Manchester: near miss between two trams, 17 May 2019

[edwin_m]

The trams all run to and from different routes and for Metrolink to work each route has to have a service every few minutes. So doubling up isn't the answer except on the busiest routes. Line of sight can cope with trams spaced at around a minute apart on sections where there are no delays due to other traffic or pedestrians, as on the busiest part of Metrolink between St Peters and Cornbrook.

 

[Greybeard33]

The on-street sections of Metrolink were always line of sight. It was only the ex-railway sections from Victoria to Bury and from Deansgate-Castlefield to Altrincham that were originally block signalled.

The block signals just about coped with 25tph on the busiest section through Cornbrook before it was converted to line of sight. But now there are 35tph, which will increase to 45tph when the Trafford Park line opens and the Airport line frequency is doubled. During recovery from a delay, trams often run nose to tail.

Sophisticated moving block technology could possibly provide enough capacity with automatic train protection, but would be very costly.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Sophisticated moving block technology could possibly provide enough capacity with automatic train protection, but would be very costly.

And probably isn't necessary at the speeds involved and with track brakes fitted. What might make sense, though, would be tramstops on signals protecting conflicting movements (such as this specific case), plus anti-collision tech such as that fitted to many new cars that will automatically brake if you get too close to something. As well as some kind of overspeed protection.

 

[507 001]

And probably isn't necessary at the speeds involved and with track brakes fitted. What might make sense, though, would be tramstops on signals protecting conflicting movements (such as this specific case), plus anti-collision tech such as that fitted to many new cars that will automatically brake if you get too close to something. As well as some kind of overspeed protection.

All fine apart from the anti collision stuff. My car has it. It’s quite sensitive. The way pedestrians and other road users treat us we would never go anywhere.