Vintage JNR signals video

[Jcarlton]

Two part video explaining signals. Starts with manual block, then using a staff(ball) on single track, followed by manual interlocking and what appears to be very overmanned electropneumatic tower at Ueno at a guess.

Part 1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1RVCmd0E7g&feature=related

part 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aj-33_0xtMw&feature=related

You have to love the cow waiting at the crossing gates.  I also have a hard time believing that you need a 6 man crew for what looks like a 75 or so lever machine. They must be working for the government.  All the operators for towers that I have met that used to work on the New Haven worked alone.  Including the tower at Stamford CT, of which the operator in the late '60's gave a slide show of pictures taken while at work as young man on his first job.   

[bikkuri bahn]

Ancient (pre-war), but very informative documentary.  The station starting at about 10:04 in the first clip is probably Kusatsu, on the Tokaido Line in Shiga Pref.  The second clip is a treasure of rolling stock, with streamline C55's, C53's and the 52 series express EMU's (the forerunners of today's shinkaisoku services).  The big station featured is Kyoto, the track layout is unique to that station, and the station headhouse is the second generation (1914-1950).

[Eisenbahn]

These are great videos for all sorts of reasons including the ritualised hand movements that are built into the various procedural steps. I take it that these are a part of a safe operating discipline. For me, as an occasional Western visitor to Japan, I always enjoy watching the ritualised hand actions when shinkansens arrive and depart, or when the "door girls" on a super odoriko go through their departure sequence. Similarly the drivers of Yamanote loop trains seem to have a stop , start hand sequence which they also verbalise.

 

I wondered how widespread this ritualised behaviour was outside Japan. Is it the case that it is a part of s safe operation discipline?

 

The other practice of uniformed platform staff saluting trains has long since disappeared as far as I know, but this was for ceremonial reasons rather than safety ones I suppose??

 

cheers....Eisenbahn

[miyakoji]

I wondered how widespread this ritualised behaviour was outside Japan. Is it the case that it is a part of s safe operation discipline?

There's this English wikipedia page with a reasonably official sounding translation of shisa kanko, "pointing and calling" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pointing_and_calling.  But, it only mentions Japan and says it originated in Japan.  No mention of use in other countries.  Interesting Japan Times article linked on the wiki page: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/ek20081021wh.html

 

Jcarlton, good find!

[westfalen]

They keep the handles of the levers in the manual signal cabin nicely polished. I remember at Grandchester on the main line west of Brisbane the station master polished the levers every day with emory cloth and heaven help anyone who touched them with their bare hands like the Japanese guys in the video. At Yarongmulu, the next station up the line, the levers were never cleaned and you had to grab them with a rag to keep your hands clean. Sorry for the reminiscing but aside from a different styles of block and staff instruments most of the stuff and things they are doing is very familiar to me, just goes to show how much the Japanese followed the British methods of safeworking in the early years.

 

Queensland Rail has brought in what they call Risk Triggered Commentory for drivers which is basically a watered down version of what the Japanese do.

[Eisenbahn]

Hi Miyakoji!

 

Thanks for putting up the links on "pointing and calling". Very interesting.  Any habituated behaviour that can be built into an operating procedure that reduces risk is a good idea.   

 

Hi Westfalen,

Pleased to see that Qld Rail has adopted a variant of this.  Perhaps you might suggest that their training courses be held annually in Japan  :-)

 

Reminiscing Department.  As a boy of 6, I first noticed the passing of the staff on the Toowoomba-Ipswich line to which you refer and my grandfather, a former Queensland Goverment Railways fireman during the 1920s depression, explained to me about safety on single line operation. Every school holidays I would look out for the particular stations where there was the passing of the staff. I seem to remember a wooden and brass fronted device the staff was inserted into, but I now forget the names of the two stations.

 

cheersd......Eisenbahn

[westfalen]

I seem to remember a wooden and brass fronted device the staff was inserted into, but I now forget the names of the two stations.

You could be thinking of a staff box used in staff and ticket working, there was only one staff and if two or more trains were following in the same direction the staff was used as the key to open the box which contained tickets one of which was given to the first train and the last took the staff. The minature electric staff used on the line to Toowoomba (when I worked on it, at least) seen in the staff instrument at the rear in the photo were placed in a leather strap on the handle of a cane hoop that resembled a tennis racket. We didn't have the luxury of staff exchanging apparatus like the Japanese in the film and had to stand beside the track and hand it up to the crew as they sped past (supposedly not more than 32kmh ).

 

[Eisenbahn]

Hi Westfalen

 

I remember the tennis racquet shaped cane hoop and the fact it was hand passed at speed (cow pace) . I think it was somewhere between Toowoomba & Helidon but it may have been after that. But I dont remember the device being like the one in your photo.  For me this was the 1950s and I was at primary School.  Being 6 years old at the time I remember being impressed that there was a "foolproof"  system in place to avoid head on collissions because only one train could have the staff at any one time.....an explanation I completely accepted at the time. The ticket addition means it was more sophisticated than I knew about. 

 

Actually I am heading off to Tokyo tomorrow and am presently charging up my phone, camera. I was just planning to take some photos of some of the Shinkansen stations in the Kanto region. However, in the light of this thread, what would be wrong with me taking some photos of attractive female guards engaging in shisa kanko (pointing & calling) even if just on the Yamanote loop??? 

 

cheers.....Eisenbahn

[miyakoji]

Ancient (pre-war), but very informative documentary.  The station starting at about 10:04 in the first clip is probably Kusatsu, on the Tokaido Line in Shiga Pref.  The second clip is a treasure of rolling stock, with streamline C55's, C53's and the 52 series express EMU's (the forerunners of today's shinkaisoku services).  The big station featured is Kyoto, the track layout is unique to that station, and the station headhouse is the second generation (1914-1950).

Bikkuri, are you thinking that the station at 10:04 is Kusatsu because of the structure shown at 10:13?  If so, I agree.  This just came back to me.  That carries a stream or small river, doesn't it?

 

A lot of scenes in the second video look like they could be on the Shiga-ken portion of the Tokaido, and with scenes at Kyoto Station, and Kusatsu in the first, I suppose it's likely.  The basins shown at 1:08 still exist at Maibara, iirc, although the mirrors are gone.  There's some nice scenery along JRW's Biwako Line, and with the lake's influence on the weather, it's often more snowy there in the winter than in neighboring prefectures.

 

Jcarlton, I don't know about standard staffing of switch levers, but some of the scenes there look fairly busy.  Is 6 employees really that much for 75 switches?

[bikkuri bahn]

Bikkuri, are you thinking that the station at 10:04 is Kusatsu because of the structure shown at 10:13?

 

Yes, that's right, because it's still there.  The tunnel/bridge was built in 1889, and dove under the Kusatsu River.  The river, at least in this area, has silted up.

 

I know what you're talking about re. winter weather on this portion of track.  This January, after leaving a dry Osaka on the Kitaguni, was already some snow on the ground around Maibara, and past there, the scenery was no different from Hokkaido.  Lovely moonlight scenery from the comfort of an A shindai, perhaps never to be experienced again...

 

The basins shown at 1:08 still exist at Maibara, iirc, although the mirrors are gone

 

I'll have to check those out next time I'm at Maibara (perhaps later this month...).  Those facilties were necessary back in the steam days, as it was not uncommon for passengers to get soot/cinders on themselves.  My mother, while taking a family trip (back in the fifties), got some steam locomotive emitted debris in her eye (the result of not closing the window in time for a tunnel), which developed into an infection.

[bikkuri bahn]

Jcarlton, I don't know about standard staffing of switch levers, but some of the scenes there look fairly busy.  Is 6 employees really that much for 75 switches?

 

According to the narration, the tower depicted handled 700 train movements a day.  As you can see there is a three stage staff system in the tower- the signals supervisor, the watcher/caller, and the seated staff handling the levers.  Of course, labor costs were much lower back then.

[miyakoji]

Lovely moonlight scenery from the comfort of an A shindai, perhaps never to be experienced again...

Lucky.  Well, there's always the Twilight Express, Cassiopeia, and Sunrise Izumo/Takamatsu.  They lack the, uh, charming mechanical noise of the 583, but then, you might get some sleep.  The 285's single deluxe rooms look good to me: http://www62.tok2.com/home/tsubame787/seat_285.html

 

btw, did you take any pictures of the inside of the 583?  Wikipedia is surprisingly lacking.

 

According to the narration, the tower depicted handled 700 train movements a day.  As you can see there is a three stage staff system in the tower- the signals supervisor, the watcher/caller, and the seated staff handling the levers.  Of course, labor costs were much lower back then.

 

As interesting as they were to watch, I found them somewhat difficult to understand.  The old forms of the kanji and the right-to-left writing caused me some doubletakes but the audio, particularly anyone other than the narrator, was tough.

[bikkuri bahn]

It's the old pullman style open berth on the 583 that I really like.  Dunno if there are any of that style left, other than the lateral B shindai types (which I like too).  Room berths are too fancy and pricey for a solo traveler like me- I'd rather spend that money on a shinkansen ticket or a seishun 18.  Didn't notice any undue electrical noises, as I was sited more in the middle of the carriage.  But one of the wheelsets had a flat, which is more annoying to me than than a MT whine (actually, the traction sound is music to my ears).

 

Yes, I took a few pics of the interior.  Should post them sometime.

 

Re. the video, yes the Japanese spoken is hard to pick up, alot of it railway talk and orders- could only get some train numbers, and the phrase o-rai (オーライ)- I wonder if this phrase was changed in the war years, as it comes from the English "all right", language of the enemy and all...

 

*correction: I was in a sarone 581, which is a trailer car, so no motor sound.

[Nick_Burman]

Jcarlton, I don't know about standard staffing of switch levers, but some of the scenes there look fairly busy.  Is 6 employees really that much for 75 switches?

 

According to the narration, the tower depicted handled 700 train movements a day.  As you can see there is a three stage staff system in the tower- the signals supervisor, the watcher/caller, and the seated staff handling the levers.  Of course, labor costs were much lower back then.

 

Amtrak uses/used a similar system at NY Penn Station - a Head Towerman called out moves to two or three lever operators.

 

Cheers NB

[Nick_Burman]

I also have a hard time believing that you need a 6 man crew for what looks like a 75 or so lever machine.

 

The highest number I saw on the film was 84. Plus I noticed several gaps in the rows of levers, which would have brought the count to some 100 levers or so.

 

One interesting detail is a very early application of swing-nose frogs on switches. I wonder if it was a home-brewed idea or if JGR brought it from elsewhere

 

They must be working for the government.

 

Of course, wasn't this the Japanese Government Railways?

 

Cheers NB