[bluGill]

There is improve and there is trying something new. Rails have been around for nearly two centuries - they are a solve problem. We don't need to innovate on many parts as there is nothing wrong with the old technology with some minor updated. We already know what works well for a standard train system. Innovation generally tries things that look good to politicians who don't understand trains, but in reality people who understood trains 100 years ago had the idea and rejected it as a bad idea - and the reasons they are bad ideas didn't change!

there is a lot of room to improve trains. However it all starts with standard gauge steel track, with standard sizes tunnels, standard switches, standard control algorithms (with computers this had recently had a revolution, while there is room to improve this is again in the mostly solve area), standard "rolling stock" and so on. Let me bring out here two standards that are a bit new: platform doors - now that someone invested them and proved they work everyone should retrofit to them; and elevators - it is criminal that many stations around the world still haven't been retrofitted (criminal as in I think someone should be in prison anywhere you find they have not been retrofitted) Once you have all the standard stuff laid out you can make a few tweaks to see what works, but only a few as we know the standard stuff works.

Make sure when you look at standards above you look at what others have done. If you have an idea odds are someone else has already tried it: find them and figure out how it works - sometimes you can tweak to be better sometimes you realize it is a bad idea.

[panick21_]

Rails in particular have improved quite a bit. Modern newest generation slab designs requiring very, very little maintenance and are fast to install.

> Innovation generally tries things that look good to politicians who don't understand trains, but in reality people who understood trains 100 years ago had the idea and rejected it as a bad idea - and the reasons they are bad ideas didn't change!

I'm all for respecting old ideas but this idea that modern engineers are idiots and can't think of anything people 100 years didn't think of is also wrong.

> Make sure when you look at standards above you look at what others have done. If you have an idea odds are someone else has already tried it: find them and figure out how it works - sometimes you can tweak to be better sometimes you realize it is a bad idea.

I don't disagree.

In the context of Crossrail, this seems to be what they have done for the most part. So I don't understand the criticism.

[bluGill]

> is idea that modern engineers are idiots and can't think of anything people 100 years

That is not what I was trying to say. I'm saying that politicians and managers are unable to think of things that people 100 years didn't think of. While that isn't 100% true, it is very close.

Though most of the time engineers today couldn't think of anything they didn't think of 100 years ago. However sometimes advances in other science means ideas that wouldn't work back then could work today. This is almost entirely incremental improvements though.

Crossrail didn't follow the same practices as building 100 years ago. And the results are terrible. (of course some of this is good - better safety standards - but the whole is a system that costs far more than expected for lower quality than possible elsewhere using modern standards)

[panick21_]

Crossrail uses advanced signaling making very good use of the resource. They use platform screen doors for both improve safety and reliability but also fast loading and unloading. Seem to me these are all improvements and were the right approach for Crossrail. They didn't do everything perfectly but the system is pretty damn good and pretty damn successful.

Yes, infrastructure has gotten more expensive, and that is particularly true in the Anglosphere. But those problem don't have so much to do with the chosen design, but rather it operation and planning processes.

What actual parts of the design are actually bad?

[bluGill]

I'm not up on all the issues with Crossrail, but that trains cost too much in the English speaking world is well known and Crossrail is not exempt. Generally this comes down to stations that are much larger than needed and other things that appear to be justified until you dig deeper and discover they are expensive and the rest of the world does without just fine.

[panick21_]

Trains cost to much because like many other countries, Britain buys from their own manufactures. Because of the state of British railroading since privatization most of British rail manufacturing collapsed and only a very small number of manufactures are left.

Station being to large is a question of taste and priorities. Saying that such tradeoffs are not worth it is different then just saying straight up that 'the results are terrible'.