>>19367If you ride on the newest commuter trains from San Francisco to San Jose, the first thing that you might notice is how quiet they are: Instead of the rumble of a diesel engine, the trains now run on 100% electricity.
By switching to electric trains, Caltrain, the rail service, can eliminate 250,000 metric tons of CO2 emissions a year, roughly as much as the pollution from 55,000 cars. But it’s also just a better experience for riders. That might convince more commuters to stop driving to work, cutting emissions even further.
[Photo: Caltrain]
ELECTRIC TRAINS ARE FASTER
First, the electric trains run faster than the diesel trains that they’re replacing. Instead of a single locomotive in the front pulling the entire train behind it, each individual car is now an “electrical multiple unit,” or EMU, with its own engine, connected to overhead electric wires. “It’s generating power throughout the system,” says Dan Lieberman, a public information officer for Caltrain. “It just allows it to get up to speed much faster.”
Because the train can start and stop faster, Caltrain can add more stops to its express trains, and still shave minutes off the route. The new express route between San Jose and San Francisco will stop at 11 stations instead of seven, and take 59 minutes instead of an hour and five minutes. (The local train will take 75 minutes rather than 100 minutes.) During peak commute hours, more stations will now have trains every 15 to 20 minutes, even though Caltrain won’t use any additional trains. At off-peak hours, trains will run every 30 minutes, rather than every hour. (Caltrain started rolling out the new trains last week; they’ll be fully in service by the end of September.)
