Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

> the three factors that determine how many people you can move past a given point per unit of time are the frequency of the vehicles, the capacity of the vehicles, and the speed of the vehicles

Why is speed relevant?



Because it's per unit of time. The faster you go, the higher throughput you'll have.


The frequency already accounts for the time component.

(People/Car)*(Car/Hour) = (People/Hour) = Throughput

At a constant frequency and higher speeds, you will simply have less trains on the track at the same time.


Yes, I guess you're right, but the maximum frequency is bounded by vehicle length and speed (you can't have a vehicle pass every thirty seconds if it takes more than thirty seconds for a single vehicle to pass a given point).


The longest TGV and Shinkansen consists are around 400 m, so they pass a given point in 30 seconds at about 50 km/h (30 mph). Of course there's spacing for safety and so on, but 50 km/h is so low that it's really a factor in practice unless you also have non-HSR traffic on the line.

A bigger factor in practical capacity is loading and offloading people and switching near termini.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: