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  #21  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 5:00 PM
OhioGuy OhioGuy is offline
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Sadly a small list for me.

N America: Chicago, DC, New York City, Atlanta, Toronto, Miami, Los Angeles, San Francisco
N America (light rail/streetcar): Houston, Cincinnati, Portland, Seattle

Europe: Paris, London, Stuttgart

Favorite among these systems is the Tube, though it’s been nearly 20 years since I was on the Paris Metro, so it’s hard to remember much.

Hopefully I’ll be able to add quite a few more over the next few years. Looks like Lima, Santiago, Valparaiso, and Auckland will be added to the list next year, followed by Sydney, Melbourne, and Montreal the year after.

Last edited by OhioGuy; Jun 21, 2018 at 5:37 PM.
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  #22  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 5:29 PM
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Maybe it's the charming uncompromising 1970's design or the fact that I spent a week there while deeply in love, but I will always be partial to the Vienna U-Bahn:


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  #23  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 5:42 PM
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Public transit is my passion, and so I've ridden every rail system in North America except Phoenix, Buffalo, PATCO, Charlotte, and Monterrey.

Outside North America, it's a long list as well:
London
Glasgow
Dublin
Amsterdam
Cologne
Wuppertal
Berlin
Frankfurt
Stuttgart
Dusseldorf
Hamburg
Dresden
Nuremberg
Munich
Vienna
Paris
Lyon
Strasbourg
Grenoble
Brussels
Zurich
Bern
Lisbon
Madrid
Barcelona
Rome
Milan
Prague
Sydney
Melbourne
Perth
Tokyo
Kobe
Osaka
Kyoto
Nagoya
Hiroshima
Shanghai
Hong Kong
Seoul
Busan
Manila
Singapore
Kuala Lumpur
Bangkok
Taipei
Kaohsiung

Of all the systems I've seen, I was most impressed by Taipei. It's all quite new, very well thought out, and incorporates best practices from around the world. Singapore, Kaohsiung, and Hong Kong are also very impressive. I've not yet had the chance to inspect and compare all the new Chinese systems.

Most charming is perhaps the wee lil subway in Glasgow.

I thought Strasbourg was the best designed and integrated surface system.

I was very impressed by Perth's conversion of its suburban network into a modern metro.
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  #24  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 6:23 PM
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I have a friend who's ridden every rail transit system in the US. He made a spreadsheet to act as a checklist. I copied it and now track my own progress. You can see my checklist here. I've ridden or at least been to a station and seen a train for 48 of the 87 metro, light rail, commuter rail, and streetcar systems in the US.

Outside the US, add another 8 from Canada and another 6 from Europe.

Paris is my favorite by far. If I have to stick within the US and I avoid the homer answer of WMATA, I guess I'd say I have a soft spot for SF Muni, because I want every city to have an urban light rail system.
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  #25  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 7:07 PM
emathias emathias is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
I have a friend who's ridden every rail transit system in the US. He made a spreadsheet to act as a checklist. I copied it and now track my own progress. You can see my checklist here. I've ridden or at least been to a station and seen a train for 48 of the 87 metro, light rail, commuter rail, and streetcar systems in the US.
...
Personally, to that spreadsheet, I would add an "other" category to incorporate and/or better account for things like the Miami MetroMover or the Detroit PeopleMover, or the Seattle Monorail, and perhaps a separate section for funicular or inclined railways such as Angles Flight in LA or Duquesne Incline in Pittsburg, among others. Yes, some of those are more novelties, but some are functionally important to their areas and I notice that the spreadsheet already does note some novelty streetcar systems, so I don't see the difference really.
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  #26  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 8:23 PM
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Heavy rail only, ranked:

Tokyo
Hong Kong
New York
Chicago
Atlanta
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  #27  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 9:20 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by emathias View Post
Personally, to that spreadsheet, I would add an "other" category
Actually the original creator did include such a category. I removed it for my own purposes because I just don't care about tracking airport circulators, inclines, and novelties. I do agree with you that the Miami Metromover in particular is legit transit, and the Detroit & Jacksonville versions were at least intended to be. Maybe I should add the people movers back in, and remove the heritage streetcars (which I also don't care about), but I honestly haven't given it that level of thought prior to right now.

Anyway, I'll do what I want for my own purposes, but feel free to copy the spreadsheet and manipulate it for your own purposes however you want
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  #28  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 10:14 PM
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Hm, this is a good idea for a thread. Counting any and all rail, I've been on the following systems:

North America
- New York (subway and LIRR)
- Chicago (El and Metra)
- Montreal (metro)
- Boston (T)
- SF/Oakland (Bart and Muni)
- LA (metro)
- San Diego (trolley)
- New Orleans (streetcar)
- Portland (LRT and streetcar)
- Cincinnati (streetcar)
- DC (metro)
- Salt Lake City (light rail)
- Pittsburgh (light rail)
- Cleveland (light and heavy rail)
- Seattle (monorail)
- Las Vegas (monorail)

Europe
- London
- Dublin
- Paris
- Berlin
- Geneva (trams/streetcars)
- Rome

Favorite in North America is probably New York, and the favorite in Europe is probably London, if only because it can be slightly stressful trying to navigate a metro in a foreign language.
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  #29  
Old Posted Jun 21, 2018, 11:12 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
I have a friend who's ridden every rail transit system in the US. He made a spreadsheet to act as a checklist. I copied it and now track my own progress. You can see my checklist here. I've ridden or at least been to a station and seen a train for 48 of the 87 metro, light rail, commuter rail, and streetcar systems in the US.

Outside the US, add another 8 from Canada and another 6 from Europe.

Paris is my favorite by far. If I have to stick within the US and I avoid the homer answer of WMATA, I guess I'd say I have a soft spot for SF Muni, because I want every city to have an urban light rail system.
8 from Canada? only 5 cities in Canada have rail transit systems..

Unless you are counting the three commuter rail systems, bringing it to 8? and you've ridden all of them?

Mind you Canada isn't going to be at 5 for long, it'll be at 7 by the end of the year, and plans are underway in various cities to bring the number to 11 urban rail / 15 with commuter rail systems..
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  #30  
Old Posted Jun 25, 2018, 3:41 AM
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What is the advantage of walk through trains? Most busy systems are so packed with people, walking even within a car is impossible.

My list, NA: Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal, Boston, NYC, DC, Atlanta, Buffalo, Detroit, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Salt Lake, San Diego, LA, Bay Area, Portland, Seattle.

Asia: Souel, Taipei, Hong Kong, Shenzen, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Singapore, KL, Tokyo

Europe: London, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, Vienna

Australia: Melbourne, Sydney, Gold Coast

Best: Taipei, Hong Kong, Singapore and Seoul due to coverage, efficiency and cleanliness
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  #31  
Old Posted Jun 25, 2018, 4:12 AM
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tokyo is tops for coverage and service.

although these systems will get no arguement from me. impressively clean and efficient indeed.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Doug View Post

Best: Taipei, Hong Kong, Singapore and Seoul due to coverage, efficiency and cleanliness

however, my very favorite were the old La Brugeoise wooden buenos aires subte cars, built between 1911-1919. unfortunately they had to finally take what remained of them out of service in 2013. luckily mta runs old subway cars every december, so i still get an oldtime railcar fix. i was a big fan of the redbirds, but they had to go — everything has its day lol.
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  #32  
Old Posted Jun 25, 2018, 3:07 PM
lrt's friend lrt's friend is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere View Post
8 from Canada? only 5 cities in Canada have rail transit systems.. Unless you are counting the three commuter rail systems, bringing it to 8? and you've ridden all of them?

Mind you Canada isn't going to be at 5 for long, it'll be at 7 by the end of the year, and plans are underway in various cities to bring the number to 11 urban rail / 15 with commuter rail systems..
That is not quite correct. Ottawa has had a relatively modest rail system in place since 2001, the original O-Train. Of course, a major LRT line, which will act as a light metro, will open later this year.
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  #33  
Old Posted Jun 25, 2018, 7:30 PM
emathias emathias is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Cirrus View Post
...
I should add the people movers back in, and remove the heritage streetcars (which I also don't care about), but I honestly haven't given it that level of thought prior to right now.

Anyway, I'll do what I want for my own purposes, but feel free to copy the spreadsheet and manipulate it for your own purposes however you want
Yeah, I'm definitely not telling you what you should do for your own purposes! Do what works for you - and I did use the data from that spreadsheet to start my own version, with pretty fine-grained differentiation of systems. Like for Chicago I tweaked apart Metra, Metra Electric, South Shore, the CTA 'L' system, and then decided I'd include the O'Hare peoplemover, too. And in Boston I included their commuter rail, grouped the Red, Blue, and Orange Lines together, but then put the Green Line and the Mattapan trolley into their own categories.

Basically, I came up with these categories and am going to try and fill out sheets for every city out there that has them. North America is almost complete based on your spreadsheet, although I need to research and add some funiculars and airport peoplemovers, and make sure I have all theme park peoplemovers. And if I'm feeling really ambitious, I might try to add all unusual trains under the "Other" category to include not just San Francisco's Cable Cars, but things like the Oregon Zoo's Zoo Train.

Code:
Term        Definition                                Examples

Metro       Substantially grade-separated either      Paris Metro, New
            as subway, or as elevated, or as a mix.   York Subway,
            May include some surface sections on      London Tube,
            edge parts of system.  May include        Chicago 'L'
            automated lines if the automated lines
            are of the same scale of a typical metro
            line.

Lightrail   Mostly surface, mostly in dedicated       Portland MAX,
            right-of-ways but mostly not grade-       Paris T3, LA
            separated but also mostly not in traffic. Gold Line
            May have short sections grade-separated.

Tram        Mostly surface, mostly in traffic.  May   San Diego trolleys,
            have short sections in dedicated right-   Oslo tram, Seattle
            of-ways or even grade-separated, but      South Lake Union
            primarily runs in traffic.  Commonly      Transit, Portland
            called "streetcars" or "trolleys" in      Streetcars
            the U.S.    San Diego trolleys

Funicular   Any railway dedicated to a serving a      Bergen funicular,
            severe incline.                           LA Angels Flight,
                                                      Barcelona Funicular
                                                      de Montjuïc

Monorail    System running on a single rail, whether  Las Vegas Monorail,
            steel or concrete, whether running over   Seattle Monorail,
            or under the rail, of a scale of units    Osaka monorail,
            that could function as a metro.  Small,   Chongqing monorail
            single-unit monorails which are fully
            automated should be categorized as a
            "Mover" line.

Mover       Defined by being automated and both small Skyrail Midorizaka
            units and short trains. Frequently free   Line, Detroit
            or priced below normal transit services.  PeopleMover, Miami
                                                      MetroMover

Commuter-   Mostly definited by schedule emphasis     Chicago Metra,
Diesel      on rush hours, but also defined by        WES Commuter
            wider average distance between stations   Rail, CalTrain
            and distance of travel from city center.  

Commuter-   Electric defined by schedule emphasis     NY Metro North,
Electric    on rush hours, but also defined by        Paris RER, NJ Path,
            wider average distance between stations   Chicago Metra
            and distance of travel from city center.  Electric

Other       Any rail line that doesn't obviously      San Francisco
            fit in any of the above categories or     Cable Cars
            could fit in multiple categories but
            has other unique features.
I have a ways to go with all the international localities (I want to make it a completely comprehensive spreadsheet in that regard).
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  #34  
Old Posted Jun 25, 2018, 9:28 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere View Post
8 from Canada? only 5 cities in Canada have rail transit systems.
I was counting modes separately. In Toronto, I've ridden the Metrolinx UPX (1), the TTC subway (2), and the TTC streetcars (3), and I've seen the GO commuter trains (4). In Montreal I've ridden the Metro (5) and seen the AMT commuter rail (6). In Vancouver I've ridden the SkyTrain (7) and seen the West Coast Express commuter rail (8). One might argue that I'm too liberal by counting the two TTC modes separately, but I think everything else is a separate agency.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Doug View Post
What is the advantage of walk through trains? Most busy systems are so packed with people, walking even within a car is impossible.
In short, a 10% capacity increase for free. Here's an explainer.
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  #35  
Old Posted Jun 25, 2018, 9:37 PM
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North America: DC, New York, Chicago, Boston, San Diego, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Houston, Dallas, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, Denver, New Orleans & Montreal
Europe: Paris, London, Rotterdam, Amsterdam
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  #36  
Old Posted Jun 25, 2018, 10:30 PM
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Systems I've been on (LRT in grey):

Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton.

New York (MTA + PATH), Boston, Philly, DC, Atlanta, Chicago, Minneapolis (2 stops from the airport to mall of America), Phoenix, Seattle, Portland, SF (BART + Muni metro), LA (only rode the Red line).

London, Glasgow, Dublin, Paris, Barcelona, Seville, Lisbon, Rome, Milan, Rotterdam, Prague, Berlin, Hamburg, Munich.

Hong Kong, Taipei.

---

When it comes to metros there was a sea change around 1965, such that you can almost neatly cleave metros into those built before that period and those built after.

"Old school" metros feature shorter distances between stops, and small stations often built directly below the street with a small (or no) mezzanine level. Their entrances are often simple staircases down from the sidewalk. If they're elevated, their tracks often run above streets on steel viaducts. They rarely feature a terminal for buses or surface transit.

"New school" metros travel longer distances between stations. They're often much deeper than "old world" metros and feature at least two underground levels: a generous mezzanine/ticketing area and then the track/platform level. The busier stations were designed with maximum passenger circulation in mind complete with separate fire exits, multiple escalators, elevators and several exits. If they're elevated, they're often on a concrete guideway on a right of way that interferes as little as possible with active commercial streets.

When I think about these distinctions, I think of Toronto's Bloor Danforth line being the last of the "old world" metros (1966), while Montreal's metro (also 1966) as being the first of the "new world" metros. Each system has elements from both worlds, although subsequent additions to Toronto or Montreal's metros are firmly in the "new world" category.

Anyway, as a user I actually prefer the "old world" better. One thing I disliked about the Hong Kong system was how it took an eternity to get to the train level from the street, as you had to walk through endless tunnels and travel down many escalators from each station's two dozen, or so, entrances. If the NYC subway didn't have its repair/operational issues or crumbling station conditions, it would be my favourite system in the world, hands down.

But because it does, I'll have to say that my favourite system is either Berlin or Paris. Paris has a very dense network of stations that pop up every 1,000 feet, or so, along a line. I wouldn't be surprised if the distance a passenger has to walk to exit the average Hong Kong station rivals the distance between stations on the Paris metro. Paris and Berlin have solved the capacity and distance issue of old world metros by building a parallel S-bahn or RER network. NYC kind of has this with the express lines, but you're on the same, uncomfortable rolling stock and those trains really only run express through a section of the line.

The worst metro I've ever been on? Rome. The filthiness of New York in the 1980s with the network coverage of Toronto. Bleh.
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  #37  
Old Posted Jun 26, 2018, 12:14 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Doug View Post
What is the advantage of walk through trains? Most busy systems are so packed with people, walking even within a car is impossible.
At rush hour, certainly this is true. But at off peak hours, when the system is still busy but not sardine packed, another advantage of walk through trains (other than the capacity increase mentioned below) is that it allows for more even load balancing throughout the train. Without it, you may have some cars that are absolutely packed (generally those closest to the escalators / stairs in stations), but with it people can move throughout the train, so no part of the train becomes uncomfortably crowded.
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  #38  
Old Posted Jun 26, 2018, 12:51 AM
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All in USA. Sorry, I'm poor.

Boston (H/L)
New York/Northern New Jersey (H)
Philadelphia/Southern New Jersey (H/L)
Baltimore (H)
Washington D.C./NoVA, Maryland (H)
Atlanta (H)
Pittsburgh (L)
Cleveland (H)
Detroit (Is a peoplemover heavy or light rail?)
Chicago (H)
Las Vegas (What's a monorail count as, heavy or light?)

Can't call a favorite. Every system has something charming/redeeming about it.
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  #39  
Old Posted Jun 26, 2018, 1:01 AM
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The Detroit one is hard to define since it only goes in one direction... It uses the some technology as Skytrain in Vancouver but it is restricted to using only 2 car Mark I cars (the original rolling stock manufactured in the 80s, and by far the smallest).
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  #40  
Old Posted Jun 26, 2018, 1:11 AM
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In more or less chronological order.

Toronto
Ottawa
Chicago
London
Amsterdam
Prague
Rome
Vancouver
Calgary
New York
Boston

Oddly enough, despite having been to Montreal several time I've never been on the metro there.
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