Talk:List of urban rail systems by length

How was this list defined as to qualify and define the length? (and I am sure it should be spelt lenth not lenght)

I would think that by almost any definition Sydney's Cityrail would have enough kilometres to beat some of the entries on this list

Los Angeles and San Francisco Problems

Most of the Los Angeles length here is not urban rail in the sense of the others (undergrounds, subways and metros). The rest is tram or light rail. Needs to be fixed (from one who was there at the creation as a member of the Los Angeles County Transportation Commission). Below there is indication that this list includes light rail. No, for the most part it does not. A bit of clarity would help... Light rail or trams belongs in its own article. Any yes, Paris RER and Sydney Cityrail are really commuter rail systems, not metros, though they are high-end commuter rail systems.

San Francisco's BART deserves to be on the list. It is a metro as much as any other on the list.

-Demographia

Berlin data

All matters of semantics. The term subway is often used to denote an entire Metro system, such as NY or Washington, where the system is sometimes in subway, sometimes elevated and sometimes on the surface... but never are there grade crossings. Same for the London underground. This is the principal charateristic of a Metro. Thus, metros may operate above, below or on the ground. The Paris metro, for example, has a long elevated section on Line 2.

In in the broad sense of the term, Sydney does not have a subway, but its Cityrail commuter rail system operates in subway configuration in the downtown area.....

Sources for the length of the rail systems in Berlin: for Berlin U-Bahn and Tram see this PDF file at bvg.de, for Berlin S-Bahn see link. --FlorianB 8 July 2005 15:02 (UTC)

This is, was, and will be, a List of ONLY Subway or Elebvate Metropolitan Railway Systems. to the definition of a Subway you can read here:

http://www.urbanrail.net/about.htm

What is a metro? A subway? An underground? *1) An urban electric mass rail transport system, i.e. it is primarily used to move within the city *2) Totally independent from other traffic, rail or street traffic *3) High frequency service (maximum interval approx. 10 minutes during normal daytime service)

Obviously a metro does not have to be underground (this is why I prefer this term to 'subway' or 'underground' or 'U-Bahn' as all these terms imply a tunnel), it can also be elevated or at grade. A metro does not necessarily use heavy rail technology, therefore the Docklands Light Railway or the Lille VAL are full metro services, with the only difference that their capacity is smaller according to the needs of the city/area they serve. It's also irrelevant whether the metro runs on steel wheels or rubber tyres, is monorail or conventional double rail, uses third rail power supply or overhead wire, is fully automated or has a driver, has standard, narrow or broad gauge.

There are many mixed forms nowadays and probably there will be even more in the future. In Europe (especially Germany and the Benelux) light rail systems (Stadtbahn, Premetro) have been bridging the gap between metros and trams for some decades now and provide, in most cases, a perfect service in their city. For the time being I can only cover these mixed systems (which I'd like to refer to as metroTrams) in Europe only, although also in America and Asia more and more networks of this kind are being built.

Sydney don't have a Subway.

About Berlin...same answer the S-Bahn and the Tramways AREN'T Subway Systems.

BTW Paris with Subway+RER+Tramways have 200 km more than Berlin!

But you can open, and i will be happy to help you, a page where there are a list of all the city with the total km/miles of ALL the Urban Railways of any typologies that run above and underground.

have a nice day.

Ok, the introduction is better now, although I find it still way to confusing what is included on the list and what is not. But still, Berlin S-Bahn is exactly what you stated, you just need to read the first paragraph of its article! It is an integrated system together with the U-Bahn. So I will add it again. The only difference is that U-Bahn is mostly underground and S-Bahn is mostly elevated (and partly underground). --FlorianB 17:03, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

i'm not agree. the S-Bahn in the whole Germany are Commuters Lines. this is a page with ONLY subway/metropolitan systems. if you included the Berlin S-Bahn someone will can adjoint also the RER of Paris, that is on surface, but for the most part in the municipality of Paris underground! some other will adjoint the Path of New York city that is completely underground. Some other (me?) will can adjoint the S-Lines of Milano that have the 80% of the tracks undrground inside the Milano's border. some other will can write something about the Ferrovie Metropolitane of Roma and Napoli that run underground for more than 15/20 km with dozens of stations!

but...all thats are Commuters Railways, that are not Subways! The 10 S Lines of Milano run underground in the city every 2.5 minutes for 18 hours each days! for 12 km on the line S10 with a dozen of stations. is the SAME thing of a Subway, but no-one consider that as!

the same thing is for Berlin. Btw....why the underground lines are called U-Bahn and the elevated ones S-Bahn? cause the first one are a Subway System inside the city. the second one are an elevated system for the commuters of the Berlin Metropolitan Area. the same thing happened in Milano with the distinction between Metropolitana and S-Line. the same thing happende in Spain where there are Metropolitans and RENFE (the Commuters Railways that have a lenght that in Madrid is BIGGER THAN BERLIN!) the same in Paris, NY, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Barcelona, Moscow, London....

you are the only one that one adjoint the Commuters Line to Berlin. no other one in that months did that with other cities!!!

do you want read that Berlin HAVE THE BIGGEST SUBWAY SYSTEM OF THE WORLD?

OK.

READ IT.

ALONE.

I'm going to move the L.A. Metro system higher on the list, seeing as the Metro rail article lists the system length at 118km, and the system seems to fit the criteria listed above. BlueDrew 06:26, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

San Francisco BART

Could we really consider the BART system in San Francisco as a subway ? In many aspects it is closer to Berlin S-Bahn than to the subways as we imagine them. Well, all this is subjective and a matter of convention I guess... Metropolitan 4:17 (CET)

New York Subway

Corrected the data for the New York Subway to reflect "Route" distance rather then the "track" length as previously shown. All other networks are listed by "route" length.
Why the number goes from 400km to 1000km just in weeks?

re-corrected NY data. this is a list by lebnght and not by tracks. NY Subway have more than 600 miles of tracks, but a half parte are parallel tracks fpr the express service, along the normal service.

please do not change for that 20th times the NY data.

Laon

Where would you put the Poma 2000 of Laon ? 208.46.78.226 00:18, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

1) An urban electric mass rail transport system, i.e. it is primarily used to move within the city

• YES - Inside Laon, between the railway station and the city hall
  

2) Totally independent from other traffic, rail or street traffic

• YES - rubber tyre system on metallic track
  

3) High frequency service (maximum interval approx. 10 minutes during normal daytime service)

• YES - 2mn 30 headway

the Poma is a Mini-Metro system, so it isn't a subway. it can be cosider as a People Mover, not sure as a subway!

Bombay

read: Mumbai#Transport should it be included as it is? It is just a normal commuter railway which the article says it should be excluded.---Pedro 10:47, 30 April 2006 (UTC)

i've cancelled Mumbay from the list. it is a Suburban commuter railway system and not a subway system. on Wikipedia there is a well did page on Mumbay trasportation.

Paris

pleas don't wrote again the RER close to Paris in the list. it is well wrote on the intro that this is only a subway list and that the Rer of Paris, the German S-Bahn and similar aren't counted. thanks

How is it a problem to clarify that the RER isn't counted ? More than 60 km of the central RER network is underground. The central RER network is fully independent, each lines being operated in dedicated tunnels. Many travellers are believing wrongly that it's part of the metro system. Clarifying that the RER is excluded from the figures only makes the list more transparent. I fail to see what's the point in hiding such an information. Furthermore, please learn to sign your messages while posting on discussion pages. Thanks. [User:Metropolitan|Metropolitan] 16:49 10 may 2006 (UTC)

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YOU can open a new page about RER, and will write how many times that Paris have a long, long Rer network. but NOT HERE. that page is ONLY about SUBWAY.

in the Intro there is wrote in a clear way and there is wrote that the RER of Paris, as many other simila system as the one of Germany, SPain, Ityaly...aren't interestdf by this list. German S-Bahn, Renfe in Spain, S Lines in Milan, FR in Roma have all network really similar as lenght to RER, and ALL runs underground in the citycentres. BUT NO ONE WROTE NOTHING ABOUT ITS....cause that list is O N L Y...A B O U T ....S U B W A Y ...

i can't believe.....

MILAN

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I noticed one little mistake: Milan has only three subway lines already operating, not four. Line 4, 5 AND 6 are only planned or in pre-building stage. The north branch of the line 1 in future may become the line 7, but now it's still part of the M1.

on the main underground corridor of Passante Ferroviario (11 Km) there is a line called S10 and other 4 lines that run inside evry 4-5 minutes. it's a subway service.

SI units and English units both PLEASE!!!

I've done conversions before for wikipedia, but someone comes along and says conversions are off. Turns out my conversions were not off, the original numbers were English units converted and rounded to SI. I know we are lazy Americans, but please use both units. I'd rather use SI units too, newtons are a lot easier than ft-pds, but I've used the English system most of my life, it is just easier for me, and others to visualize.

Corrections to Istanbul's Data

I made the correction to Istanbul's data. New length excludes suburban rail system (72 km total acc. to Urbanrail) Urbanrail's data wasn't updated and doesn't include the newly opened lines. For the map, http://www.istanbul-ulasim.com.tr/harita/IstanbulHarita.pdf

Sorry, i must reverted your edit. See on the end of the article, what is not included. Suburban rail lines is exact that (like RER in Paris or German S-Bahns). --Jklamo 21:57, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Suburban rail system, which is under state's rail company's authority, isn't included in the 52 km as I wrote above though! Just the suburban rail system by itself is 72 km, from Halkali to Gebze. With the finish of Marmaray project though, underground metro trains will work on those systems just like it does in Athenes. But, as I said in my first paragraph, acc. to municipality's web site, without suburban rail, there are 52 km rail system in Istanbul. Mayor said 50% of city's budget goes to transportation projects in Istanbul. If he is not lying, hopefully 52 km will increase soon. I guess that answers your concern. I'll change it back, however please correct it again if I made a mistake somewhere else.

Portland, OR

Portland, Oregon's MAX line should be on this list.

Oh, also, the person screaming about the S-Bahn in Berlin is only partially correct. Take a look at a map -- there is a big S-Bahn line running straight through the city (a line which also takes the RB and ICE trains). I assure you that that line is FAR more critical to the city's transportation network than the U2 past Schoenhauser Allee. Oh, and the Ringbahn. That thing is critical too, and is entirely within the city. Zweifel 07:02, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Manchester, United Kingdom

I think a few of you should look at this line, it has a central street running zone incorporated with roads, traffic and lights, etc. Yet it also runs through suburbs on the extremities of the track.

I'm no expert on trains and railed transport, but this is definately an urban rail system in my eyes.

it currently has a main line from Altrincham to Bury and a second line from Piccadilly (centre of the Altrincham-Bury line) down to Eccles. The main use of this rapid transit system is essentially commuting to and from work in the city centre, however, the lazy ones also use this for getting around the commercial area of Manchester going between shops.

Link to their main site, happy updating! [1] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.135.162.192 (talk) 17:20, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Berlin combines S-Bahn & U-Bahn

Berlins urban rail system combines two major networks creating a single one-fare-metro-system. Unlike previous discussions suggests, the S-Bahn is not a commuter rail, like the RER in France. The Berlin-Brandenburg regional/commuter service would be the RE or RB. The Berlin S-Bahn is primarily serving the administrative territory of the city forming together with the U-Bahn a single metro system. A single ticket allows to use this highly integrated system. Unlike commuter services the S-Bahn is also scheduled every 10 min (typical metro criteria). The integrated system will therefore rank the combined rail length of 477 km. Annex: The inclusion of the S-Bahn rail length is based on the articles´ name (List of urban rail systems by length (section)) and its first paragraph describing the nature of the S-Bahn accurately.

Sorry but I beg to differ. The Berlin S-bahn is exactly like the Paris RER. Actually, trains frequency is higher on the Paris RER than it is on Berlin S-bahn, reaching intervals as low as 90 seconds between trains on central part of line A. Another thing is that various S-bahn lines share tracks on the city center of Berlin whereas all RER lines run on dedicated tracks, almost exclusively underground, in the Paris city center. And similarly as in Berlin, with a single ticket, you can switch between metro and RER lines in Paris. As a matter of fact, the busiest urban rail line in Paris (and also in the western world for the matter) is the RER A. If you consider Berlin S-bahn to be part of the city's urban rail network, then, there's absolutely no reason whatsoever to exclude the RER from Paris urban rail network. For which silly reason would you believe that 76.5 km of the RER network are built underground if that would be otherwise?

As for the administrative limits. They mean nothing. Most of Berlin urban area are within the 892 km² of the city of Berlin, whereas the 105 km² of the city of Paris (Boulogne and Vincennes woods included) represents only 5% of the Paris urban area. If one day it would be decided to enlarge the city of Paris to encompass the inner suburbs, would the RER become a subway all of sudden to you?

But anyway, as a matter of fact, the double level system U-bahn/S-bahn or metro/RER has proven to be vastly superior to the in-between system such as what could be found in London. Granted London tops a ranking list on the internet, but its system trying to combine local services and express services is definitly less user-friendly than are double level systems such as in Paris, Berlin, but also Tokyo. Metropolitan 01:46, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

The pro S-Bahn argumentation picks up some misinterpretations in previous discussions (Berlin data). The RER was an example (maybe some similarities to the S-Bahn exist). The points you raised does´nt seem to change the conclusion. By the way, the administrative territory is an important measure, what else?