Why more than two rails? 

Trains are awesome

@@TransportMan777 hell ye

Welcome

​@@TransportMan777 yeeees

I grew up with a train obsessed dad and brother and while I admired their passion I couldn't even fake interest, I found trains so boring. My first real job was in the giftshop/ticket counter of the Newport railway museum, (I was recovering from a stroke and hip surgery in my late teens, my disability support worker found me the gig, and they were the most supportive team!) At the time I was obsessed with Edwardian fashion, so the 8M carriage was my ticket in. My passion was domestic history, and I realised while I found the "engineering talk" my dad and brother engaged in dull, I did love trains because I loved learning about the daily lives of people 100 years ago, and trains were always a big part of that. Learning how different lines changed as populations moved around, learning how electrification changed the way we travelled, and even helping contextualise events I lived through. (eg: the split during early privatisation, I remember how awkward it was, but at 15 had no context for *why* the system ran that way) Now I'm train obsessed all around and I owe a lot of that to Taitset for combining the history, the day to day context, and the technical details in such an entertaining way! Even just something simple like my co-worker lamenting that the city loop never runs in the direction we want it to, once upon a time I'd say "yeah it sucks" but now I think about how the junctions and cross overs are laid out and can appreciate how much time and management goes into those decisions. It's brought me closer to my brother and father because now I love hearing them talk about the technical aspects of gauges, switches, horsepower and engine output, and they love hearing me talk about how Rockbank appears on the Siemens seat covers and is the only V-line station on the design.

Yup, my mind also went tubelight mode and took a few seconds to light up.

We call them guard rails in the U.S. (and crossties instead of sleepers)

Hey, thanks for the laugh. I just caught that! Lol!

There are some Czech made turnouts here though

I prefer Czech Streets

This isn't being considered in Victoria since the vast majority of the broad gauge track is on the mostly self-contained suburban network and won't actually ever need to run standard gauge rolling stock. Some regional lines that run towards other states have been converted further out of Melbourne, connecting to the dual gauge lines shown in the video (which area all relatively close to Melbourne and in particular Southern Cross Station, the terminus for regional/intercity/interstate trains).

Was it? Wider gauge is better for both cargo and high speed passenger trains. It's more expensive to have it as standard though. Given that Germany is doing its best to kill its railways, I guess it indeed was worth the effort as it helped to speed up their demise:D

​@@TheArklyte The switch from 1600 to 1435 mm in the German Grand Duchy of Baden was completed in 1855. Today nobody doubts it was worth it.

@@TheArklyte standard gauge is actually better for high speed rail. It offers better stability and maneuverability, it reduces the lateral forces on the train. The only thing that is a plus for wide gauge is the wider trains and thus more capacity if used correctly, but that’s only really worth it for local trains and indeed cargo train. But it’s not worth having to maintain two different systems at the same time.

@@Repelstreeltje please remind me how exactly is narrower vehicle MORE stable at high speed turns? Thanks in advance.

Even more interesting is the dual tracks between the Russian gauge (1520mm) and Finnish gauge (1524mm). Despite the discrepancy, it is actually possible for some wheelsets to run on either gauge, so that’s what they do. They run cross-border trains with an axle gauge of about 1522mm so that they can run in both countries, albeit often at a lower speed for safety reasons.

​@@KasabianFan44 The nominal gauge is specified for a straight track, in curves it can change. Russian standards say that 1520 mm is for straight track and for curves with radius more than 350 m, 1530 mm for radius between 300 and 350 m, and 1535 mm for radius smaller than 300 m. An imprecision is specified as up to 8 mm wider or 4 mm narrower. And these specs are for new tracks, older ones can be ever less precise, standard mandates that everything between 1512 mm and 1548 mm is considered safe. So all wheelsets can adapt to 1524 mm! In practice most of cross-border freight trains were unmodified Russian, and most of cross-border passenger trains were purpose built Finish, because that was simpler to setup politically. Allegro high speed train service operated with speed up to 220 km/h on both sides of the border. 2020 pandemic killed night trains, 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine killed rest of the passenger service and almost all of the freight between Russia and Finland.

​@@xpehkto the 2020 pandemic also killed night trains over here in Spain. Sad to see the same story being repeated :(

@@osasunaitor The pandemic was only the excuse. Night trains in Spain were in a decline long before the pandemic and renfe wanted to get read of them regardless of the pandemic. It's just like they took advantage of the new HSR line to Paris to cancel the night train, even though it could have continued to run along side the high speed line. The fact that even now, when it's more popular, they refuse to reinstate this service shows that it would have happened regardless.

@@AL5520 yes, I know. The pandemic was just an excuse but it will be remembered as the moment when Spain lost its last night train nevertheless. Our high-speed-only obsessed politicians don't care about providing the services that people actually demand, they only care about filling their pockets with multi-billion contracts for high speed trains to nowhere.

domino

domino

@truegemuese There is still some dual gauge rails in the US, but it is limited to the interfaces between narrow gauge tourist railroads and standard gauge mainlines. So it is almost all in stations.

The only places US dual gauge existed is where narrow gauge and standard gauge met, and those were few. Hyce found one piece of old dual gauge out in the wild.

You can see dual gauge… Antonito CO and Orbasonia PA 3 foot narrow and standard.

You can also see them at rail crossings. As in where two rail tracks cross. For the same reason.

It's just an one-side check rail setup, isn't it?

@@u2bear377 Essentially yes, but the flange of the outer rail isnt inside of the rail, but is running on it. de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auflaufkurve

Its essentially giving the outer wheel a way bigger diameter in order to take turn more easily. However they are being phased out at the moment

@@intubungamer6173 No. The wheels of the railway rolling stock have a conical (well, somewhat more complex) shape. In curves the wheelset shifts towards the outer rail, so the outer wheel rolls with the larger radius circle while the inner wheel rolls wit the smaller radius. The difference creates yawing moment that steers the wheelset into the curve.

@@u2bear377 pls just google "Auflaufkurve" or "Deutschlandkurve" and it will all make sense. The conical part on the outer wheel isnt touching the outer rail anymore. The flange is touching the outer rail from ontop.

It's called 'gauntlet' track when it's done like that. The reason is usually just to make the pointwork more simple though, I'm not that uneven wear is a major consideration.

We use gauntlet track on many bridges in America & at certain stations. Mainly to keep frieghts away from platforms.

They're all recycled rails from elsewhere.

The Standard Gauge goes all the way to Roma Street.

@@carisi2k11I forgot about that

And lets not forget the gaunlet tracks with standard gauge on one set and narrow on the other, plus the guard rails on the merrivale

Are you misspelling gauge or is this a thing,?

For me it was more the opposite. You see the guide rails in more places across the globe. However the double rail feature abit less. I do think it could be useful for international trains that would go in and out of Spain. (Spain uses a different gauge then the European standard do to their history with Franco)

​@@sirBrouwerok

I would say American railroads are safe, but it's just the people who run them don't know or doesn't pay attention to maintain them to be safe.

Thiis is just a 1 minute video covering the most common examples seen in Victoria today.

Not sure how common they are in the UK, but I've definitely seen them in some places. (They're sometimes just a single rail on the inside of a curve, rather than two like shown here)

Seems like you get frisky when you see trains penetrate tunnels. Get it?! Lol

1600mm Broad Gauge is also a British gauge, used in Ireland/Northern Ireland.

Broad gauge certainly is (or at least was) the default in Victoria.

@@Taitset In Albury, a border town, we have Victoria and NSW tracks intersecting While NSW are what you'd call broad, Victoria are the slimmer ones (or atleast were, the train station there has been under going renovations for 5 or 6 years now)

@@_muppelpuppel_9773 Other way around mate, Victoria was Broad gauge 1600mm, NSW Standard gauge 1435mm. The Victorian side was converted to Standard gauge just over a decade ago, so there's no broad gauge in Albury any more.

That's probably just the lighting, the common rail isn't visibly more shiny than the most commonly used other rail (which is different depending on where you are)

@@Taitset aaahhh I see. But still, the common rail is run over by 2 different gauge train wheels & the other 2 are not. In this case take example there are 6 train with 1435 mm gauge & 4 train with 1600mm gauge. The common rail will be run over by 10 trains, the 1435 mm & 1600 mm gauge. That's mean the worn are high at the common rail. So it's need to be replaced sooner than the other 2.

@@Priyodarsono Correct, although I honestly don't know how it would translate into different wear patterns, rail can last decades without needing replacement. It's possible in some places they might be able to swap two of the rails to to extend the life too.

It wasn't one country when the gauges were chosen.

They did try! Multiple colonists asked London what gauge to use and got the answer "we don't care as long as you're all the same". The chief engineer in NSW at the time was Irish, so he chose 5'3"/1600mm as used in Ireland, AND told the authorities in Victoria about it and they were fine. Unfortunately, before construction started, he was then replaced by a Scottish engineer, who decided that NSW's railways should be 4'8.5"/1435mm gauge as used in Scotland. He didn't tell anyone in Victoria, and by the time they found out it was too late to change. And then colonists in Queensland just went ahead and used 3'6"/1067mm gauge because they assumed that their railway would never possibly link up with those further south, and so gauge wouldn't matter!

Thanks for the info. Only goes to show you shouldn't post comments before you have all the facts. My apologies.@@dkbmaestrorules

@@dkbmaestrorules This is such an interesting question. I guess 1435mm or 4 foot 8.5 in those days was new and they had no idea the scale of its use 100 years later.

Yes, I said mainline gauges.

If a train derails, the wheels will drop down to ground level between the running rail and the check rail, limiting how far the train can wander off to the side.

There's no theoretical reason why not, and it's possibly been done in some shunting situations. But the dual gauge sections are all quite short, so there's no real reason to do it.

Yes, it happened in South Australia and there are some preserved examples at the National Railway Museum and at the Peterborough roundhouse.

All our electrification is overhead wire, which is the best and most common type of electrification!

let's just say that there a LOT of frog points

Dual nose frogs and in some designs, 5 switch blades

If you go to platform 1 and 2 at Southern Cross Station you should be able to find them. Those platforms are dual gauge to accommodate interstate arrivals.