https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/ne ... slam-door/



Imagine if the FRA or AAR banned all "Dutch-door" rolling stock on U.S. mainline excursions, including private varnish.........

An American ban on existing coaching stock would probably be an Amtrak decision. A Federal Railroad Administration rule would probably only apply to new construction, and I think there already is a similar rule about doors on new cars. The Association of American Railroads no longer pays attention to passenger standards, it's purely a freight train club.

Details, schmetails.

Are there even any "Dutch door" cars left on Amtrak's roster?

The realistic aspect is that, somehow, Amtrak notices it doesn't have any such rolling stock left, writes a rule or standard saying they are banned, and all the major RRs then use Amtrak's rules as a default to banish the use of anyone else's rolling stock with Dutch doors, gravity trap vestibules, open platforms, or openable windows. (Exempting their own business car fleet, naturally.)

We're already seemingly 90% of the way there already in the US and Canada.......... just try to find any train trip where we could enjoy an open Dutch door like many of us spent many hours riding to appreciate train-riding far beyond being stuck in a seat. Even excursion lines often shoo us out of vestibules now, and open window cars are becoming increasingly scarce.

Last I knew, Western Maryland Scenic RR still had cars with Dutch Doors, and they were fine with letting passengers open them or use them for taking pictures. It's a wonderful way to enjoy the #1309 if the dome car is crowded.

Come on down to U.S. Sugar in January (20-22) if you want to ride a dutch door at speed behind steam (also open baggage car doors). They are doing a one-time steam event for 3 days with photo stops and such, covering the common carrier freight lines.

It is interesting though how the dutch door is fully allowed on some trips and standing there is banned elsewhere.

For the UK, ending these classic doors is like suddenly banning dutch doors on passenger cars. Just about any heritage car used by such groups have these doors.

Bart

I don't think this is 'Dutch doors' (with hinged upper panels) -- it is stock with compartments, each of which has its own door on both sides of the car, like the old boat-train cars serving the Fall River Line.

Why you could not easily adopt central-locking mechanisms from automotive practice to lock, and more importantly unlock in emergencies, for far less than some 7-odd million pounds, escapes me. Perhaps there is some requirement for consultants to figure out precisely when all the doors need to be locked, and then kept locked or released in a variety of foreseeable circumstances. I cannot imagine that the current European practice of unlocking the door by double-pulling the inside handle could possibly be construed as 'safe' (or advisable) in the railroad context, for example.

But any thoughts on practical implementation from our community might be more than welcome, considering the stakes that are coming to be involved.

Just to put a bit of background to this, the notice for the fitting of central door locking actually dates back to 1999 and all stock was supposed to be so fitted by 2005, unless exemptions were granted....
https://www.orr.gov.uk/guidance-complia ... exemptions
..so they have had 24 years to get something sorted!

Latest news is that they have been granted a further 3 month extension of their exemption which will cover them up to the end of February (not that the "Harry Potter" steam route (Fort William-Mallaig) actually runs over the winter....)

Wireless electronic deadbolts?

PC

What all is considered “mainline” in the UK?

Only ones that come to mind are the heritage cars that are owned by North Carolina and operated on the piedmont trains. But Alaska Railroad also has Dutch doors.

If the actual issue is locking / controlled doors the superliners and viewliners are just latches like the Dutch doors.

All trackage owned by Network Rail, the National Infrastructure operation.

It doesn't include any of the preserved/heritage lines (yet), so they don't need central door locking on their cars, in the same way that wooden bodied stock is still able to be used on those lines.
A maximum 25 mph speed limit applies on those lines as well, under the "light railway" legal status of their operations.

Basically, any part of the national rail network under the control of Network Rail, the quasi-public corporation that franchises operation of freight and passenger trains to private franchise operators like GNER, DB Rail, Virgin Rail, etc. Our favourite "heritage railways" operate independently, much like they do in the United States. Essentially, if your rolling stock leaves a captive rail line, it has to abide by certain standards, be outfitted with their version of Positive Train Control, etc. Operating main line preserved diesels, for example, must be outfitted with Automatic Warning System (AWS), Train Protection Warning System (TPWS), and On-Train Monitoring Recorder OTMR). Steam on the mainline gets away with an exception by being "tailed" by a suitably equipped diesel, that annoying thing you sdee on the end of mainline steam video clips.

Network Rail is due to be replaced next year (after bureaucratic delays) by a new agency called "Great British Railways."

I find that most Americans, even railfans, have little to no understanding of the "denationalization" process in most of Europe and Japan undertaken by the mandates of the European Community in the 1990s. This is in large part because passenger operations in Europe continued to be jointly marketed as a unified national passenger rail network even when it wasn't. Feel free to research at Wikipedia and the like.

It is relevant that, as I type, some of the countries are now moving towards a form of "re-nationalisation" that reads as something more akin to Conrail, Amtrak, and the CN of old (which was de-nationalised in 1995). the above-mentioned GBR is part of this.

Amfleet II passenger cars were originally built with side vestibule doors with plastic windows that could be lowered.

More detail (may be paywalled):

https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews ... ry-threat/

This article focuses on the West Highland Lind and its "Jacobite" trains between Fort William and Mallaig, operated since 1984 originally by British Rail.

Could someone post a photo of these cars showing the doors in question? I'm not quite clear on what the issue is.