, EMD does still exist, it was just sold by GM in the mid 2000's. 645 and 710 series diesel engines are some of the most cheap and easy to maintain in the industry, if not *the* easiest and cheapest. Parts are still made to this day and are cheap/easy to come by.
To bring GE or another locomotive manufacturers product into METRA shops - those shops need to have whatever special equipment and a supply of all the necessary spare parts for that brand of locomotive. I don't know if METRA has enough 'clout' to have the descendent of EMD (which is still in business) to design, build, test and offer for sale at a 'reasonable' price a locomotive dedicated to METRA's needs. METRA's has been, currently is and will continue to be a adequate level of funding.
EMD is now part of Caterpillar and is still a strong player in the freight and passenger locomotive market .This glaring oversight makes me question all the other statements in this “educational” video.
Metra's locomotive needs: - EMD prime mover -Easy to maintain -Will last for ever if you're stubborn enough. Clearly the answer is to repower some RS-3s. /s
EMD DOES still exist - it still does locomotive engineering in it's original location in La Grange. EMD bought by Progress Rail who is a subsidiary of Caterpillar. But the building still operated with the EMD logo. Progress Rail still makes EMD parts and locomotives. Surprises me Alan got this wrong
@@BigBrex0124 Are you for real? “Forget” things? He produced an entire video on the subject and got a major fact wrong. A fact that can be found through a 2 second google search. He didn’t forget, he just made no effort at all.
Having worked for Cat during the mid 2000's and having had a factory tour of the EMD plant, I too was surprised to hear the misstatement. That plant was amazing- the welding they do to make the engines is almost unbelievable.
However EMD did reduce offerings for passeneger locmotives for some time hence Siemens Charger locomotives gaining a foothold in the US to name one foreign builder!
@@RamonInNZ Siemens is the only builder offering passenger locomotives in the US because the market is so small. Both EMD (Cat) and GE (Wabtec) declined to bid on the Amtrak order.
From a UK perspective, our high speed rail links from south to north (probs equivalent size to state length rail) where there is a train every 15mins running from 5am until 12:45 at night. If you miss a train you’re so likely to manage to get on a different one it’s superb
At least Amtrak have never closed a station with no warning stranding me in a city overnight. Unlike GWR. They UK is honestly only marginally better than the US. And that's mainly due to the extent of UK rail compared to the US.
The Metra Electric line honestly has the best case for operating as rapid transit with a bit more frequent service. Unless all the other Metra lines can operate like this we're doomed to keep expanding highway lanes like on 294
The Tollway Authority needs to constantly build new projects to avoid the conversation about retiring the toll bonds on the long paid for roads. Construction is what perpetuates their existence.
@@scenicdepictionsofchicagolife Its even worse that they are removing the oasis along the toll road that were a nice amenity to have oh well I guess IDOT never heard of induced demand
So, by now even AFRICA gets high speed rail and the US is still stuck to figure out how to effectively operate commuter rail, make it more relevant for more commuters. At the same time, me living in a village in southern Germany: annoyed that the commuter rail serves the village only 3 times per hour / a train every 20 minutes in each direction
When you talked about no one taking the train because of fear of missing one, it really hit me why America’s transit is so bad. In the UK, on most routes if you miss a train it’s 10-20-30 minutes for another depending on the time and the route, e.g. my town to London can be every 5 minutes during rush hour, but on a Tuesday morning a few hours after it’s only every 20 minutes, and if the train got cancelled, then I could always take a different route and catch a different train back to one of the 3 train stations in town, and if all the trains got cancelled? I’d just catch a coach or bus, or at the worst take a cab, and if I really couldn’t travel I’d just need to stay at a travelodge or something overnight. In a world where if I miss that 6pm train I’m literally screwed, I think I would just drive everywhere, much like everyone does…
During rush hour, metra traind usually run every 10-20 minutes. I used to take the Rock Island Line to work every day. Each morning my train was always on time, both at my station and reaching downtown. It never made me late to work. Each afternoon, i would take the 4:10 outbound back home. On paydays, i would get off three stops early because that station shared a parking lot with my bank. I could walk over, cash my paycheck, and return to catch what was the 4:20 outbound that ran 10 minutes after my usual train. I never had to run to catch it, nor was it ever late.
As a German sitting in brand new Siemens, Stadler and Alstom regional trains I‘m rather shocked about the design of US double decker cars. That is how our livestock transports look like from the outside. And the inside looks like a prison.
The San Diego transit system is better, i promise. The COASTER(San Diego to Los Angeles GE large engines), SPRINTER(Oceanside to Escondido, Siemens Desiro DMU ) and the BREEZE( Buses in North County, San Diego abbreviated MTS in downtown SD) are usually clean and there is good route times. The Sprinter is in fact multiple Siemens Desiro DMU's and I used to take it for work all the time. You could take the Sprinter from Escondido to Oceanside and catch the Coaster( GE large units) to Los Angeles fairly quickly. These trains used to run until 11pm or so. The Sprinter used to run all night long but they cut it down to 11pm to 4am downtime. Anyway, i love those little Siemens Desiro's, they can go fairly fast and are nice and comfortable. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprinter_(light_rail) Whats cool is the platforms at all stations raise up at night so big GE freight engines can fit though, we get one freight delivery once a week.
Hoooooold up. I agree with a lot of this, except for the EMD slander. First of all, you're acting like there's tons of locomotive manufactures in this country. There's not. For the longest time, EMD and GE were the only big players in that space. But the real reason why Metra chooses EMD is because there's way more replacement parts out there available on the secondary market. GE, in their infinite wisdom, does not allow parts to be made second hand, and requires people to go exclusively to them to get replacement parts, which you're never going to believe this, they are wildly expensive. That's why the vast majority of new/poor commuter rail services use EMD products: because it's simply the cheapest and most reliable option they have. And that is also why you will never see Metra buy the P42s from Amtrak. The cost to maintain those locomotives are astronomical compared to EMD units, even though they may look better or whatever
Right! For Amtrak, it was cheaper to buy the brand new Chargers than to overhaul and modernize the GEs. And I don't think those GEs are great for commuter use anyway. Slow to charge and not very powerful in HEP mode.
Also wasn't EMD located in La Grange Illinois therefore it was easier for them to obtain parts and get their locomotives to be worked on when they needed service?
Not to mention the reliability of EMD products over GE in the first place. Yes not everything will last forever but EMD knew how to make the 645 basically indestructible. Yes GE has cleaned up their act with the GEVO being pretty decent, but when getting stuff second hand, you're gonna wanna go with an F40 or SD70MAC rebuild over a P42.
@@franciscogodoy9158 Yeah the Genesis series was designed for long distance and Corridor passenger service. They weren’t designed for commuter service. They would probably need to be upgraded to fit the role.
I just spent a month in Chicago, took the Union Pacific North line into town every day and honestly it was really good, they had trains running frequently and you would buy tickets on their app and it was pretty smooth
Fascinating. Having used Metra four times in my life (as a visitor from the UK), I was intrigued (baffled) by the Gallery cars and now I understand why they were built. Let's hope the "real" double-deck cars come into service quickly to boost ridership numbers. Perhaps a more modern fare system (tap in, tap out) might reduce the need for on-train inspectors - but will this upset the Unions? I also suffered from Metra's poor schedules which severely restricted usage. Like many US commuters services, they seem geared solely to "inbound in the morning and back in the evening" which severely limits or eliminates the possibility of off peak or contra-directional travel.
They were pioneered by the Burlington in 1950. Originally to replace heavyweight, single level cars. The intent was capacity. Having worked in commuter train world as a trainman, conductor, and engineer, even if the cars were truly double decked it wouldn't require any more trainmen and women.
not sure if i would made it ever to the USA, but as far as i can say is in Europe the Netherlands one premium place to commute, followed more or less by Switzerland and with a larger gap the rest of Europe inclusive the UK. but i think its not only the money, or who owns/runs the infrastructure, its a problem with the lifestyle too. And as you quoted notjustbikes, the problems are also suburbs build as large swaths of one family houses with garden around.... No train could ever run there and get at least more than a few passengers even at 15 schedules. i guess even buses to train wouldnt work either cause its to complicated to change the vehicle when you have your own car in garage... but you dont get a public transport worth to name it without a different way of lifestyle and you dont get a change of lifestyle without some worthy public transport...
@@SirHeinzbond I think the US needs a long-distance train network that will promote development of walkable development along train lines rather than car-centric development along highways. Without regional public transit we can’t have commuter public transit.
@@craigstephenson7676 i think the whole US needs a complete overhaul, from carcentric sprawling suburbs to walk-able cities who generate wealth, from just fly over there for thanksgiving and buy a sixth television on black Friday to highspeed train network not only for people but for heavy transport too and oh hey we have some rare resources lets dont waste them...
I went to Chicago for a wedding needless to say I found out how the system works. I also found out I sat in a station for two hours when I didn't have to because I was worried I was gonna miss the train back to where I was staying. They also have a star system which doesn't work out so well because there's no interconnecting things when they needs to be.
It's been proposed. In reality, though, there is very little appetite for a "ring line", as people commuting suburb-to-suburb would still need to figure out how to get where they're going on the other end. Take a look for the Metra STAR line - the proposed outer ring line that never took off.
What? Again there's a difference between Chicago's transit authority and the Illinois Central now known as metra. The train you're describing Bridges Chicagoland suburbs and even different states such as Wisconsin and Indiana and has nothing to do with Chicago lands transit. Our train lines cover approximately 90% of the city, serves as a model for many other cities Rail systems, and run every 5 to 7 minutes like clockwork.
Chicago also has a corrupt system. They take money from the state and federal grant money. It's all very inefficient system. Americans love huge trucks and SUVs for driving . Most never need a truck, they just drive one because they can.
Also I think I might’ve over used the word also. I was probably super tired like I am now. the train system is pretty good although there’s a bit of confusion between that Amtrak. There was a couple of spots where I found a ring if I’m remembering right. Another there is a lack of interconnect stations so you end up going to one coming out running across to the other one. once I had it figured out it started to work but the map they adopted was not very helpful either. I’ve also spent time on the New York and DC subway system and London tubes and while I can’t speak for the quality of the DC system as of late they all ranked above. mostly due to simple things like a better map design.
Incidentally I just got home in a double decker train wagon of a German IC train and the design of those gallery cars literally gave me a brain aneurysm. Are you sure this was a rational decision to safe labour costs and didn't just result from a brainstorming session of a bunch of railroad executives, after they snorted their way through a hopper wagon full of cocain?
@@MrAlex-ej8ov Most likely. I mean, I do understand that they would want to prevent fare evasion and not spend too much money on that. But reducing your train's carrying capacity by about 1/3 seems like an extremely dumb and counterproductive way to go about this.
Impressive cuz the IC2 cars don't seem to be very popular in Germany (I detest them myself, though am not German), but like... lordy to have the luxury to kvetch about the IC2 vs having to deal with what we have here in the US...
I’ve seen this sort of behaivour from a government run rail service that runs trains reluctantly and is just itching to replace them with buses. For example the Mt Gambier to Adelaide service used to be a daily service. Then the ANR made it three days a week and a bus for the rest. They probably wanted to pull one rail car (a Budd car called a Bluebird). The less than daily train would piss off the public and then the ANR would point out the lack of patronage and pull the remaining service. This is echoed throughout the country, deliver a shitty service and then point to lack of ridership to change to buses. Even freight, a tactic was you gouldn’t order freight cars in less than a fortnight so that farmers were driven to road transport and the government say the line is hardly used then close the line. This example was the Cudgewa line which used to rail out a lot of sheep, but the government railway wanted to get out of sheep transport. I read about a similar thing on the Forsayth line in Queensland where the QR refused to rail 1000 cattle.
Correction regarding gallery cars: Those actually weren't from the 1960s/70s, but originally from the 1950s, built in several different series for the CB&Q, C&NW and Milwaukee Road, all in the greater Chicago area. I agree that it is good to phase them out; they have the additional problem of just having one entrance door in the middle with steep stairs so they are not accessible for wheelchairs or the elderly, and station stops take a long time boarding and alighting through that one door. European perspective: A big city commuter system of course must be electric and run at least once every half hour throughout the day. Running that many trains justifies the expense of electrification, which is a fixed cost and once it's built you can run as many trains as you like on it. Track ownership? Sure there can be mixed freight/commuter lines. That's the fine art of timetabling. But where commuter traffic is densest it's better to separate passenger from freight tracks to minimize mutual interference. The intermediate solution? They can buy all F59PHI they can get a hold of (that are replaced by Chargers elsewhere). Progress Rail (EMD's successor) specialized on freight locomotives, though there is the F125 built since 2015 for Metrolink. It uses an engine from Caterpillar (nowadays the owner of Progress Rail / EMD). Probably because those big 2-stroke engines aren't that ideal in the stop and go operation of commuter trains. On the long run Metra should look at electrification. And isn't there a chance to get federal funding for this? So it's not all up to the freight railroads that happen to own the tracks. They certainly wouldn't say no if they can get a track upgrade for free with federal money, even if it means their lines will be busier with hourly (or more) commuter trains so they have to run their freight trains in the gaps between.
The F125 isn't a good choice for any railroad. It has been very problematic for Metrolink, and it has 4700hp, but needs 1500 for HEP, leaving 3200hp to power a train, only 200 more than Metrolink's legacy fleet
@@AVeryRandomPerson If they end production Siemens will have pretty much a monopoly on new passenger diesel locomotives for North America. Or is Wabtec Motive Power (MPXpress) still in the business? (same company as GE Transportation nowadays)
American answers to your European perspective(all in good fun, just want to offer some rebuttals): Electrification: I think this could definitely be an option depending on how things go with a different commuter service; Caltrain. Caltrain currently operates a fleet of F40PH and F59PHI locos and the same Gallery cars as Metra as well as Bombardier Bi-level coaches but is planning to fully electricy its route from San Jose to San Francisco by 2024. If this proves to be successful and viable, I would not be surpised if many major commuter services, including Metra, quickly make the switch to electricity in an attempt to modernize their fleets, many of which are averaging 40-50 yrs old. However, electrifcation of rail in America is still a mostly untested market outside of the NEC, and Americans in general seem to just have a natural disdain towards electricity to begin with (take a look at the automotive market haha) so I do think it will take some time before that is the mainstream way of doing things but I do think we are heading in the right direction when it comes to green transportation. Track ownership: Unfortunately unless the US government itself comes and buys every single railroad in the US at once, this will never happen. While I agree that yes, using the art of timetabling and signals and all that, it should be possible to safely operate both types of trains within frequent service of each other. However, many of the freight companies that currently own the tracks the trains run on in the US have owned those tracks for decades, if not literal 100's of years and they do not plan on relinquishing said tracks under ANY circumstances. Transporting freight by rail in the US has always been extremely lucrative as its really one of the only methods we have for bulk transport from coast to coast as we lack any rivers that flow longitudinally and unfortunately throughout history nobody thought to mention that transporting people by rail could be just as important. Fast forward to 2021 and we have what is called Precision Scheduled Railroading which is a type of business model currently used by ALL major freight carriers in which basically they are running freight trains on a set schedule instead of by demand for the entire train in order to constantly keep freight, and more specifically the freight cars themselves, moving. PSR is hard to explain without completely diving into the history of railroading in the US, so I'll just leave it at that for now. But basically because the freight companies are already running their own trains on their own "schedules" on their own tracks, passenger trains will never have the precedent and this has been the unfortunate case for the last 20-30 years. As of right now, the freight companies still stand to make more money off their own trains than they do from the contracts they have with Amtrak and other commuters to allow their trains to operate and because of that the freight companies WILL NOT sell the tracks and WILL NOT give precadent to passenger trains under most circumstances. Now every company is different of course with some being more lenient and cooperative towards commuters such as BNSF and CSX and as Alan mentioned, you have some that are a little more "hostile" towards passenger traffic such as CP lol. Intermediate solution: I agree that for short term, buying as many F59PHI's as possible would be smart and I hope Metra continues to do that(they could at least repaint them tho LOL) but I also agree that the F125 should not be the final solution as it is giving Metrolink hell maintenance-wise and besides the emissions, it wasn't really much of an upgrade capability-wise from their previous fleet. I think the F59PHI should be the last diesel for Metra while they research the total cost of electrification and I think other commuter services should follow suit but in regards to that being federally funded? I think it's a shot in the dark. Even if the government offered to heavily subsidize the project costs I don't know if the freight companies would take it simply due to how much money they are already previously making on each of their lines. At the end of the day, the freight companies only care about making money for themselves and so I highly doubt that they would be alright with a sizeable increase in commuter traffic which would then limit the amount of freight traffic which in turn would cause them to move less trains, which moves less freight, and makes them less money and so on and so forth and not to mention we are already having enough supply chain issues in America as it stands and so reducing overall nationwide freight train traffic in favour of commuter traffic I don't think would truly be beneficial.(Also a track upgrade I don't believe would be incentive enough tbh) Never say never I guess, but I think the price tag on a project like that would just be way too astronomical to be justifiable and so I do think it will be up to each individual freight company on whether or not they want to cooperate with their local commuters to upgrade infrastructure and work around each other's scheduling, I don't think the government has enough influence on them to force that per se, but I guess we'll see. In conclusion: Overall, railraoding in America is extremely archaic. The introduction of PSR is arguably the only real "innovation" regarding the operation of the railroad industry, but as pretty much any railroad employee will tell you, it was an innovation for the worst if anything. In the over 150 years that the Transcontinental Railroad has existed, the overall practices of running a railroad have not fundamentally changed despite the fact that the land and life around the railroads has. Everybody is correct in saying that in order for passenger rail to be successful in America there needs to be some serious restructuring of American railroads in general but the likelihood of that happening is bascially slim to none. The sheer amount of money each freight railroad makes combined with the fact that there really are no comparable modes of bulk transportation across the US have pretty much already secured the fates of most passneger rail networks throught the country. This is an extremely complicated and complex problem that has no immediate answer and we probably won't see the results of change until well after our lifetime but the way it sits, and has been sitting, passenger rail is only continuing to detoriate in America and with our population ever-increasing its high time we do something about it! I would love to hear other people's opinions on this matter as this is something I am cleary passionate about LOL and hopefully overall this can become a bigger discussion!
@@ashtonnelson2624 Freight timetables planned to the minute and passenger timetables planned to the minute, even by different companies: That can go together so conflicts are only if things go wrong and several delayed trains wait for who can go first. In a "clockface timetable" system that requires all passenger trains to arrive at a hub station before the full hour (or whatever time) to form their connections, the railway would become extremely unattractive to passengers if they can't count on catching their connections. I can see the conflict potential there in case of busy infrastructure. Note that the two largest western freight railroads UP and BNSF both take active part in running Metra, not just providing the infrastructure but also the operation of the trains themselves. Or so was my impression, seeing their logos on the trains and reading about them. I'm also curious about the success of Caltrans and I hope it can serve as a model for others to study. (Take a look at NJT though, also mentioned in the video, they're electric since they took over from electric predecessors ... Or even at the electric line of Metra.) I understand that the European model, which has changed in recent years towards having an infrastructure operator required by law to give fair access to any train operator, cannot be directly transferred to the US. I'm not sure whether anyone is motioning towards such a model, but I assume there would be opposition.
3:14 Worth noting, that actually isn't the worst commuter rail schedule in the US. It does get worse, ever since the pandemic, the Northstar commuter rail in the Twin Cities went from a schedule cut of 12 daily trains, with 5 morning+1 reverse and 5 evening+1 reverse, to just *four daily trains*. Two in the morning, two in the evening. Currently working on a video on how the Northstar can be fixed but much of what this video covers can easily be applied to it + other US Commuter rails.
I grew up on the BNSF Aurora line (or "The Burlington" as we called it) and I remember loving going to Chicago on weekends or the Brookfield zoo just whenever. It was such a great line.
There's a reason foaming railfans use the nickname "The Racetrack" to refer to the Burlington triple track line to Aurora; the terms "first-class" and "deluxe" and such are often overused and watered down, yet there's no watering down when they are used to historically describe the Burlington as operators. (There's a reason Jimmy Hill went after the Burlington for his northern railroads instead picking some other railroad to get to Chicago). Bonus fun fact: in Burlington slang the commuter trains are nicknamed "dinkies".
I find it weird how much double deckers are used in the us and canada, especially for regional lines. If the capacity of each train is lower, you can improve the frequency, which ends up increasing overall ridership
Running more trains - instead of having higher capacity per train - costs a lot more money (also means less room for cargo trains on the track as a possible side issue). Higher cost translates into higher ticket prices, which will cost you potential customers. Also, since each train has a set operating cost attached to it, each train needs to have above a certain averge number of riders to be profitable. Having higher frequency of trains gives more flexibility to passengers, yes, but if they cannot be operated profitably, that is not sustainable.
You also end up with a lot of unhappy commuters, since they have to deal with cramped trains, take a later train and be late to work, and/or take an earlier train and have to start their day even earlier. And then coming home, they'll end up resigning themselves to taking later trains and getting home later. Capacity on city lines is definitely important.
Higher frequency on a lot of routes is simply untenable. Remember, transit agencies rent spaces on the tracks from freight operators, and more timeslots means more costs
GO Transit in Toronto runs bi-level coaches exclusively, every 15 minutes on some lines, and those trains are often packed during rush hour. Combining high-capacity trains with frequent service keeps thousands of cars off the road.
Metra can barely staff their trains to meet their pathetic schedule today. CTA has cut service by half due to lack of operators. Adding frequency is pretty much a nonexistent possibility for most or all transit agencies in the US right now unfortunately.
I always wondered why Metra cars had that weird cutouts on the second floor. Also great point about rider perception; that's very important. If your network is perceived to be unreliable, slow or "for the poor people only" like it is in a lot of cities, nobody's going to ride it
When Illinois Central still owned the "Electric Line" they used to have bar cars on the trains out of the city on Fridays. According to an old alcoholic that lived next to the Richton Park station.
Rock Island and Milwaukee District West had bar cars until 2008. Never heard of the Electric District having ever had them. Is it possible they mixed up the Rock Island and Electric District?
@@tylerkochman1007 if you pull up Google and you find the Metra Electric station in Richton Park take a look at those townhouses there to the immediate Northwest of the station. That's where she lived and that's where she commuted to and from. When she pointed at the train and started telling her story she didn't mention Rock Island or Milwaukee. So... no.
@@ughettapbacon ...it was called Lioncrest, right? ...too crazy to see a RP reference in a chat...lol...I'm obviously from there too (I'm from "The Hills")
God. I was working for them (EMD) in the mid 2000s. They still exist, even under progress rail. The whole old team is still there. They just stopped making passengers, usually working with others, like bombardier doing much of the engineering, but no liability.
Accessibility on the gallery cars does suck, but the seat design (the back flips so you can always face forward or sit with a group of 4) is the best around. The SD70 order is a cheap way to improve the state of good repair when the F40s are failing daily. They can get way more of those than new chargers.
Metra is transitioning to non-flippable seats. They did a survey and a significant majority of riders indicated that they did not care if the seats reversed. Most people are fine with not necessarily facing in the direction of travel.
@@notacow69 So 50 years ago that was the best thing about the C&NW; a group for coffee and BS in the morning and then beers and BS in the evening. Sure beat driving in from Barrington . . .
The gallery cars aren't too bad provided they are used for their original intention: conductors checking tickets without having to go around both levels. Which I think is pretty cool, BUT I know lots of commuter services don't do that: VRE down in the DC area also uses Gallery cars AND THE CONDUCTORS JUST GO UP BOTH LEVELS ANYWAY
I'm guessing it's easier to walk up there, than for the conductor to reach up at an awkward angle and the passengers to reach down at an awkward angle. :|
@@AileTheAlien Probably, but still And yeah in general I agree that the cars could have been designed a lot better... i.e. like conventional double decker cars.
I wouldn't want to sit in the aisle seat on the lower level. Looks like you'd be showered with whatever scraped off the bottoms of everyone's shoes at every station when people up top walked down the "aisle". Someone at some point probably stepped in dog poo on their way to the station - ugh!
I've seen some of the wildest parties in these cars on St. Patrick's day, game day, and other days where a single car becomes a double decker party bus. Service definitely needs to be better...
The most egregious issue with METRA is that the old Illinois Central electrified line is just sitting there, and could be turned into a real rapid transit service to some of the most underserved parts of Chicago almost for free. Yet METRA operates it like it's 1950 with a ticketing system completely separate from the CTA and schedules almost solely designed to get office workers into the loop with trains 1 or 2 hours off peak (it's especially bad on weekends). I've spent a lot of time in Chicago and a lot of time on the perennially overcrowded CTA buses to Hyde Park stuck in traffic on Lake Shore drive. It's absurd when there's an electrified rail line that almost 100% duplicates the same service that is underused and costs a fortune to maintain.
My uncle who worked in railroads for a while (LIRR, some things abroad), said that to make American railways better requires a fundamental change in government.
LIRR is improving however. They significantly revamped their mainline and are in the process of adding a third track. They also extended service to grand central and is expected to open soon
METRA received $185.6 million in federal, state and local subsidies in 2019... they got $200 million in 2018... but they claim they REALLY need $1.2 billion to buy about 400 new rail cars... and $320 million for 40 new locomotives... also they need $400 million to fix aging infrastructure... looks like the only fundamental change government can engage in to fix this problem is to swipe even MORE money from taxpayers pockets
the gallery is mainly for single riders compared to families or groups, who can manipulate the seats on the main floor, as well as the mentioned conductors and ticket collections. the big things for me, as someone who rides the Metra Electric on a regular basis, is the other metra lines should have consistent schedules and weekend scheduling. The Electric goes from 4am to 1am/2am on a daily basis regardless of weekday or weekend, the only changes are the number of lines around rush hour and on Sundays specifically the trains being bihourly. another thing you mentioned in the video that the electric does well is sharing space. There are many, and I mean MANY, freight lines and depots that parallel Metra Electric, as well as some Amtrak lines, and then for a significant portion of the route (115th/Kensington to Millenium Station) the independent South Shore Line shares the tracks with Metra Electric in a partnership. there's tracks set aside specifically for the Electric and South Shore trains, 4 on the west side of the usually 6 track railways, and 2 used for regular freight trains, one for inbound and one for outbound. If other lines were able to have tracks set aside for themselves and other set aside for freight companies to have as their own it would be mutually beneficial. The main issue, unfortunately, if just how big Chicago is in the rail industry, both commuter and freight, as well as many tracks going through suburbs and the increase in tracks would result in less space and most likely demolition of land. This is still at the end of the day an amazing analysis of the Metra and it's issues
The ME has its problems but once you're *on* the train and done dealing with the current schedule, it's fantastic. It's fast, electric, clean and doesn't share tracks with freight. It's too bad they haven't given the other lines that level of infrastructure.
We have some gallery car trains on the CalTrain line between San Francisco and San Jose and I actually like them. No need to sit next to strangers when riding alone.
I went to Poland for 2 months just to get away from America's infighting and the thing I loved the most was their TRANSIT SYSTEM! Every 8-12 minutes there was a trolley car; in any direction. Every 15-20 minutes there was an SKM train (similar to a subway but from city to city) in any direction. Only from 4am to 6am did the train schedules slow down, but there were still trains operating. You could live in Gdansk, take a train to an all night rave in Sopot, get hammered, and take the train back at 6am without having to worry about a D.U.I. or killing innocent people while driving drunk. And best of all, the police knew what you were doing, but didn't care, because you "Weren't breaking any laws!" Go home and sober up. Or get robbed in an alley. It's up to you. So long as you pay $0.90 for the train fair and don't pee in public. American transit was behind Europe in the 1980's. Now we are 30 years behind and are a laughing stock for the rest of the world. Let's wake the Hell up! Great video by the way. I love 'More than just bikes.' He feels like a brother I've never met because I agree with a lot of his city planning views.
Being drunk in public is not an offence in Europe. Have you seen what happens around harvest festivals like Oktoberfest? You'll only be "canned" in Poland if you're blind drunk, passed out or danger to yourself. That doesn't go on your record, hut you have to pay for the "service". Same for drugs. You can be high as a kite and they can't touch you because _being_ on something is not a crime - you can't buy, sell or use (yes, there's good logic behind it, but that's beyond this channel)
In Britain, the trains run every 30 mins to my closest city and they keep running till 11:30 at night. This isn’t representative for the whole country but it’s pretty decent. If I miss a train I can’t imagine having to wait 2 hours to catch the next one. Plus it’s like 3 quid for a ticket
One departure every 30 minutes at peak times in a city of nearly 10 million? Compare that to Oslo, a city of 1 million which has departures every 10 minutes at peak times.
One of the major problems with US transit, not just metro is it always seems to be an after thought for cities. By the time they get around to planning anything like a light rail there is no room for it without knocking down buildings and destroying businesses and homes. Then the city tends to get funding from local companies for the project, with the normal back pats involved. Meaning the rail doesn't go where it needs to go based upon trafic hot spots... it goes where who ever donated the most money. So it might go from the Mall to City hall and the local Stadium but some how totally by pass any residential area's to pick people up.
After watching this, I am even more bummed to see that it's not just us here in new york city environs that have to put up with railroad scheduling issues and equipment problems. Since the MTA controls the LIRR, MetroNorth, various bridges and tunnels, and the buses and subways, they do nothing well.
Great video, I've been using the Metra BNSF line for my entire life and have always loved it but had absolutely no clue how bad some of the other schedules were on different lines. There's nothing better than finding out you happened to get on an express train that will take you to Union Station in 20 minutes instead of 45.
I live on the UP-west which is almost as good as BNSF, I'm glad I know this now because I know to check the Metra service on that line before I move to a different area. Imagine you move to a place where you have only evening trains at 4:20 5:10 5:50 and 6:00 or something like that
Being from Chicago, I've had plenty of times where the North Central Service line would've been super useful, but that line has even more issues than you mentioned. Not only is it horrible infrequent with no weekend service, but it also makes only one intermediate stop within the Chicago city limits, and that is Western Ave which is the first stop out of Union Station. It skips all the other Milwaukee District West line stations before it splits off onto its own route, and the only other transfer point with any other line is at Prairie Crossing, which is way the hell out. It's unique in the way it meets up with another line, but the fact that its route takes it way the hell west before going North and making no stops except for Western Ave along its way west makes it even less useful.
The NCS would certainly benefit from both more frequent service and also having reverse peak service. Now that the peoplemover at O'Hare connects to the Metra station, the least they could do is run some extra trains as far as O'Hare Transfer, even though the Blue Line is much more direct and convenient. (Might be harder to do that at points north of there, as there's two stretches of single track for bottlenecks)
@@TheLewistownTrainspotter8102 the single track is definitely a bottleneck, but I’m sure trains could be run at least on a 2-hourly schedule like it was before the pandemic. The current rush-only service just makes it feel especially useless. Trains stopping at O’Hare transfer could definitely be worthwhile for people who either don’t live near the blue line (including in northern suburbs) or who are going from downtown.
@James Cudworth It's a half mile from Franklin Park (NCS) to Franklin Park (MD-W). Doable, but not terribly fun, especially if it's raining or snowing.
@@notacow69 I’ve done that walk before! Actually walked all the way from Franklin Park (NCS) to Mannheim so I could have the chance to flag down a train there. It was funny because I was the only one on the entire train on the NCS and the conductor seemed confused as to why I’d take that particular train only to Franklin Park when I could’ve taken the MD-W. Anyway, if you were going inbound on the NCS and had to go back out on the MD-W, I could see that connection at Franklin Park working well. That’s a good point.
Another reason why commuter rails don’t have GEs anymore is because they are slow at loading AMPS so it takes them much longer to accelerate than EMD. With stops being so close to each other on METRA, they need to accelerate quickly.
Another nice thing about Metra owning all the track is finally getting some maintenance. You ever sit on a 50-year old gallery car traveling over some weakly welded track near a grade crossing at 70 mph in Berwyn? Its just like Action Park!
Seems a little harsh to put so much blame on Metra. Most of the issues outlined are way above what Metra is able to do. Everything listed pretty much just comes down to money, from acquiring ROWs, to new rolling stock, to training workers on how to service new equipment. Metra has had some serious corruption issues which have exacerbated financial issues, but short of changing how it gets it funding, it's hard to drastically change things and it seems they are doing their best to make do with a somewhat lousy hand.
Plus there's the fact that they have to run along existing freight lines, which means trying to lease track usage rights from reluctant rail companies who'd rather not share their lines with passenger services. Metra doesn't own most of its track.
@@VestedUTuber Technically, with the BNSF Racetrack and the Northwestern Station lines, Metra just supplies the rolling stock. The freight railroads supply the crews.
...which is exactly why Democrats want more and more Federal control of everything. They don't care how badly organized it is, as long as they get more taxes and more high-paying, do-nothing political patronage "jobs."
@@davidlafleche1142 Oh, and the Republicans must be so much better with how they basically hand everything to corporations who are just as badly organized. Face it, corruption is a non-partisan issue, the only partisan part of it is who the politicians of each party are in bed with.
For whatever reason your intro made me nostalgic for a time on a rainy night, driving home from my accounting job in Chicago through late night traffic, enjoying the radio. Like A LOT, the memory was unbelievably vivid and comforting. I'm 17 and the closest I've ever come to Chicago was a 1 week vacation in Montreal.
What isn't mentioned is that Metra inherited a lot of things including all the different infrastructure, something that's still left over from the earlier days of railroading with Chicago being a major hub between eastern and Midwestern/western carriers (still is even under larger systems). Private competing infrastructure also created duplication and convoluted setups in some instances as railroads have moves farther around and outside Chicago to reduce freight congestion (yet it's still a massive problem all these years later) The gallery cars were first introduced by the C&NW for their commuter service in 1958 and I think CB&Q was another Chicago operation that used them as well, so the fact that Metra inherited such a fleet and wanted to standardize with that makes sense from an economic standpoint even though it traps them into existing designs (GO Transit designed their own Bi-Level coaches after trying out gallery cars in the mid-70s from CP in Montreal) Though EMD doesn't exist in name anymore, they still very much exist as Progress Rail which was the name given to it when Caterpillar acquired them in the mid-2000s. Though EMD hasn't designed and built their own commuter engines for a few years, MPI made locomotives using existing EMD or similar components including trucks and prime movers which can been seen on many notable commuter railways today with GO Transit using them as the backbone of their fleet While GE units have eclipsed EMD for dominance in mainline freight, that hasn't really happened for commuter service and with parts availability and rebuilding still viable options, I'm guessing most commuter railways would sooner switch to square wheels than go with GE
Biggest problem I see with metra is the frequency. Other than that it’s really not bad, it has good coverage. Coverage and Frey are the most important things IMO and they got one of them and both of them in select places.
I personally like the million dollar cost over run for a new train station on the northwest line! EMD's are workhorses and can be rebuilt, 40 years plus and I rarely see a broken down F40-PH.
The comment they only use EMD power is a laugh you see way more older EMD's being rebuilt for 15-20 years of more service than GE's plus he forgets that EMD was and still is in Metra's backyard so of course there would be some bias. That is like saying the problem with Southwest Airlines is that they only fly 737's when they could pickup some used Airbus planes. And there is nothing wrong with rebuilding SD70's I am sure it will be way cheaper than buying a new Siemens Charger which also would have a different prime mover.
@@bwallace5945 tell me, how many SD40-2s are still on the rails despite their age? He did leave out it's cheaper to rebuild and upgrade than buy new locomotives because the railroad KNOWS the in and out of that loco instead of getting to know a locomotive, having it tested for months, etc.
In addition to everything else mentioned here, the maintenance cost of new locomotives like the charger are astounding compared to older EMDs or rebuilt ones. Look at the maintenance cylce of the charger, cummins qsk900(i think), compared to the old EMD 645 or 710. The cost of basic maintenance of these cummins and sometimes CAT engines, progress rail locos, are insane. Lastly the aftermarket is extensive for parts for EMDs, with 1000s of suppliers for all parts. How many suppliers carry charger replacement parts? (Only the OEM). So costs are high, along with the new technology that is VERY expensive when it breaks, and it does all the time at least in my experience. Sorry for the long post, since I deal with these types of things on a daily basis I have alot to say.
I actually get why Metra went to that initial weird double-decker design. NJ Transit, who uses the "full" second level double-decker design, has had major problems with its conductors not "collecting" tickets because of the second floor and because of an ill-advised management decision to evaluate trainmen (or trainwomen) based on their "hitting the platforms" at train stops. As a result, on loaded trains many tickets simply don't get collected, especially on the upper level, because the conductor can only collect so many tickets or check so many phones between station stops when they are forced to be outside so that the evaluators can see them. So, if you've "bought" your ticket on your phone app and haven't activated it, you can get a free ride. I'm told that NJT did an internal audit and found that pre-pandemic that upwards of 50% of tickets were not being collected. I've ridden a number of times over the years where my ticket, and those of my traveling companions, were not collected. The double-deckers also have the disadvantage of significantly lengthening dwell times in stations. I know that commuters hate the middle seat on single-level Comet cars that have 3-2 seating. The double-deckers add a level without necessitating that dreaded seat that often goes unoccupied. I'm told that federal funding doesn't give the option for 2-2 seating for single-level cars, so state commuter rail agencies are forced to buy the double-deckers. It's a form of blackmail. Perhaps Metra doesn't have the ticket collection issue, although the old "reach up" cars suggest that they anticipated that issue before NJ Transit found out how much of a problem it could create.
Then again, NJT's been ass-backward about its general fare policy for years (even now, it's not even trying to set itself up for better fare integration with the MTA or SEPTA).
Honestly, the entire northeast needs to go to a single card system (or at least cards that can be used with different operators), and they should remodel their stations to have fare gates (think Netherlands style) so that this whole collection issue doesn’t happen.
Biggest issue with the single level Comet equipment on NJT is getting mixed Comet sets and getting slammed around by slack the entire way. Don’t forget those earsplitting flat spots on the wheels, made worse in autumn by leaf season. If you have an entirely Comet V (maroon seats) train, generally slack is not as bad an issue.
Isnt there a massive fine for doing this? In Vienna the fine is around €120, meaning the entire system can work on an honor system with spot checks, since no one wants a massive fine. At three fines you are already above the price of a yearly ticket (a single ticket is €2,40 and yearly is €365), and in one year you will definately be checked more than that in one year, especially if you travel around rush hours.
@@spartan117zm The OV Chipkaart (aka OV Shitcard) is a good idea, but the implementation is worthless. TLS, the company that runs the OVC, sits on a huge pile of cash for no other reason than "because they can". And the implementation is rubbish if you have to switch between train operators. Going from Doetinchem to Venray for example (yeah no idea why you'd want to) you have to switch between operators twice. Doetinchem to Arnhem is Arriva, there you have to check out of Arriva and into NS to get to Nijmegen, where you have to check out of NS and back in to Arriva to get to Venray. If this goes wrong anywhere, you'll automatically get charged 20 euro for the privilege, because reasons and there's a bunch of BS hoops to jump through to get your money back. And this is ignoring the fact that out of the 5 train stations in my city only central station has the gates. If you just travel between smaller stations, the whole system is still very much an honour system because ticket checks are few and far between. It's completely possible to take a train into town, then get off 1 station before central station and take a bus for the last few km. Also over the past 20 years public transportation has gotten so damn expensive, that unless you've got no alternative or you're desperate to avoid rush hour traffic jams, there really isn't a point in not going by car, bike or moped. And the price hike has gotten significantly worse since they've started to charge by the km as travelled by the train or bus, rather than the old zone based system. So if the bus doesn't go in the right direction, you end up paying more than you should have, because they've found a new way to make a couple euro. If I want to go downtown I go by moped, because of free parking and no real hassle in traffic. If I need to go further than 20km on a bad weather day or 70km on a good weather day, I go by car. Because it's the fastest and cheapest option.
When I lived in the suburbs I loved going to Chicago for all kinds of things. The train was almost never a viable option due to how early I would have to get to the station to make the last train home. I really hope they fix things. Chicago is a great city and it deserves better.
North Central Service is still operating with a reduced COVID schedule. Heritage Corridor is owned by CN and gas multiple freight crossings. The Union Pacific North has half hour service within Chicago and Evanston during the midday.
4:43 Pass through on the double deckers are for fire escape reasons. Also stops a fire/emergency from happening up top and having the bottom riders unaware of what’s going on and vice versa
Correction about the Metra Electric: The schedules are relatively frequent during daytime. I think 30 minutes is the maximum headway during daytime (greater after the hours of like 8 to 6), but during the evening peak I found that there were trains leaving every few minutes out of Millennium Station. This schedule still *sucks* though, since the MED is the only transport link along Chicago's Southern lakefront, and the line has the capacity to run metro-style services but Metra doesn't want to.
The Metra Electric would need significant signal and track alignment updates to significantly improve service. Most of the north end is patched together, and directional signaling means that they do with four tracks what most other corridors can do with only three or even just two.
@MasteroMatter When did you try to see the Union Station headhouse? It was closed during the pandemic, and at times for special events. Historically Amtrak didn't use it much, but in recent years, it is the coach passenger waiting area, replacing the much-too-cramped concourse level.
I grew up riding the Metra, or more specifically, the BNSF (and if not that then the Union Pacific West Line which is almost just as good schedule wise). Honestly I had no clue that the rest of the system was that bad with the schedules, and as for the cars, I guess I always figured that’s just what train cars were typically like on commuter trains. Boy was I wrong and I now really hope they get those new cars that make more sense
I am in the same boat! I loved the BNSF line and the accessibility it granted my community to Chicago. It had such a profound impact on me, that I started to use some of longer routes out of Chicago Union Station. These include the Hiawatha Line to Milwaukee, and Capital Limited Train to Washington D.C. Now I use the D.C. metro system between 4-8 times a week, and I cannot get enough of trains being a part of my life and commute.
well the rte 59 station *IS* the busiest station after union station in the whole network. but with with up-west line, ogilvie is much less hectic than union if your living in dupage and not wanting to deal with the nexus of chicago rail
Great video, however I just want to correct you on one thing at 6:12. You mentioned that Metra won’t buy the Genesis engines because they aren’t EMD, which could play a part in it, however the primary reason is that Metra actually tested P42s a while back but found their load speeds to be too slow compared to the F40s.
I can understand that, having been a Class I freight engineer. EMD and GE have/had different throttle response systems. The joke about GE locos is "Run 8 and wait", the computer decides how fast to load.
Everyone: Please update your locomotives, they're aging Metra: I missed the part where that's my problem After seeing Metra's horrendous schedules and rolling stock, I'll never complain about a train being late nor overcrowding on the LIRR ever again... And as a New Yorker whose parents were born in NJ, I for one welcome our new Glorious Republic of New Jersey overlords. Seriously, New Jersey serves as a role model for how rail (and trams) should be done...I know it's odd to say NJ is a role model (especially from a New Yorker) but it absolutely is.
There are other role models besides NJ, Avery. You must be aware, for example, of the Brightline (now Virgin Trans, I believe) rapid transit between Miami and West Palm Beach and the to Orlando. Nothing in New Jersey compares to that. Also Texas Central between Dallas and Houston.
@@GordonLF But the Birhgltine's just...ONE high speed rail line i. And it's not even the original high speed line in this country when Acela has been running for YEARS! NJ is a role model because it has WIDESPREAD public transportation (as in, connecting the ENTIRE state by bus, train, and light rail)...which Florida doesn't have. Sorry not sorry HECTOR, but I stand by what I said. NJ *IS* a role model. One line in Florida is not enough. And before you talk about SunRail in Orlando...that is such an inconvenient rail. It doesn't even have a station on International Drive or on Disney property. And the Texas Central hasn't even started construction yet!
@@GordonLF Wrong again, Hector. They are back to being Brightline now. You keep bringing up private high speed lines as if that makes the ENTIRE states of Texas and Florida role models. Sorry but until Florida and Texas has widespread railway networks (this includes public COMMUTER rail with stations in between serving towns and not just cities; not just high speed rail or Amtrak), then they will never be role models. NJ still fits this definition of a public transportation role model. Sorry not sorry, the North will always be superior to the South. *COPE!*
@@albertetzel5925 You mean ALP-45DPs the New Order 4535 and upwards is going to finish GP40s F40PH-2CATs in NJ Transit fleet. Some of those are Metropolitan Transit Authority New York State West of Hudson fleet
The beauty of the North Central line is that it's the only Metra rail which serves O'Hare airport. Now certainly, if you're going into downtown, the better option is to take the CTA Blue line, which goes from the airport itself to the loop downtown. But if you're heading to the suburbs, you have your choice of going north towards Antioch or, well, going north towards Antioch. (again, the CTA Blue line is better for getting downtown). Another problem with the Metra is the lack of connectivity between the lines outside of downtown Chicago - something which the acquisition of the EJ&E line would have done wonders to solve, but instead CN acquired the line. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elgin,_Joliet_and_Eastern_Railway
Chicago has multiple downtown terminals that aren't connected too. Much like Boston & NYC. Philly solved this issue by connecting the 2 terminals w/a 4 track tunnel but they have their own set of issues.
2:05 can I just say that I find these multimodal vehicles really fascinating? My favourite is a fire brigade in Switzerland that has six fire trucks that can also use the railways to ensure a response time of
The bus schedules here are also insanely disappointing… they come early and leave you, they come late even when the schedule says arriving… like it could say arriving at you’re standing at the bus stop for 15 minutes 💛
Some things you said are straight up wrong And they need to be corrected. Gallery cars were 1st made in the early 1950s. CP is not the railroad that is hostile. It's CN because they're the ones not allowing Metra To expand the schedule on the heritage corridor and North central service. And while EMD doesn't exist anymore, It's new owner progress rail is the one that still provides service for existing locomotives made by EMD. Therefore it's not bad that they still use EMD locomotives, The problem is that they don't have the funding to buy new Locomotives and that they have to resort to buying locomotives 2nd hand. Get your facts straight before you embellish a Commuter system that isn't as bad as you make it seem.
@@NewPaulActs17 The whole point of a commuter line is not the terminal stations, but the stations between. The two lines serve completely different areas.
Metra gallery cars are really cool in my opinion, as they are streamlined and reminiscent of streamliner passenger trains. I also really like the F40PH locomotives they use, as they are pleasant to look at, sound cool, and are just nice. I don't see a downside in gallery cars or F40PH locomotives.
Your videos are informative and this one was really entertaining! I'm a lifelong Chicagoan and live on the Metra North Central line. To be fair, it's not meant to be a weekend & stay late in the city line, its sole purpose is to connect commuters from areas of the northern burbs that have difficulty accessing expressways during the week. I've taken this line for work and take another local line to the city on the weekends, which is only about a 15-20 minute drive. Since other public transport options are crap in the burbs, having a car is a must anyway. This line and others like it on the Metra network aren't as bad as they may seem on the surface and really do serve an important need.
Personally I work on light rail trains there is a certain part in the night when the train is empty and we become a rolling transient daycare. They scheduled for profit not convenience.
As someone who mother used to catch the train at 6:30am in the morning to get to work and 4pm to get back home, my mom hardly complained about the train because it was wayyy cheaper and safer to do compared to trying to drive in the morning and you're still sleepy.
Chicagoan who moved to DC. Metra is a godsend compared to MARC and Virginia Rail, where there is only service during rush hour and only M-F. Want to go somewhere on a weekend. You have to drive. Commuted by Metra for years and it was pretty reliable.
Was a Metra commuter for 7 years. NCS schedule used to have 10 trains in each direction but was cut back due to low ridership which came about when covid first hit. At that for almost a year the NCS line only had 2 trains going in each direction and they were only about an hour apart. I rode that line a few times during that Era and I must say even two was one too many, there were hardly any passengers. All but just a couple line schedules were cut back at the start of covid and all but a couple remain cut back to this day however they've added several trains to each line as ridership started to come back. These days it seems ridership is almost completely back but, still have yet to return the schedules to what they once were
Those commuter rail train tables remind me of how Swedish State Railways would deliberately sabotage a train schedule when they wanted to close an unprofitable line after nationalization. They also had a bus company BTW! Today we have one commuter line that has a truly terrible schedule and it's the newest like the line between Luleå and Haparanda two towns in the far north east of Sweden next to Finland. They run three times each way and match absolutely nothing. You take the night train to northern Sweden well get ready to wait for four hours to catch a train for the last 100 miles of your journey. The last train also leaves just after people get off work so say bye bye to some shopping before going home.
You know, for all it's faults, I never really realized how lucky I was to grow up not too far from the Union Pacific Northwest Line. At least until my family moved nearly half a day away from the city and state that was our home. Living in the Twin Cities area right now and while the bus schedules can be pretty good, certainly better than Tennessee, it's nothing compared to what Metra is and could be at it's best. If Metra had greater control of their track mileage, were directed to run every line like their best, and required to create a few ring lines to connect places without needing to go into the city, they'd outpace and outperform so many transit systems. Metra could be more than a suburban commuter service and they should be.
The gallery cars were introduced by the Burlington RR in 1950. These cars replaced ancient coaches that, among other shortcomings, were steam heated and lacked air conditioning. The gallery cars allowed efficient ticket taking by conductors and collectors as well as the remote operation of the doors from a single controller. The Armchair Urbanist-approved new cars have reintroduced a fundamental flaw fixed with the 1937 introduction of the (A-U hated) EMD EA diesels. With the operator's cab low to the rails like an EMD AB6, the operator will now be subject to injury in the most mild of grade crossing collisions. The engineers on the original Zephyrs were injured or killed every time a motorist decided to commit vehicular suicide by train. Thus the elevated cab. Metra tried GE products before settling on the MP36 as the GEs could not accelerate fast enough to maintain the schedules. Commonality of parts is a highly efficient and less expensive way to keep a fleet running. Southwest Airlines flies one model of aircraft for the same reason. Metra's fundamental flaw is it's existence as a government rail corporation. Ghost payrolling and patronage hires discourage elimination of financial waste. So the solution is always soak northeastern Illinois taxpayers more. More conductors, service all day and night, multiple vendors of power, take over the freight lines...you name it. From his armchair, the Urbanist thinks that the bankrupt state of Illinois (a state that can't pay it's existing bills, much less shower Metra with more cash) should borrow more money so Metra can run like a rapid transit line, something it has never been designed to do. Armchair indeed.
Damn, maybe the state of Illinois wouldn't be so bankrupt if it spent money investing in public transit rather than building and maintaining a gazillion roads that get congested anyway
@@_DeathDreams_ The state lost the ability to say 'no' to any costly program. The current governor's brilliant solution to increasing costs was to give state employees raises unheard of in the private sector. Also, Metra operates in Cook county and the surrounding counties, while the highways are statewide. People voted with their feet decades ago when they walked away from the passenger train. They have not been dissuaded from their decision.
@@TomKlimczak Great response. People will be defensive about whatever they are fond of but reality must prevail. Sidenote, I'm glad to have moved out of IL. Good luck out there.
Good video, but not sure about some of your information... The gallery cars were invented by the CNW in the 1950's. The Milwaukee road, The Burlington and Rock Island all ordered gallery cars afterwards...Metra inherited all of their junk, Metra then ordered Amerail cars in the 90's because they needed cars that would be interoperable with the 300+ cars they already had! The RTA was formed before Metra, which took over running the bankrupt Milwaukee and Rock Island lines... Metra does not really favor EMD over GE, they favor whatever is the cheapest! Metra is run with RTA tax money from 6 IL counties, every procurement must go through a bid process, lowest bid wins... Metra's first "new" locomotives (since 1979 purchase of the F40ph-2s)was the MP36-3s... Morrison Knutson won the low bid to build Metra's next batch of "New" locomotives. These locomotives were built using rebuilt EMD prime movers. They could have bought new GE's, (for 2 million per unit) but went with the MP's because of cost (1.5 million per unit) and fleet commonality. The fact that every decision has to be made by a board of people who know absolutely dick about railroading is the real reason that Metra runs the way it does... Metra has been a three ring circus for 40 years, only the clowns running it have changed!
God damn hating on it you know Europe isn't perfect sure they have high speed rail but some of the countries there are struggling with national debt *cough* Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece, Romania, etc especially Greece which hardly has any money to give back to the European Union so you guys are the ones who needs to get their shit together.
Man am I glad for my commuter service. Going every 15 minutes through the day and every half hour throughout the night, on modern, fast, easily accessible and comfortable trains.
Hey Alan, I found your Channel recently andI've been breezing though a lot of your content! It's up my alley lol First I wanted to say I live in Chicago and specifically I've lived next to a Metra line for 4 years. I moved here from the South (Florida/South Carolina), and I never learned to drive and all issues aside between this and the CTA I've never been more mobile and it's really great. I'm able to travel to downtown and even to some Suburbs and I only wish people could experience this down south. There was this Lawyer who lived in Charleston, SC i met named William Hamilton who was always very passionate about improving public transit while I was living there and living up here has made me appreciate his passion so much more especially as I've become more and more invested in trains as a concept for the future. (When I left Charleston was trying to Impliment some kind of BTR but idk if it made much progress yet) So from my perspective this is fantastic although I admit a bit of a hole in places and agree completely it needs to be upgraded and run more but man I'll take this over maybe getting a bus every other hour on sunday. (Charleston has a lot of Unique design issues that would probably make a great video tbh if you ever find yourself looking into it, the city is basically a giant historical landmark and a upgrades and building in the city is heavily regulated due to this. Highly reccomend it although you may already know) Secondly, and idk if anyone else would chime in but I have a passion for public transit and livability in cities, and rural areas and for a while I had considered civil engineering as a possible goal but Urban Planning also seems close to my heart the more I learn about it. I would love to follow something like these into some kind of career but I'm not sure where to start or what to start with at the moment and am trying to do more research to best suit what my goals are, any advice on where I could start looking?
At least they wont be as loud as the F40s because those have inverters for the power to the cars and have to be at 9,000 rpm all the time even at stations.
The worst train schedule I've seen in my travels around the world was in Tibet in the middle of fking nowhere, where you had 4 trains a day at literally these times: early morning, mid morning, afternoon and early evening (that was what the schedule said, no times given). To think that a city like Chicago is barely doing better than that, that's insane. To compare, a tiny village of maybe 2500 inhabitants in the Netherlands (this is back in late 90's when I lived there) had a train every hour from 5 a.m. to midnight, even 2 at peak hours, and that's in both directions.
That Metra schedule looks very similar to the West Coast Express train into Vancouver BC which I have used in the past. Translink (BC gov agency who runs it) would like to put more runs on but they have to pay millions of dollars just to use the track as it is. It is already heavily subsidized and loses money even though it's at maximum capacity and is not exactly a cheap service. It's a real shame the commuter rail tracks were torn up decades ago when cars became the in thing and there was no such thing as gridlock.
The best story I have about Metra is taking it into Chicago and coming back from a concert. I took the L back to Evanston and missed the train back to Waukegan by 5 minutes. Having no other options and a dead phone. I had to find a random ice cream shop then charged the phone just enough to double check the schedule. Yep no trains. Then I had to pay a Lyft to drive me back to Waukegan to get my car.
My family has been taking Metra to commute every day since it opened. I never realized how bad it was until someone on RU-vid told me. Now I'm going to lobby the government to nationalize the south shore line. Watch out Michigan City.
Check your history. Double-decker cars in Chicago were not originally intended to limit the number of conductors or relieve them from making trips "upstairs." When commuter (and long-distance) passenger trains all were run by private companies, the Chicago City Council thought it would be just dandy to tax each train as it arrived into one of the several Loop stations. The tax was to be calculated according to the number of axles on each passenger car. The passenger train operators partially got around the tax by running higher-capacity rail cars (i.e., the double-deckers); hence, fewer axles per train. I don't know whether this tax disappeared with the advent of Metra and Amtrak, since both organizations are quasi-governmental bodies. I worked in Illinois for a number of years, and traditionally, one taxing body there doesn't collect taxes from another.
6:00 EMD actually didn't cease to exist, they're still around. They're called Progress Rail now and they're owned by Caterpillar. In terms of freight locomotives they basically build the same stuff but they only have 1 model of passenger locomotive. It's very large and very expensive, and Metra wants power on the cheap. Hence why they keep buying older EMDs from everywhere else.
In the rest of the world, we have things called Electric Multiple Units, where you have motors in each carriage, and you don't need a separate driving carriage.
@@katrinabryce they built a version called RDC's here in the 50's. They are almost the same thing, an the biggest similarity is they suck to work on, and consume the same amount of fuel as a locomotive.
Technically, EMD still does exist, their current owner spends more time rebuilding existing locomotives because most railroads can't afford or are unwilling to buy any of the new garbage they advertise (such as the F125 and SD70ACe-T4). Also, the MPXpress units aren't EMD products, but they use recycled trucks, engines, and traction motors from scrapped GP50s.
At first I was so confused I thought it was about Metro. I feel like metro is having the same problem for California. I'm not sure if anyone has ridden it but we use tap in and out cards that are provided by local kiosk. They are now trying to improve their schedules so that they can become more efficient and direct with their times
Another thing: The reason you don't have full-width seating on both levels is because that would make the cars too tall. I don't know if you've ever ridden on a bilevel car, but the lower-level seating area doesn't have enough headroom to stand up. There must be a gap in the upper level to provide sufficient headroom for people walking through; sitting down on the lower level, you obviously can have a lower ceiling height. The fact that the open center also allows for the conductor to check tickets without having to walk up and down the stairs in car, saving a considerable amount of time, is also a benefit of the design. The height restriction is dictated by the straight center sill of the car, dating back to the original bilevels developed for Chicago-area commuter railroads; obviously, you must put your floor atop the center sill, which runs atop the trucks and in a straight line between the couplers. With the newest bilevel designs, such as used in the NYC area, the sill is depressed in the center, between the trucks, allowing you to have a bilevel coach that still fits within the much lower East Coast loading gauge (the same reason there are no Superliners in the Northeast).
Failing that (which I honestly expect), I'd at least hope they get something akin to the M8s or the Silverliner Vs in Denver (the ones in Philly have an astronomically atrocious design that actively hampers utility not seen with the aforementioned EMUs). Sure, they won't have a second level or the benefits that come from European-style cars, but even they'd be more useful than those damn gallery cars they're running now.
I have a hard time believing that an agency that is buying used freight locomotives to use them to haul passengers, and also wanted to de-electrify their electric lines and use diesel instead would buy EMU's. But we can hope
@@daanwillemsen223 I'd be more concerned about their age, lack of accessibility (Metra already has this problem), and the fact that they're built on a _bus_ platform.
