[gjkood]

The Indian Railways is definitely an interesting organization.

Doing a cursory glance at a Wikipedia entry, some of the stats:

1. Established in 1832

2. 3rd largest railway network in the world

3. 8th largest employer in the world.

I was hoping to see something about the actual Rail Track details but this is more of a civil engineering specs for building construction.

I am curious about when and how Indian Railways will incorporate high speed rail such as the French TGV, Japanese Shinkansen or Chinese CRH.

On a visit to China in 2017 and taking a short trip in the Chinese CRH, I heard stats about 2,000 high speed trains a day. It was an interesting experience traveling at speeds greater than 300 kmh and not feeling a thing.

Of course I am curious about when the USA will incorporate the same.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Railways

[xenocyon]

Another factoid to add to your list:

Indian Railways is a state owned enterprise - a very large one. Until recently, India's central government released two annual financial statements (budgets) each year: one for railways, and the second for everything else.

[ece]

Track is being laid for the Japanese Shinkansen system between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, tough it seems to be delayed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mumbai%E2%80%93Ahmedabad_high-...

[vishnugupta]

> when and how Indian Railways will incorporate high speed rail

So there are two parallel efforts going on.

High speed bullet trains[1]. These require building everything from scratch, tracks, stations and so on. When fully operational, it will be a truly new experience for Indians and hope will boost economy and benefit common man.

The second one[2] is upgrading existing tracks and coaches to be run at a higher speed (I guess around ~150KM/h). This will also have an added benefit of upgrading existing infrastructure such as signalling, crossings, tracks etc., Given the sheer size and complexity of Indian Railways IMO this will have more benefits as it'll improve the overall running times, utilisation and such.

Indian Railways is a life line of millions of people as they rely on it for daily wages. And as far as complex systems to very few come close to it. Until very recently they still relied on manual token exchange mechanism[3]. During one of train station visits my father drew my attention to token exchange and explained how it worked. Truly awesome.

I'm glad to see it on the front page of HN; more people need to know about it.

[1] https://www.nhsrcl.in/en/home

[2] https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/tamil-nadu/102-vande-...

[3] https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Thiruvananthapuram/Ball...

[einpoklum]

I can understand why you might need new tracks for bullet trains (old ones not perfectly level and aligned, quality of materials, friction properties, whatever).

But why would you have to build new _stations_ for them?

[kalleboo]

You need new tracks as in completely different right of way. Bullet trains need very straight tracks, existing tracks are too curved and at high speeds you'd fly off in the corners (tilting trains exist but have limitations). And if you're building new track, there are no existing stations to reuse.

[DocTomoe]

Generally, when you go the high-speed route, you have lines that are a lot longer than slower, more local lines. You do not want stations along the way to be terminus-style stations, where you'd

1. have to switch out the driver position from one end of the train to another end to just leave the station again and

2. have a series of track switches which may malfunction (which ironically is a challenge even for highly industrialised countries like Germany), and it

3. means more and slower track to be maintained.

If you set up a bullet train program, you want speed, and these problems kill the speed advantage. The solution is to build a new station in which the train can just pass through.

[jonp888]

If the train has to leave the high speed line on the outskirts of the city and run at slow speed it wastes a lot of time.

[zmix]

> high speed rail such as the French TGV, Japanese Shinkansen or Chinese CRH

You forgot the German ICE[1] ;-)

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intercity_Express

[gjkood]

Indeed! I am sure I missed quite a few high speed systems.

India is in the shape of a diamond, where the most populous cities would be at the four points of the diamond aligned North-South. A high speed train network that would cover Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai and Mumbai together as a fully connected graph will probably have the highest volume of traffic. [1]

A trip from Trivandrum, Kerala or Kanya Kumari, Tamil Nadu in the South of India to the stations in Assam or Arunachal Pradesh in the North East of India would be some of the longest trips that you can take.

India has also some of the most beautiful railway lines in the world with switchbacks connecting the plains to the hill stations. [2]

Also some of the most expensive train rides. [3]

Of course there's air travel for the time conscious but the trains are for the adventurous travelers.

BTW, One of the most interesting stays I had in the US was at the Chattanooga Choo Choo in Chattanooga, TN. [4]

[1] https://www.trainspnrstatus.com/images/indianrailwaymap.jpg

[2] https://navrangindia.blogspot.com/2017/09/amazing-darjeeling...

[3] https://traveltriangle.com/blog/luxury-trains-in-india/

[4] https://www.choochoo.com/

[ausudhz]

He forgot many if that matters. There are high speed rails in many countries not only these. just to name a few: Italy, Spain, Korea, Taiwan

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_high-speed_railway_l...

[zmix]

Coming from Germany I just could not hold it back... ;-)

Besides that, I doubt, that they all are independent products, but rather one of the named platforms.

[donw]

It's a little known fact that "DB" actually stands for "Daheim Bleiben". :D

[DocTomoe]

... which translates to "Stay at home".

[DocTomoe]

Technically, he did not. Both the CRH and the current ICE models are based on Siemens' Velaro platform: https://www.mobility.siemens.com/global/en/portfolio/rail/ro...