ION - Waterloo Region's Light Rail Transit

[Spokes]

Yikes. That would have been scary

[trainspotter139]

Although it sometimes seems like there is little coordination between GRT and ION, why would you say that?

Because the Rapid Transit team is operating completely separate from GRT.

[trainspotter139]

Mike Farwell is suggesting the opening day will be in May. Which would be very pleasant!

Does anyone know if this date allows them to complete testing? Just wondering if it is even feasible.

There's really not a lot to do left. From the sounds of the stuff they've been doing, they might be getting all their certification eggs into the same basket. They have certainly been doing the LRV dance in the yard the past couple of weeks.

[plam]

Does anyone know if this date allows them to complete testing? Just wondering if it is even feasible.

There's really not a lot to do left. From the sounds of the stuff they've been doing, they might be getting all their certification eggs into the same basket. They have certainly been doing the LRV dance in the yard the past couple of weeks.

There kind of seemed to be a lot of fault codes two weeks ago when I last listened to the radio. How's that been going? I think we need 600 hours of fault-code-free operation per train to certify, or am I wrong?

[trainspotter139]

There's really not a lot to do left. From the sounds of the stuff they've been doing, they might be getting all their certification eggs into the same basket. They have certainly been doing the LRV dance in the yard the past couple of weeks.

There kind of seemed to be a lot of fault codes two weeks ago when I last listened to the radio. How's that been going? I think we need 600 hours of fault-code-free operation per train to certify, or am I wrong?

I wouldn't read too much into that. Bombardier likely still has the trains running on a "Debug" version of the operating software which in all likelihood has ridiculously strict fault tolerances that the "Release" version wouldn't have.

[danbrotherston]

I saw a near-collision at Charles & Frances tonight... the LRT was coming down Charles with the green light in its favour and a jackass at Frances decided to start creeping into the intersection for some reason... the horn seemed to scare them enough that they moved back in time, dunno wtf they were thinking.

This does not surprise me one bit, I walk up this road daily, and multiple times a week I will have a driver creeping forward into the crosswalk while I'm crossing.

[Canard]

I’m amazed at the number of pedestrians I see crossing through the gates and lights without a care in the world. I can’t believe someone hasn’t been hit.

[Bob_McBob]

That's one of the reasons I'm always so annoyed about signal failures and traffic light timing issues, especially at locations like the University Ave crossing. It's training pedestrians in particular to not take it seriously.

[Canard]

Absolutely; this is the worst time for those kind of failures to occur, but by the nature of testing and integration, it’s exactly the time when they will.

For what it’s worth, when driving through Brantford on the weekend, we had to detour around a railway signal which was stuck down. Police were waving people to go down to the next street. I don’t ever recall coming across stuck crossings before, but perhaps I’m just more aware of it now that I’ve been following progress here.

[jamincan]

Is it possible that the unusually wet winter is wreaking havoc on a system that would normally be fine? If you saw this happen in Brantford, perhaps the problem is more wide spread than just with the ION gates. That said, it does seem to primarily be a problem with the gates north of Erb - I don't think I've heard any reports of stuck gates on the southern half.

[trainspotter139]

Absolutely; this is the worst time for those kind of failures to occur, but by the nature of testing and integration, it’s exactly the time when they will.

For what it’s worth, when driving through Brantford on the weekend, we had to detour around a railway signal which was stuck down. Police were waving people to go down to the next street. I don’t ever recall coming across stuck crossings before, but perhaps I’m just more aware of it now that I’ve been following progress here.

I had to call in the CP crossing on River @ King a week ago because it was stuck on. This same crossing was in the news a couple days ago because a school bus had stopped on it while a train was approaching. (CP staff were apparently also there at the time to perform maintenance)

[Canard]

Is it possible that the unusually wet winter is wreaking havoc on a system that would normally be fine? If you saw this happen in Brantford, perhaps the problem is more wide spread than just with the ION gates. That said, it does seem to primarily be a problem with the gates north of Erb - I don't think I've heard any reports of stuck gates on the southern half.

Oh god, stuck gates happen everywhere. Not isolated to one section at all.

[Spokes]

Sandbags are stand-in passengers for Ion testing

Ion trains are taking unusual passengers for a ride.

Heaps of sandbags — the equivalent of a train's 200-passenger capacity — are loaded on as part of the ongoing testing of vehicles and light rail infrastructure.

"There's quite a few sandbags on there," said Brendon Simon, senior Ion project manager with the Region of Waterloo. "It fills up the train from end to end."

The sandbags simulate a full vehicle, giving the driver a feel for how it handles and brakes compared to travelling along the line when it's empty.

"The vehicle performs a big differently," Simon said. "It just gets that practice in."

The weighted train also tests out the infrastructure along the line, including the power supply to keep it moving along at the right speed.

https://www.therecord.com/news-story/919...n-testing/

[plam]

There kind of seemed to be a lot of fault codes two weeks ago when I last listened to the radio. How's that been going? I think we need 600 hours of fault-code-free operation per train to certify, or am I wrong?

I wouldn't read too much into that. Bombardier likely still has the trains running on a "Debug" version of the operating software which in all likelihood has ridiculously strict fault tolerances that the "Release" version wouldn't have.

Makes sense and I defer to your expertise about trains. There are certainly bugs in the software which will hopefully not be too serious.

The Record article said 4-6 per day, have we seen 6 out yet?

[Bob_McBob]

So when do we get the LRV update? Still nothing in the council meeting agenda.