Hello,

On my visits to Berlin in the late 1980s I had encountered, or at least I suspect I had, the automatic train operation (ATO) on Line U4. Was this line really ATO equipped and does it go automatically today?
I would be also interested in confirmation or denial that the line is still part of the 'Kleinprofil' system. I saw the train last week and, though having not examined it thoroughly, I think it was a 'Grossprofilzug'. But I may be wrong. I may have been originally served by 'small' trains, but maybe the loading gauge of this separately built railway allowed for running the 'big' stock.
Please advise. Thank you.

Hello,
the automatic-system (we call "SELTRAC") ist shutting down in 1995, becouse the technology is to old. The spare parts are to expensive (Relay technology).
The line U4 is a "Kleinprofil" (small profile). There can not cars of "Grossprofil" (big profile) driving. The tunnel is to small for this big cars.

Marco
www.u-bahn100.de

Thanks a lot for the info. Now I see why the Seltrac operation is not particularly referred to on the web sites... It's interesting that cost-profit relation was so bad - the ATO mostly likely eliminated some paid staff.

OK - U4 is and always was a 'Kleinprofil' line.

Hi,

have you been in Berlin or did you see the train on tv? So maybe you saw another train, beacause there was a driverless project on line 5 (Großprofil)also. It was called STAR. You can read about it on the pages of the BVG: [www.bvg.de] (in english) or [www.bvg.de] (same in german).

so long
aki

Actually, I think I travelled by an automatic U4 in 1987 and 1988. Over a week ago I saw the U4 train at the platform at Nollendorfplatz. Unfortunately, as sole presence of a staff in driver's cab does not exclude the ATO (sometimes they man trains anyway), I could not judge if it was hand-operated or not. Neither did I have time to inquire longer.

U5, you say - are they just trials in off-hours or do they run revenue services?

As far as I was told in Madrid, ATO always needs a driver. The driver's job is still to close the doors and to press two buttons to set the train in motion again, the rest is done by the central computer. I even had the chance to operate one train myself (hope noone at Metro Madrid reads this....). I wish they installed a system like this in Berlin, the ride is much smoother than manually driven. Driverless operation seems to work differently.

As far as i know is the U9 (Großprofil) an half automatic system. There is a driver on every train. His job is to close the doors at the station or if ever needed to make an emergency brake.
The STAR-System (as tested on the U5) is more difficult because many sensors are needed at each station, to check, that there is no one on the track or to close to the platform border.

Same interesting story seems to be with London's Central Line. Much investement, completely new technology, but still the drivers are in cabs.

I once read something about train automation in UITP reports. There were some definitions and, I may be wrong however, they said there is manned or unmanned option within the notion of ATO. Anyway this may be just the problem of meaning of the words, and very often even the experts differ here. We may however agree, I suppose, there is a need for a word to cover full automatic running of trains, including stopping and accelerating but not necessarily giving 'Go' signal at stations.

So is there on Lyon's Line D ATO-ed or not? There are definitely driverless trains.

PS: Sorry for writing all-English but using German would be a disaster in my case :-)

Thanks. I didn't know about U9. As for U5: will they stop the trains if a railway fan goes to platform edge to look into the tunnel? :-)

Hello Jacek,

Lyons line D must be equipped with ATO based on infrared-technique I think. The trains are driverless because the stations have cameras and the passenger-exchange is controlled in a control-center. On U9 in earlier times and in Madrid they do not have this cameras for this reaseon, so the driver has to do it on his own.
U9-ATO was installed in 1976 by Siemens-Halske and is based on induction-cables lying in the trackbed, like in Munich. This is called LZB (lineare Zugbeeinflussung). The maintaining-costs exceeded their notmal level and that caused the shut-down of this system, same as SELTRAC on U4 (same solution).
The STAR-project on U5 uses magnetic chips, installed in the tunnel, which give information into the train directly, this causes less maintainance then the electronic equipment of the LZB.
I read in your Internet-address that you´re from Lodz. Are there any talks about the old metro-project of two subwy-lines or disscussions about a tramway partly underground going on?

Greetings Alex

>> Are there any talks about the old metro-project of two subwy-lines or disscussions about a tramway partly underground going on?

In Poland U find many dicussions about traffic solusions. The most of the projects was to expensive for poland. The plans for a metro-line in Lodz died because of two reasons. As first U never find somebody in poland who pays for a transport system like this (But some guys who want to build churches or drive big cars!) & in the case of Lodz is this solusion to big a good tram-line is more than enough for this town. But Lodz needs better traffic solusions. The newest plans where the "Fast Tramway" (based on the same idea like the Stadtbahn)

They planed one metro-line with a few stations in the early ninetieth.