2008-02-21 X2000 around Hölövägen Crossing

On a cold February day I went to Hölövägen crossing, between Järna and Mölnbo to compare a high speed railway crossing in Sweden to the ones I am used to in the U.S..

At this crossing, trains cross it around 145km/h (90MPH). Where I live, I am no where near a crossing that handles train traffic at this speed, so it was a real opportunity to see the timing of the crossing gates and the trains arrival at the roadway. The crossing gates timing was interesting to see.

As this is a high speed crossing SJ needs to preempt the gates in proportion to the speed of the train. From the time the lights and bells began to ring to the time the gates begin to lower is about 13 seconds. The gates lower in 7 seconds and remain fully down for 95 seconds before the train is at the crossing (edit at 0:22). If this crossing's times were implemented in the U.S. no one would put up with the long waits! ;) But to its rescue, when the train clears the island circuit and there is no other rail traffic, only about 2 and one-half seconds goes by before the gates begin to rise. Here in the U.S., sometimes the gates take anywhere from 5-15 seconds after the train passes to go up, what a waste of time!

I have also included some other shots in and around the Hölövägen crossing and Hot Box Detector that include a few X60's and regular long distance passenger trains.

Add &fmt=18 to the end of the YouTube address to watch in High Quality ;)

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• X2000
• X60
• SJ
• Sweden
• Tåg
• Train
• Crossing

[mrksvideos]

Tack! Actually I took the bus and walked. Had to go to Järna and take the 786 bus to the Solviks grindar stop, which is right at Hölövägen. A quick walk is all that is needed. Once you cross the railway, there is a dirt road that goes off to the left and parallels the railway for some great photo locations! I was there in February, a little cold, but the proper clothes, jacket, a 7-UP and a little sandwich kept me happy for about 5 hours tromping through the fields and roadways. :)

[lunkan93]

lägg kameran på spåret som jag gjorde. det e coolt

[mrksvideos]

I didnt have a camera I was willing to have mangled up by the trains. When you are on vacation 8800 km from home, you dont want to gamble like that :)

[Jonte135]

@chetirepyat All graffiti is ugly.

[chetirepyat]

I didn't realize that even Sweden has ugly grafitti.

[lunkan93]

@Wichtelchen2006 haha ja :P hehe 

[Wichtelchen2006]

@lunkan93 Dann reißt der Zug sie mit und gleist aus. Tolle idee... -.-

[Wichtelchen2006]

Den vänstra två röda ljusen blinkar snabbare än den högra. xD

[Norrlandstaget95]

How did you get to that place? I was trying to find a bus or something that stops close to that level crossing. My guess is that you had a car...

//R

Nice video anyways! ;-)

[Tjita1]

The time it takes between the gates go down until the train gets there depends on the speed the train is going. The limit is usually 144 km/h (for some reason), below that the gates start to go down 1 km before the train gets there, and above that the gates lower 2,5 km before the train gets there by use of contacts in the rail sensing the speed.

There are of course exceptions to this, but this is the common setup.

The indication for the gates to go up again is immediately after the crossing.

[fontheking5]

Good video , recognises many trains there too , the rail signals did the same thing were i grew up , the stop alarming when the gates were fully down .

[fontheking5]

Thanks for the warning about the bump in the road Jobergg . We got some bumpy crossings were i live too .