This is a bit mad - entire Swiss rail network timetable on one page

dowlingm

http://www.sma-partner.ch/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=279%3Aswiss-national-timetable-on-a-single-page&catid=42%3Aprojekte-und-konzepte&Itemid=130&lang=en

D.L.R.

Yeah its the Swiss who are mad regards rail

gjim

I've never experienced better than the Swiss rail system. Albeit this was during holiday visits.

Everything runs TO THE MINUTE. So you go to get a ticket between A and B and they suggest an itinerary involving a 5 minute connection - this is between inter-city trains - and it works.

EVERYTHING is integrated - a single journey can involve a combination of suburban (DART like), high-speed inter-city, regional and even cog railway trains. All connected.

The first time I did a particular journey (about three years ago between Zurich and Zermatt) it took 4 hours and 20 minutes. Last year I did the same trip and it took an hour less because they'd tunneled through some section. So there's continuous investment leading to significant REAL improvement.

The whole thing is simply a marvel of human engineering.

DWCommuter

Apart from the obvious engineering, they actually know (from staff to management) how to run a railway. (Apologies to over sensitive/molly-coddled IE staff that may be reading, I know its hard.)

kwalshe

I work in Zurich regularly enough and every time it blows my mind. If the train is running early the driver will pause at stops for an extra 30 secs etc. so when he arrives at the next station he will be exactly arriving at the specified time. When I arrive back to Dublin to face the morons in Dublin airport it really hammers home the Irish way of doing things

dowlingm

The Swiss aren't sitting on their laurels either. Having cracked how to make a massive proportion of trains adhere to schedule, they are now working on how to allow the few percent that don't to make connections as best as possible.

http://www.railwaygazette.com/news_view/article/2008/12/9147/making_every_second_count.html

Dr Felix Laube, Head of Processes & Methods, Infrastructure & Traffic Management Dept, Swiss Federal Railways

Marco Lüthi, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology

In a system with an integrated clockface timetable, the importance of reliability over pure punctuality is evident. Delaying a train a little to make a connection is often better than insisting on a perfectly punctual departure, as long as delays can be made up during the journey and are of no material significance for later services.

gjim

Interesting. I wonder who is Head of Processes & Methods in IR?

Actually when I said it was a marvel of human engineering I actually meant to say that it is a marvel of engineering and human organisation.

For me something like this is far more impressive than any individual civil engineering project.

Is the whole thing is electrified? I didn't recall seeing any diesels.

Ckal

gjim wrote: »

I've never experienced better than the Swiss rail system. Albeit this was during holiday visits.

Everything runs TO THE MINUTE. So you go to get a ticket between A and B and they suggest an itinerary involving a 5 minute connection - this is between inter-city trains - and it works.

EVERYTHING is integrated - a single journey can involve a combination of suburban (DART like), high-speed inter-city, regional and even cog railway trains. All connected.

The first time I did a particular journey (about three years ago between Zurich and Zermatt) it took 4 hours and 20 minutes. Last year I did the same trip and it took an hour less because they'd tunneled through some section. So there's continuous investment leading to significant REAL improvement.

The whole thing is simply a marvel of human engineering.

You'd love Norwegian rail, then. Did it in the summer. It was the best trip I've done. The Oslo - Bergen line goes through glaciers. They don't even melt in the summer. Stunning stuff.