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Berlin S-Bahn's new Class 483 and 484 have entered service

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318259

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Video of the trains in service on the S47

640px-J33_752_S-Bahn-Triebwagen_484_002_A.jpg


They're kind of ugly looking - the locals have referred to the drivers cab as "a giant iPad" and it's easy to see why.

There are some interesting points to these trains, though:

They're the first Berlin S-Bahn trains with air conditioning.

Unlike the older, widespread Class 481 and 482, these trains can run as a two-carriage "quarter train". The older trains have a minimum length of 4 cars.

They're the first Berlin S-Bahn trains with full UK-style accessibility requirements. This means colour-contrasted doors, beeping sounds when the doors open and close, and tactile "easy to see, easy to press" buttons.

The door open buttons make a quiet beep every second while the doors are unlocked but closed, making it easier for visually impaired users to find them. This is a typically German thing - their pedestrian crossings make a constant ticking/heartbeat sound while the pedestrian light is red for the same reason.

The locals aren't terribly pleased about the new door open / hustle alarms. The older S-Bahn trains don't make any noise when the doors open. When they closed, a voice said "stand back please" and a melodic jingle played. That is going to be missed.
 
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duesselmartin

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yes, although that jingle was a two tone beeping sound. Many felt ist was unique to Berlin S-Bahn.
Colour contrast doors are also being introduced on older sets which will stay in service.
In recent time, the S-Bahn warns passengers that doors can open at any time. Now that is annoying.

All in all these new trains may not be pretty but functional and hopefully reliable. That counts.
 

Bletchleyite

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Do they really not use "Zurueckbleiben, bitte" any more? That's surprising, that's up there as almost as German as beer and sausage.

It's mostly manually announced by the driver, though it's automated in the standard DB voice on some U- and S-bahn stock.
 

py_megapixel

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Do they really not use "Zurueckbleiben, bitte" any more? That's surprising, that's up there as almost as German as beer and sausage.

It's mostly manually announced by the driver, though it's automated in the standard DB voice on some U- and S-bahn stock.
No, they seem to have replaced it with "BEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEP", like in this country - as one person put it in the comments section, ' R.I.P. "Zurückbleiben bitte oooh-eeeh-oooh"'....

A few rough translations of other comments are provided below:

"der alte Türschließwarnton ist immernoch der beste" -> "The old door closure warning sound is still the best"
"Die Türgeräusche beim öffnen sind so schrecklich!" -> "The door tone when opening is terrible!"
"Das andauernde Gepiepe der Türen nervt höllisch." -> "The constant beeping of the doors is hellishly annoying"
and so on.
 

Bletchleyite

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"Zurueckbleiben, bitte" is more like blowing a whistle - it's the "oooh-eeeh-oooh" that the beeps have really replaced. Indeed the dispatchers at Hamburg Hbf S-Bahn in the 90s used to say it then blow a whistle into the microphone. Basically a short version of the old long-distance "an Gleis N bitte einsteigen..." spiel.
 

duesselmartin

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"Zurueckbleiben, bitte" is more like blowing a whistle - it's the "oooh-eeeh-oooh" that the beeps have really replaced. Indeed the dispatchers at Hamburg Hbf S-Bahn in the 90s used to say it then blow a whistle into the microphone. Basically a short version of the old long-distance "an Gleis N bitte einsteigen..." spiel.
in the Rhine-Ruhr region, we only had that on the 420 stock. The old x-Wagen had a terrible whistle-impulse sound.
Not sure about the 1920-40s Berlin "Stadtwagen" type.
I believe the beeping sound is now regulated by an EU norm. Most likely, Germany is only country to implement it.
 

Taunton

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The old 1930s S-Bahn fleet, which lasted way past reunification into the 1990s, had plenty of quarter trains ("Viertelzug").

They also had the best hustle alarm ever - two seconds of loud 100db bell, like a fire bell, with a red light over the door. Seemed without any interlock, you could get bell, doors closing and the train physically starting all at the same time. Bit impressive for late evening 5-second dwell times actually.
 

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Do they still open the doors before the trains have come to a stop? I always thought this was a great idea and a shame that they don't do it in this country.
 

Bletchleyite

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Do they still open the doors before the trains have come to a stop? I always thought this was a great idea and a shame that they don't do it in this country.

On the pre-war 471/871 units in Hamburg they used to hit the button just as the cab entered the station, so you could have the (manual) doors opened well before it stopped.

Merseyrail used to release while still moving, not for a long time, though. LU probably did too.
 

py_megapixel

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On the pre-war 471/871 units in Hamburg they used to hit the button just as the cab entered the station, so you could have the (manual) doors opened well before it stopped.

Merseyrail used to release while still moving, not for a long time, though. LU probably did too.
The older Paris Metro units could be opened before the train comes to a stop. Until a few years ago, I think you could on U1 in Nuremberg as well, but that line has been converted to driverless operation now, with a batch of shiny new Siemens units. (U2 and U3 received identical treatment, but several years earlier).

Incidentally the sliding doors in some lifts also open before the car is fully level with the floor. I have no idea why this is, but it does make it feel quite a bit more efficient.

Berlin seems to be rather unique in how much they mix and match units on their U-bahn... on one line, the first train could be a brand new Stadler Metro, then one of the rather old units built in the early 90s, then a brand new Stadler again, then a Bombardier/Adtranz HK class from 2005... very different to many other metro systems, which buy a fleet of trains for one line, then do a huge upgrade to one line at once.
 
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Jamesrob637

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Do they still open the doors before the trains have come to a stop? I always thought this was a great idea and a shame that they don't do it in this country.

Some Münchner U-Bahn stock yes but by the time the door was open wide enough for ingress and egress you were going literally half a mile an hour if even that.

I like that new S-Bahn even if just for the fact that it's air-conditioned! Berlin can be stifling in the summer despite being as far north as Birmingham.
 

Bletchleyite

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Some Münchner U-Bahn stock yes but by the time the door was open wide enough for ingress and egress you were going literally half a mile an hour if even that.

You could (with a bit of a shove) get Hamburg 471/871 doors open when the unit was still going well in excess of 30mph, given the "positive braking" approach employed in Germany. It was very much like Southern slammers but without the risk of belting anyone with the door.
 

Nym

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Do they still open the doors before the trains have come to a stop? I always thought this was a great idea and a shame that they don't do it in this country.
They do on the Piccadilly Line (you have to time it right) and the Bakerloo Line, but the latter takes a while for the door engines to respond.

I seem to remember D78 stock having very swift door releases in service too, especially on a left side door release where you don't need to take your hand off the CBTC to take a door release.

And yes, the train allows you to release the doors while moving.
 

Mojo

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They do on the Piccadilly Line (you have to time it right) and the Bakerloo Line, but the latter takes a while for the door engines to respond.

I seem to remember D78 stock having very swift door releases in service too, especially on a left side door release where you don't need to take your hand off the CBTC to take a door release.

And yes, the train allows you to release the doors while moving.
It is physically possible, but Train Operators have gotten in trouble for doing this.
 

318259

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"Zurueckbleiben, bitte" is more like blowing a whistle - it's the "oooh-eeeh-oooh" that the beeps have really replaced. Indeed the dispatchers at Hamburg Hbf S-Bahn in the 90s used to say it then blow a whistle into the microphone. Basically a short version of the old long-distance "an Gleis N bitte einsteigen..." spiel.
It used to be that way on the Berlin S-Bahn. Most stations had platform controllers who would announce the train ("To Teltow Stadt, board please" followed by "Teltow Stadt, stand back please", then they'd radio the driver with "close doors" and "depart".

There's an add-on for Train Simulator called "Through the heart of Berlin" that captures this era of the S-Bahn. It's worth a drive if you're into commuter routes. The stock is very old and behaves strangely - only one acceleration notch that needs to be held down, and brakes that can be increased in multiple steps but only released completely in one go. Makes it more of a challenge to stop in stations.

Berlin seems to be rather unique in how much they mix and match units on their U-bahn... on one line, the first train could be a brand new Stadler Metro, then one of the rather old units built in the early 90s, then a brand new Stadler again, then a Bombardier/Adtranz HK class from 2005... very different to many other metro systems, which buy a fleet of trains for one line, then do a huge upgrade to one line at once.
Yes, the Berlin U-Bahn is great for that.

They've recently modernised a lot of the older stock and given them proper door open buttons. On my first visit in 2009, some of the older units had metal bars across the doors with flappy metal push paddles instead of buttons. It looked like the inside of a fire exit and was quite weird to use.

Do they still open the doors before the trains have come to a stop? I always thought this was a great idea and a shame that they don't do it in this country.
You can do this on the slightly-older 481s and 482s. The buttons light up just before the train stops, and you can open them and step out as the train is still doing about 3mph.
 
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LSWR Cavalier

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One hopes very much that the doors are locked as long as the train is moving

Another queer thing about Berlin, there are wide and narrow U-Bahn trains, same gauge but different width bodies. The narrow ones can be fitted with extra stepboards so they may be used on the widened lines. Vice-versa is of course not possible
 

Taunton

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Another queer thing about Berlin, there are wide and narrow U-Bahn trains, same gauge but different width bodies.
Nothing oddball about that on urban systems, a number around the world developed like this. New York for example is still half-and-half (IRT and BMT/IND).
One hopes very much that the doors are locked as long as the train is moving
Depends on your attitude I suppose. The lovely classic old Paris Metro "Sprague" stock, last used I think in the 1980s, had manual sliding doors. They were closed by the conductor with an air cylinder, perfectly visible behind the window, but about 10 seconds after departure the piston could be seen to withdraw. Approaching the next station the pistons were advanced again to hold them closed to just before stopping, when they were released again. Obviously a retrofit on once all-manual operation. On hot summer afternoons once the train got going unofficial door sentries, commonly students, would take over and open the doors to give a nice breeze down the car, rolling along at about 20mph. Looked surprising to us Interrailers at first, after a few days we were well into doing it ourselves. This was when, just like London, you could still fall directly out of the back of a Paris bus into the road behind. Nobody ever did that either.
 

Gag Halfrunt

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Another queer thing about Berlin, there are wide and narrow U-Bahn trains, same gauge but different width bodies.

Different heights as well, like on the London Underground.

They are split into two general categories: Kleinprofil ("small profile", used by the U1, U2, U3 and U4) and Großprofil ("large profile", used by the U5, U6, U7, U8 and U9) lines. The names refer to the size of the train's coaches. Großprofil coaches have a width of 2.65 metres and a height of 3.40 metres, and Kleinprofil coaches are only 2.30 metres wide and 3.10 metres high. Therefore, the trains have to operate on separate networks.

 

JonathanP

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One hopes very much that the doors are locked as long as the train is moving
Things are a bit different in Germany :) I haven't travelled on the new stock yet, but what happens on the previous stock is that the door controls are enabled slightly before the train comes to a halt, so by the time you have pressed the button and the plug doors have opened, the train is at a stand.

These days the doors are driver controlled, but in the past mainline trains would have doors that released automatically on both sides below 5km/h, and to this day, the conductor on a loco-hauled intercity train will typically make an announcement if the train makes an unscheduled halt, to warn people not to open the doors. They also announce which side to get off.
 

AlexNL

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I believe the beeping sound is now regulated by an EU norm. Most likely, Germany is only country to implement it.
It is indeed a "new" EU norm, it's defined in the European Railway Agency's Technical Standards for Interoperability for People with Reduced Mobility. There's a whole section there which outlines exactly what sounds train doors should produce, for how long, and at what volume levels.

This is a EU regulation which applies to all new vehicles, across member states. If you look at the latest rolling stock introduced in the Netherlands for example, you'll hear the same beeps.
 

py_megapixel

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It is indeed a "new" EU norm, it's defined in the European Railway Agency's Technical Standards for Interoperability for People with Reduced Mobility. There's a whole section there which outlines exactly what sounds train doors should produce, for how long, and at what volume levels.

This is a EU regulation which applies to all new vehicles, across member states. If you look at the latest rolling stock introduced in the Netherlands for example, you'll hear the same beeps.
It's the same in the UK as well. We adopted the PRM-TSI before we left.
 
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