Passenger trains in Israel

[philipmartin]

Here's an article from Railways Africa, that I'm having trouble understanding. It says that Israel Railways is buying 60 double decker coaches from Bombardier, which will make its fleet 425 strong. How can a minuscule nation such as Israel need all this rolling stock? My guess from reading the short article is that they are mix of EMU's, and push-pulls.

http://www.railwaysafrica.com/news/isra ... uble-decks" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Here's the Bombardier article on the topic. http://www.bombardier.com/en/transporta ... and-africa" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[SemperFidelis]

The "miniscule" nation of Israel (by land mass...perhaps) has a population nearly identical to that of Manhattan, about 8.5 million. Couple high population density with very high gasoline costs and there you have it, demand for transit.

Edit- sorry, Israel's population is just over 8 million, not 8.5. Israel has high density urban areas and little in the form of American-style sprawl. Land use is, for practical and political reasons, much better regualated in Israel than it is in the United States.

[ferroequinologist]

Not to mention, the population is very well situated geographically for rail. A lot of the population is located in a strip along the coast, plus Jerusalem. And there's a well developed public transport system in general.

The issue is that buses are much more ingrained culturally there, and I think much cheaper and not much slower.

Israel Railways has some pretty major expansions under way. There's a couple new routes in the north that are under construction, plus the high speed line to J-lem.

[rhallock]

A google search will reveal that Israel is not only building new lines but has plans to build a high speed route to Eilat on the Gulf of Aqaba. They want to develop that area as well as use the line for container freight on a land bridge to compete with the Suez canal.

[rhallock]

Here is an outstanding recent article on Israel's railways: http://www.railjournal.com/index.php/mi ... hannel=527" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[philipmartin]

Very informative article, rhallock. Thank you. Persoally, I might be a little leery of riding high speed trains in the land of intifada.

[george matthews]

Very informative article, rhallock. Thank you. Persoally, I might be a little leery of riding high speed trains in the land of intifada.

Israel is like the Greater London area, very densely settled and ideal for a greater suburban network. The only potential "long distance" journey would be a line to Eilat - if they ever build it.

[Gilbert B Norman]

From Marriott Biscayne Bay Miami--

Quite the opinion piece regarding IR history appears in today's New York Times:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/16/opin ... racks.html

Fair Use:

If you hike the overgrown line up to Israel’s northern border at the cliffs of Rosh Hanikra, where the tunnel to Lebanon was cut in 1948, you’ll pass a little sign on which someone has composed a meditation in Hebrew. “The management of the Cairo-Jaffa-Haifa-Beirut railway apologizes to passengers,” it reads. “The clock is broken, the track worn down, the locomotive tired, the weeds high, the fuel expensive, the engineer asleep, the tunnel at Rosh Hanikra blocked. And one more little detail — peace is running late. But don’t give up: The train is coming. It’ll be just a few more minutes.” Every time I read that I just want to sit down and wait..

For any considering a journey over there (Col. Perkowski , you've noted you have been), perhaps you can lesrn more about these railway artifacts.

[Gilbert B Norman]

I guess this is the equipment this lady noted in The Times article attempted to ride:

https://www.istockphoto.com/photo/tel-a ... 2-87390665

[Gilbert B Norman]

Are there any reports to what extent IR has sustained damage arising from the current ongoing armed conflict?

[eolesen]

No word of damage, but they have apparently been used by the IDF to move active troops and reserves being called up. That is probably part of the rationale for having what would be an excessive number of cars, and during the initial attack on Shabbat, that meant trains were staged, empty, and ready to go.

[Gilbert B Norman]

So Mr. Olesen, does your immediate mean that the Defense Forces knew "something was up" for the Shemini Atzeret holiday period, and had the IR position their equipment for a mobilization?

[Jeff Smith]

From GBN's earlier post:

[eolesen]

So Mr. Olesen, does your immediate mean that the Defense Forces knew "something was up" for the Shemini Atzeret holiday period, and had the IR position their equipment for a mobilization?

It has nothing to do with Yom Kippur.

Trains do not run from sundown Friday until sundown Saturday due to Shabbat (Sabbath).

[Gilbert B Norman]

OK; back to my Comparative Religions course I took as one of my 12hrs of Humanities electives, and being it was taught at a state school, was non-sectarian in scope.

Yom Kippur was over for the year, and it was over the Shemini Atzeret holiday that Hamas chose to attack.