Journey from Hamburg to Milan – todays run compared to a circle run

The first version was written as a proof of concept. It compares

• a normal “linear” train (blue) starting from north
• to a ‘jumper’ train (red), that hooks to the circle train.

The ‘normal linear’ train is based on the train table of the ICE from Hamburg to Milan showing todays speed.

NOTE: The circle train starts from south and returnes to south, collecting all jumper trains on the way – here only one. In order to show the simultaneous run of the 2 trains starting from north, the circle train in the south has to start about 3 hours earlier to catch the hook train at the same time with the linear. Therefore watch to the south to see the start.

http://screencast-o-matic.com/watch/c2fYeNnu8b

The file was to large to upload to youtube, therefore you have to click the link to play it…

The circle train concept here was that the circle train would start and stop at the same place, here in the south. You see at the bottom of the simulation the start of the circle train, entering the circle and picking up the hook train starting from north at the same time as the linear train. After hooking to the circle train, the red train runs with 200 km/h on the circle and returns to the normal average speed when leaving the circle.

The demonstration shows that even if the distance on the circle is bigger, it arrives faster to the target.

The run of the linear train is imitating the run of train running from Hamburg to Milan. At the time the simulation was made (about 2006) that took 7 hours with a high speed train.

The reason why the high speed train is running slower is evident: Though there are major parts where it runs faster then 200 km/h, its average speed is only 100 km/h, because it has to stop at every station and also it has to slow down on tracks where a slower train is in front.