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A comment on Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020). Parent comment

Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by Animats on Monday April 05, 2021 @03:23PM (#26703399)
The limit is siding length. Eventually you have to park the thing somewhere. There are some super-long trains used by bulk carriers on dedicated track. The Union Pacific ran a 3.4 mile long container train once, from Texas to LA. Double-stacked containers at reasonably high speed. There were locomotives spaced throughout the train, all under control from the head end. There's a video.[1] Worked fine, but got political attention due to long grade crossing blockage.

[1] https://youtu.be/jdIzRFOaTCY

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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by elygre on Monday April 05, 2021 @05:57PM (#26705206)
An unexpected discovery from that video was how many Evergreen containers there were. Suddenly I see them everywhere!
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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by bombcar on Monday April 05, 2021 @07:12PM (#26705864)
The one I always see (and keep an eye out for) is the TEX containers - I like to think of it as TeX as in LaTeX :)
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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by AnimalMuppet on Monday April 05, 2021 @03:37PM (#26703593)
Siding length isn't an issue if the line is double-tracked the whole way.
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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by Animats on Monday April 05, 2021 @04:01PM (#26703886)
If there are any problems, lack of a siding somewhere nearby leaves the main line blocked. Also, at the destination, you need some place to put the thing, except for bulk mine trains which go round and round a loop.
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Re:Four ways to speed up trains on the New Silk Road (2020) by AnimalMuppet on Monday April 05, 2021 @04:30PM (#26704268)
On a double-tracked line, lack of a siding somewhere nearby leaves one of the two main lines blocked. That's still serious, but less than what you are saying.
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