I tend to see the Swiss railway more as a metro system on steroids.
Provide a service that works to provide a decent and reliable service for most people, instead of a handful of high profile high speed services that only benefit a few. Make connections work so that if you need to change trains, it is both reliable and quick, instead of unreliable and time wasting. It’s not sexy or high profile, but it makes a network that actually meets the needs of the people.
Historically they have invested on frequent and reliable connections rather than speed of individual segments.
Looking at the future, it’s entirely possible that the north/south axis through the Gotthard will be upgraded to 300 kph in the context of TEN-T corridors expansion, however it’s not a priority for SBB at the moment.
Terrain, temperature amplitudes, conservatism.
Erm, who cares? I can go from one side of the country to the other in 3-4 hours and in comfort and on time!
For one year I had the joy of riding to my Client on one of the few fast ICE tracks between Cologne, Germany and Frankfurt, Germany. It is basically one of the top tier German train tracks, going up to 300km/h I believe. I think on the prestigious I was on time (even in stretched German regulations of +-7 min or so) at most 50% of the time.
I rather go medium velocity in Switzerland but mostly on time and predictable than fast on paper with a 50% success rate.
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Small country, mountains and short distances.
I tend to see the Swiss railway more as a metro system on steroids.
Provide a service that works to provide a decent and reliable service for most people, instead of a handful of high profile high speed services that only benefit a few. Make connections work so that if you need to change trains, it is both reliable and quick, instead of unreliable and time wasting. It’s not sexy or high profile, but it makes a network that actually meets the needs of the people.
Historically they have invested on frequent and reliable connections rather than speed of individual segments.
Looking at the future, it’s entirely possible that the north/south axis through the Gotthard will be upgraded to 300 kph in the context of TEN-T corridors expansion, however it’s not a priority for SBB at the moment.
Terrain, temperature amplitudes, conservatism.
Erm, who cares? I can go from one side of the country to the other in 3-4 hours and in comfort and on time!
For one year I had the joy of riding to my Client on one of the few fast ICE tracks between Cologne, Germany and Frankfurt, Germany. It is basically one of the top tier German train tracks, going up to 300km/h I believe. I think on the prestigious I was on time (even in stretched German regulations of +-7 min or so) at most 50% of the time.
I rather go medium velocity in Switzerland but mostly on time and predictable than fast on paper with a 50% success rate.
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