Denentoshi line to receive platform doors... Sort of.

[Kabutoni]

Tōkyū going for the cheap and easy option. I think this is to keep passengers away from the platform side, rather than preventing them from falling off. Trains pass here (Tsukimino station) at 110kph IIRC.

 

 

It's not a very elegant solution, but charming to say the least. :D

[Densha]

Lol. What if you're under that when it comes down?

[Kabutoni]

Lol. What if you're under that when it comes down?

 

Well, it's wires, so you'll probably be beheaded. Serves you right for disrupting operations.

[miyakoji]

Doesn't look really durable. I wonder how those will hold up.

[KenS]

It's interesting that the gate drops after the train pulls away.  You'd think they'd drop it after the doors close before it departs.

 

The durability looks like the real problem. Get those bent, and they could jam going up, leaving people coming out that door/doors to walk along the edge of the platform to the next gate, and really slowing things down.  The converse is that anything heavy enough to not bend coming down like that needs some kind of impact sensor, to avoid crushing someone.  These are probably light enough that they'd hurt, but not seriously, and the drivetrain likely lets them "float" atop someone's shoulder if they do stop, until the idiot steps clear. Simpler mechanisms are less likely to go wrong.

 

It's a clever idea though, if there are trains with different door placements using the station.  The Yamanote line had to retire their six-door cars when they introduced gates due to the gate spacing needed to match the four-door cars. It also makes it easier for the railroad to acquire future trains, as they don't need to specify the same door spacing.

 

If there are passing 110 kph trains here, then it does make some sense.  That can create a bit of turbulence to say the least, and someone right at the edge could be pulled into the side of the train.  And by keeping people away from the edge, it makes getting pushed off the edge in a crowd, or a drunk stumbling off it late at night, much less likely.

[kvp]

What if you're under that when it comes down?

 

There are 3 slots. Two for moving the wire arrays, the 3rd seems like an IR frence to detect if anyone is in their way when they are moving or trying to climb through the lowered arrays.

 

this style of gate will be hard to model in n scale!

 

I really like this style, because it doesn't obstructs the view as much. Actually it would be easy to model, if the two arrays are printed on transparent plastic, then mounted on stiff rods (covered by the posts). The two sections are going up to the same height, so if the slots are cut so one could not go all the way down but the rods are the same length under the table, tehen if you push all rods up with a flat surface then they will raise up to the same height and the lower one will start sooner, since its rods are hanging down more. The weight of the rods should be able to pull them down once the plate is lowered. It's a lot of work, but it can be done without special tools. The pusher plate could be replaced with two servo motors connected to horizontal rods each moving half of the vertical rods. This would mean that instead of gravity, the servos could pull down the arrays to close them.

 

Personally I don't like platform doors, they are ugly and block the view and for anyone modelling the current epoch they are a serious problem.

 

Another problem is that if opaque platforms doors become a standard, then the under window sripes will die out, since there is no use for them if people can't see them before boarding. The solution for that could be to use transparent doors. My idea for that would be to install overlapping clear glass panels, with mechanisms under the floor and add door indicator rfid tags under each door, so the platform could detect which panels to shift when a train stops. This would automatically adapt to the door layout and length of each train. Now this would be even more hard to model, but would look much better.

Edited December 9, 2013 by kvp