
Ask HN: Why isn't literally every train automated? - djinnandtonic
Possibly late here, but why aren&#x27;t more &#x2F; all trains automated? The route is static; Speed should be easy to determine; AFAIK they aren&#x27;t mechanically unreliable enough to warrant a full-time mechanic on-board; LIDAR and image recognition can detect hazards on the track.<p>It seems silly that there have been such strides in automating automobiles before trains.
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Skye
Here are some ideas from the top of my head:

* Many trains are old (at least in the UK), and tend to be very slowly upgraded, so the trains on the network were built before it was considered practical to automate them.

* Signalling systems are old, UK example: the warning system (AWS) is built on electromagnets, clever and cheap, but not enough for automation.

* While it's possible to design a system that works well for a normal journey if nothing goes wrong, when things do go wrong you'd need a person (for example, I once was on a train and a door was stuck, the driver got out and fixed it so we could get off), also what about level crossings?

* Once you're paying someone as a failsafe, then they already know how to drive the train, then the extra automation is just extra cost, except when the railway is busy (so London Underground has partial automation, as cost of driver + automation is worth it to run all the extra trains).

* Places with automated systems tend to be isolated (see the DLR, it's isolated from mainline trains, and also has no level crossings).

* Maybe a way to keep people to blame if things go wrong, if an automated train goes wrong, who is to blame?

* Who in their right mind would want to lose their job? From what I understand people enjoy it, and it pays well, and it's not exactly a skill that can be transferred (while in an ideal world someone could get another decent job, the fact is we're not in an ideal world, so if someone loses their job they're going to have a hard time and not have a way to magically get something new, unless they're lucky).

~~~
peoplewindow
Level crossings aren't an issue. It's easy to detect the presence of large
objects blocking a level crossing if the barriers fail to come down and signal
to the train to stop before it reaches the crossing.

Drivers tend to earn much more money than guards do because the work is more
skilled. If all you're doing is opening doors then you can be a min wage
worker who is easily replaceable and thus not very unionisable. So there is
benefit even in systems that still need guards.

The real issues are deeper. Yes, union opposition is a big one, but there are
technical problems too. Full moving block signalling i.e. trains that track
how far they are from other trains and know to slow down or speed up depending
on distance was being discussed in the 1990's but the only implementations
anywhere are on metro lines. For above-ground heavy rail there are no
implementations anywhere in the world, as far as I know.

As observed by the OP this cannot be entirely a technical issue. If Google can
make a driverless car that can navigate California, a driverless train is
surely far easier. The real problem is that train automation is not a problem
that attracts the best engineers. Google can hire out entire academic
departments of the top machine vision researchers in the world to work on self
driving cars because self driving cars are something that appeals to the whims
of billionaires and techies alike. Also because the market size is effectively
limitless.

But when was the last time you heard about an automated train startup? When
did you hear about someone leaving their job at Facebook to go work on train
automation? Trains do not appeal to rich billionaires or American tech workers
in the same way that cars do, so funding for them comes entirely from the
capex budgets of mostly government funded rail operators, and is spent on a
handful of large engineering conglomerates. There are I think only about 4
companies in the world that can make automated train systems of any kind. Each
engagement is a massive activity that always requires very large and expensive
customisations to the base system. Because there are so few competitors
they're huge public contracts and it only takes one or two to be ruled out or
refuse to bid and you're down to a single potential supplier.

Projects like this can _fail_ and when they fail they fail very expensively
and with huge political fallout. They are the epitome of huge expensive
government IT projects. The Jubilee line automation project started installing
equipment in 2006 and didn't activate until 2011, with loads of line closures
and problems that made major news.

There are also some more direct technical issues. Trains have huge stopping
distances. They need to know where other trains are blockages are far in
advance of being able to physically see them. They also spend a lot of time in
tunnels. Therefore camera based approaches like what self driving cars use are
not so trustworthy. This means upgrades to the track so all trains can know
where they are at all times, and to get the benefits means reliable
communication from a central control room rather than all trains autonomously
deciding things like how fast to go (remember they cannot see slow trains on
the track ahead). These things in turn mean line closures and engineering
works, which are very expensive. And remember there's no money for upgrades
because they're all government subsidised.

There's an article about some of the issues and the smoother rollouts London
is seeing these days here:

[https://www.railengineer.uk/2015/05/08/lu-northern-line-
goes...](https://www.railengineer.uk/2015/05/08/lu-northern-line-goes-cbtc/)

~~~
Skye
Well... The Victoria Line was a form of automatic since it was made, so it
seems to be more practical to have a new system created as an automatic one
rather than upgrade an old system. Even with the new systems on the
Underground, the driver still needs to know how to drive the train, for when
things go wrong, and unlike a car, other trains can't move around a stuck
train.

I guess one of the big problem with automating trains is that while it's
easier to automate the normal operation of a train, there is less tolerance
for any issues (a train stopping blocks all other trains on the line, there
are also a LOT of people on a train at a time, stopping distance is huge,
etc...).

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londons_explore
In some places (eg. London), automation is totally possible, but is resisted
so hard by workers unions that all other workers on the railway would go on
strike until the train operator promised to rip out automated systems and
return to manual operation.

On some lines, all the driver does is open and close the doors. Even getting
to that level of automation caused lots of strikes.

~~~
auxym
Similar situation in Montreal. The new metro cars are fully ready to be
automatically ran, but it's resisted by the union.

~~~
ReverseCold
But if it's fully autonomous then they don't need the workers? So if they all
go on strike, they can all be fired.

So is it not fully autonomous, or is there a law I'm not aware of?

~~~
foxyv
You still have track workers, ticket takers, etc...

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lafar6502
How much savings would you expect from this? And whose job should be
automated? If you think about replacing one driver per train then probably the
cost of automation is higher than his salary. Instead of paying one man a
salary you would be forced to pay a maintenance contract to some IT/automation
company that would charge you exorbitant rates just because this is industrial
automation and you have no idea how to operate it.

~~~
tritium

      some IT/automation company that would charge you 
      exorbitant rates just because this is industrial 
      automation
    

This is shenanigans. This is the kind of game Enron [0] played, gouging prices
for irrational reasons, until eventually outside intervention dismantled their
operation, to discover actual costs.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_Star_(business)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_Star_\(business\))

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troydavis
Numbered pages 3, 9, and 10 of
[https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42637.pdf](https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42637.pdf)
have some info on why even positive train control (PTC) isn’t live yet:

> The estimated capital cost of meeting the PTC mandate is thus roughly equal
> to the railroads’ total capital spending in a single year.”

… and that’s for PTC, not driverless. Successful PTC is arguably a precursor
to anything more automated, with or without humans.

~~~
repsilat
Most human-driven trains use coloured circular lights for signalling.
Determining the presence of a coloured circle in a known location is about the
simplest computer-vision problem known to man, so we could probably
practically solve this cheaply tomorrow with an iPhone on a suction cup.

Maybe there are legal issues in many/most jurisdictions getting in the way,
but isn't saving "roughly ... the railroads’ total capital spending in a
single year" worth a change in regulations?

~~~
bkor
> worth a change in regulations?

Why? The regulations are there for a reason. In Netherlands the rail safety
system has to be heavily improved before automation is possible. What
apparently is the cause of the outdated safety system is that the system was
(when built) ahead of its time, but nowadays other systems are much better.

They're now going to test with automated trains on specialized goods-only
train lines.

In this case the regulation is there to ensure safety. If improvements cost a
lot it'll have to be spread out over multiple years, or e.g. not automate away
drivers. What's to me seems utterly strange is immediately jump to just
allowing such changes and assume regulation is the problem.

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Rjevski
The Lille (north of France) metro/subway/underground is totally automated -
there aren't even any drivers for safety reasons. I haven't heard of any major
issues and from using it personally it's always been flawless.

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whiskers08xmt
The Copenhagen metro is fully automated, but it was built like that from the
start. This means that there's no metro driver unions, and the metro stations
were built in a way, where it's generally hard to get unto the tracks. It did
have some issues to begin with, but it works flawlessly today.

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contravariant
Somewhat unrelated but I have wondered why people are assuming the first use
of automated vehicles will be for personal transport on a public road.

It seems a lot simpler to have a part of the road network dedicated to fully
automated vehicles. And instead of immediately transporting people (which
carries a high risk) it seems a lot more sensible to initially focus on the
transport of goods.

The initial set up would be quite expensive, but once you no longer need to
worry about human drivers and don't need to worry overly about a million to 1
chance for things to go wrong, you should be able to use the road a lot more
efficiently.

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twunde
In the US, most of the train technology is old and not cross compatible,
making each installation difficult and expensive. Looking at the NY metro area
trains and driveways, there are frequent mechanical issues, both on the trains
themselves and on the train instructions such as switch problems, sometimes
necessitating reversing back a few stations in order to switch tracks.

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AnimalMuppet
Cars can stop much more easily than trains. Trains can take _one or two miles_
to stop. That's hard to do with LIDAR.

There have been failures of automation. BART was fully automated. Then one
train misread a speed command from a trackside gadget, and sped up to over 60
MPH when it was supposed to be slowing down to 20 to prepare to stop at a
station. Unfortunately, the station was the end of the line (Fremont), and the
train ran off the end into the parking lot.

On the other hand, that was in the 1970s. Some new systems have been fully
automated. The Las Vegas Monorail is fully automated. At the end of the line,
it asks you to exit, but there's nobody there to make you, so I didn't. Then
it runs out on this dead end to switch over to the other line, where it will
fall off 20 or 30 feet if it doesn't stop in time. It's a bit scary, but it
worked...

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sebleon
Likely unions or insurance reasons.

I’ve heard similar things about airplane pilots.

~~~
poolbath1
No one has figured out how automation can save a flight in the air if the
automation fails. Remote control and communication can also fail. Ground based
trains or vehicles can just stop on the ground.

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eb0la
I guess that Train technology is old enough that regulations about drivers,
signals, and safety surely assume that there is a phisical person in charge of
driving.

Maybe the first step towards automation is beign able to drive the train
remotely. Technically feasible; but is it legally feasible?

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rdiddly
Some airports have automated, unmanned trains or trams that take passengers
from terminal to terminal within the airport.

The example is illustrative because those are usually either elevated or
underground, with virtually no possibility of people being on the tracks, and
no crossings with other traffic.

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mars4rp
it is very cheap! how many people do you need to operate a train ? 2,3 ?
compare to the scale of train it is very cheap!!!

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aprdm
The Skytrain system in Vancouver is fully automated and works well.

Only time I saw a driver was when we had a lot of snow last year. He was there
for safety since Vancouver isn't so ready for snow.

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Symbiote
On some lines where the train is automated, the metro operator still keeps
someone on the train who has training for an emergency situation, I.e.
Evacuating passengers.

So the saving is their salary compared to the train driver's salary.

On big trains, we expect the driver to spot dangers like landslides, fallen
trees. These happen extremely rarely, so the driver would be bored and lose
concentration without having to drive the train -- within the strict
parameters set by the computer, on the most modern high speed lines.

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aglionby
Specifically for the London Underground there's a lot of union opposition.
Some lines have mostly-automatic operation (everything except opening/closing
the doors) and keep a driver around for safety reasons.

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leksak
Watch tram crash compilation for hazards where LIDAR and image recognition
might not be adequate. Note the might.

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ilmiont
Normal people don't want automation...

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aviv
I'll go for the low hanging fruit - unions?

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zv
There was a thread about it on reddit, please go and find it. The trains do
not need LIDAR or image recognition. Going in straight line on rails is
simple. You don't need to even brake (useless, stopping distance is way too
big). What happens in stations and what preparations are done, that cannot
(e.g. cost efficiently) be automated. Metro on other hand is mostly automated
(see Europe)

