Talk:Gotthard Base Tunnel

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Contents 1 Why? 2 Travel time Zurich-Milan 3 No service tunnel 4 Train speeds 5 Broken Link in "External links" Section 6 Railway infrastructure contract awarded

[edit] Why?

I'd like a explanation as to why this tunnel is being built. For example what is the time savings to the communities touched; and what is the primary goal? (time savings between two major cities?) - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 03:59, 21 July 2005 (UTC)

Increased rail capacity between Italy and northern Europe; potential to run trains through the tunnel at 250 km/h. -- Arwel 10:50, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

Sexy. Thank you. - RoyBoy ⁸⁰⁰ 15:14, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

Thanks Arwel for your fixes. My english is good but it's not perfect. There was too much focus on the passenger train improvements. Also some Porta Alpina fanboy left his traces and made some publicity for this project which is now almost dead instead of improving the main quality of the article.
The basic and overall idea is a major increase in freight capability on the north-south corridor. This is done by using the principle of the so called 'Flachbahn', the flat rail link which avoids any steep gradients and tight curves, not to mention the spiral tunnels build exclusively to gain/lose height on the old track.
On the political agenda, steps are being made to force international truck traffic onto the railroad by levying tolls (LSVA) and efforts are being made to draw european partners to support the idea of the 'rolling highway'. The responsible, semi-private swiss company 'Hupac' is already now moving 5.5 million tons of freight a year through the Alps, using container-terminals in southern Germany and northern Italy funded with swiss taxpayers money. The improvements for the passenger railroad traffic are rather a side effect concerning the Gotthard base tunnel. Lötschberg has a more important role in this matter. For people who'd like to know more, the .pdf-file I linked to is a must-read. Hope this helped clarify a few things. - [Cooper] 12:03, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Keine Problem! :) English can be an awkward language at times to get exactly right. I've just been reminiscing and realised it must be nearly 20 years since I last took a train over the Gotthard route - I hope they keep the old route open when the Base Tunnel opens, because passing the same village (Fluelen ?) three times at different levels on the northern ascent is very spectacular! I used to work for British Railways, so I got 8 days of free travel on the SBB every year, but alas no more. I've changed the location of the southern portal from Biasca to Bodio to agree with your useful diagram (I see from my 1985 Kantone und Bezirke map that they're only 3 or 4 km apart). One piece of phrasing that I'm still not too happy with is "cutting through the Gotthard massif at nearly ground level," - it doesn't read correctly to me, since "ground level" means whatever the level of the ground is locally; perhaps "cutting through the Gotthard massif on the level" might be better? -- Arwel (talk) 21:48, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

The village you pass 3 times at different levels is 'Wassen'. There is no word of closing the old gotthard route, I'm pretty sure it will remain open as it does for the Lötschberg where the second Alptransit tunnel is about to be completed.
About that 'ground level' thingie: I keep having difficulties to describe why this tunnel is being built the way it is build without using a diagram (like: http://www.neat.ch/upload/galerie/download/flachbahn.zip). So if your expression describes the principle of the 'flat rail link', please feel free to replace mine.
I left 'Biasca' because it is better known however 'Bodio' is official (yet still a bit incorrect, the actual place the south portal is located is called 'Pollegio' which is even closer to 'Biasca' than 'Bodio' is).- [Cooper] 11:31, 04 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Travel time Zurich-Milan

There are various trains going from Zurich to Milan. Travel time is 4:26 for slow ones and 3:36 for the Cisalpino. It think the one hour saving should be compared to what's possible now, which is about 3.5 hours, not 4.5. Rl 11:03, 17 August 2005 (UTC)

You are right (In fact the difference in time between the Cisalpino and normal trains in not in speed but due to the fact that the Cisalpino trains do no stop in Chiasso for customs but this has nothing to do with the article :-) Matteo 13:00, August 17, 2005 (UTC)

The problem is not the custom, but the fact that Cisalpino trains can run both on Swiss and Italian electrified lines. Other trains must stop at the border for 30 minutes to change the locomotive. Coccodrillo 19:08, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

That is only part of the truth. If you search for trains from Zurich to Lugano on weekdays, you will find for example these two connections: Departing at Zurich 9:09 and 13:09. They stop at the same stations, but the first one needs 2:54, the second one 2:38. This is because the first train is a conventional (btw. also Cisalpino) train, and the second is a Cisalpino Pendolino tilting train. To make these time comparisons even more confusing: Yes, the Pendolino does not need a locomotive change at the border, but Cisalpino AG has some Re 484 which are used to pull conventional passenger trains, and they can run in Italy, too. So there are at least four possible travel times from Zurich to Milan: Cisalpino Pendolino, conventional train with a locomotive that is able to run both in Switzerland and Italy, a tilting train that is not able to run in Italy (not present in the current timetables), and a SBB-CFF-FFS train that doesn't tilt and has to change the locomotive in Chiasso. Moreover, the trains may stop at different stations...

Whether the locomotive has to be changed or not is an issue that is more or less independent of the base tunnel, so to estimate the time savings of the base tunnel it probably doesn't make sense to look at travel times between Zurich and Milan, but rather between Zurich and, say, Lugano.

What's more, current tilting train travel times are only possible with some restrictions. Due to their higher speed compared to conventional passenger or freight trains, they occupy a larger time slot and thus severely decrease the capacity of the current Gotthard line (which is probably a reason why there are so few fast tilting train connections). With the base tunnel being operational, all trains benefit and fast connections can be offered hourly instead of only two or three times a day.

Bottom line: The statement of the 1 hour travel time decrease is completely useless, since it doesn't say what was compared (anyone having a primary source?). Also, looking at the currently fastest connections does not necessarily make sense, because there are other important factors (frequency, type of rolling stock). --Kabelleger 22:19, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] No service tunnel

Unlike the Eurotunnel, the Gotthard Base Tunnel will NOT include a service tunnel between the two rail tunnels, only connecting tunnels every 300m. I removed the references to it. --80.219.168.196 22:59, 19 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Train speeds

Won't the differences in train speeds eventually lead to problems, since there will be only one track in each direction? Unless there are passing loops within the tunnel, as traffic increases, the slowest freight trains will necessarily be ruling speed. Safety considerations will require some headway be maintained, especially in such a long tunnel, and nominally faster passenger trains that get caught behind slower freight (and even slower passenger) trains will be forced to operate at the same speed as the slowest trains. They may still be faster than the trains that currently must negotiate the spirals and horseshoe curves to get into the Gotthard tunnel, but how much faster will they really be? 207.69.137.200 06:36, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

There used to be a page on the official web site explaining this, but I cannot find it (it looks like they have slimmed it down). In a nutshell per one hour there will be bundles of 2 passenger trains and 5 freight trains. That is less capacity compared to all trains running at the same speed, so you see why they can operate fast and slow trains. Fast trains will overtake slow trains outside the tunnel. As to the headway, at any time a passenger train is supposed to have a clear run up to the tunnel portal or one of the two intermediate emergency stops (Multifunktionsstellen), AFAIR it is part of the safety concept.--Klaus with K 17:56, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Broken Link in "External links" Section

Atlas Copco – The Longest Tunnel in the World (http://www.atlascopco.com/websites/acgroup/acgroup.nsf/docs/Gotthard+base+tunnel) seems to be broken. 66.234.222.96 (talk) 06:39, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Railway infrastructure contract awarded

The award of a railway infrastructure contract (track, electrification, communications, signalling etc.) has been announced. For example, see Alcatel-Lucent press release. Since I work for this company I cannot ethically add this information to the article myself. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.207.101.112 (talk) 06:48, 5 May 2008 (UTC)