3 streetcars in Kochi put on show as they pass in unison

[bill937ca]

Railfans in Japan are excited by the sight of three streetcars turning at once at a major intersection.

 

http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201806150011.html

[Ken Ford]

Foamers... same the world over. Lol

[gmat]

I thought I posted this earlier. If there was a problem, please let me know. This is from the Asahi Evening News.

3 streetcars in Kochi put on show as they pass in unison

http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201806150011.html

 

Too bad it's too far away for me to see.

Best wishes,

 Grant

Edited June 18, 2018 by Densha
Merged threads on same topic

[brill27mcb]

Happy to watch it twice, Grant!

 

This intersection is three curved track connections short of a "grand union" where a tram approaching from any direction can go left, straight or right. Toronto has a grand union, right Bill?

 

Rich K.

[bill937ca]

Toronto has three grand unions: King and Bathurst, Spadina and King plus Spadina and Queen. There once was a charter years ago that did every curve of every grand union.  We started about 9am and when I left to get my train it was after 6pm and they were still going.

Edited June 22, 2018 by bill937ca

[ben_issacs]

Folks, 

To the best of my knowledge, in Japan there are only two places where trams and trains cross each other on the level, and they are both in the one city.

The city is Matsuyama, on Shikkoku Island, and the System is that of the Iyo Railway Company.

One crossing is at Komachi, where the tramway depot is, here a single track tram line crosses  the company's single track railway from the port at Hamamatsu

This crossing it at a steep angle, and it is only tram and train, there is no road involved.

At Komachi, there is a direct interchange between train and tram.

The next is a bit further on, here the crossing is almost a right-angle one,  a double track city tram line in a road, crossing the same single track railway.

This crossing is protected by boom gates.

A good photo spot, with a red and cream tram standing at the booms with a similarly liveried EMU running across in front of it.

No doubt now-a-days, those liveries have changed.

It is very likely that in earlier times, when there were many tramways in Japan, similar crossings existed in other cities.

For the Quasi Grand Union, this is also on Shikoku, in Kochi city, the system there being Tosaden.

A full Grand Union is a Junction and intersection between two double track tramlines, generally at 90 degrees.A complicated pointwork system allows a tram approaching the intersection from any of the four directions to go straight across or either to the right or the left.

The Kochi system does not allow all of these movements, but there is a Youtube video taken from high level showing three cars using this junction at the same time.

With a full Grand Union, there could be four cars all using this junction at the same time.

Grand Unions are usually seen in cities with grid pattern streets, possibly not too many Japanese cities were of this layout.

The Matsuyama tram-train crossing could probably be duplicated in N gauge with standard track components, but a full G.U. or even a Kochi three quarter one, would probably have to be scratch built.

Regards, 

Bill,

Melbourne.

 

 

[katoftw]

Iyotetsu livery is now all bright orange.

[cteno4]

Mod note merged with existing topic

[Gordon Werner]

 

 

Edited January 27, 2019 by Gordon Werner