Australian Autonomous Train is Being Called The 'World's Largest Robot' (sciencealert.com)

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Australian Autonomous Train is Being Called The 'World's Largest Robot' (sciencealert.com)

Posted by msmash on Tuesday January 1, 2019 @05:01AM from the how-about-that dept.

schwit1 shares a report: Mining corporation Rio Tinto says that an autonomous rail system called AutoHaul that it's been developing in the remote Pilbara region of Australia for several years is now entirely operational -- an accomplishment the company says makes the system the "world's largest robot." "It's been a challenging journey to automate a rail network of this size and scale in a remote location like the Pilbara," Rio Tinto's managing director Ivan Vella told the Sydney Morning Herald, "but early results indicate significant potential to improve productivity, providing increased system flexibility and reducing bottlenecks." The ore-hauling train is just one part of an ambitious automation project involving robotics and driverless vehicles that Rio Tinto wants to use to automate its mining operations. The company conducted its first test of the train without a human on board last year, and it now claims that the system has completed more than a million kilometers (620,000 miles) of autonomous travel.

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AutoHaul? by Red_Forman · 2019-01-01 05:07 · Score: 1

Mining corporation Rio Tinto says that an autonomous rail system called AutoHaul that it's been developing in the remote Pilbara region of Australia for several years is now entirely operational.
And it has a built-in autonomous washing system called AutoWash, though the engineers refer to it as "Leeloominaï Lekatariba Lamina-Tchaï Ekbat De Sebat" for some reason.
The Dark Tower... by The+Original+CDR · 2019-01-01 05:13 · Score: 1

It's Baine the Mono!
Why is biggest interesting? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-01 05:17 · Score: 1

I'd be more impressed if it was the smartest. But that's probably harder to prove.
And it's a train, right? On rails? So it does't even have to steer. Just start and stop and the right places.
"challenging"? by DogDude · 2019-01-01 05:20 · Score: 4, Insightful

What the hell is so challenging about automating trains? I can't believe train conductors are still a thing, and they're still crashing trains. What's simpler to automate than a train? The tracks are fixed. There are very few tracks or trains in any system. The trains can only go two directions on the tracks. Why aren't all trains automated by now?

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1. Re:"challenging"? by b0s0z0ku · 2019-01-01 05:28 · Score: 1
  
  Nit to pick: "Conductor" is the person opening the doors and taking tickets, or "managing" a freight train. "Driver", "engineer", or "motorman" is the person actually driving the thing.
  As far as automation, it doesn't hurt to have a set of eyes out front if there's a person on the tracks or a car about to get stuck in a level crossing.
2. Re:"challenging"? by schwit1 · 2019-01-01 05:46 · Score: 1
  
  Unions, from the original Article
  "The Autohaul program has drawn the ire of unions worried about its impact on train driver jobs but the company said it had not made any forced redundancies and did not expect to make any in 2019."
3. Re:"challenging"? by Nkwe · 2019-01-01 06:01 · Score: 1
  
  Driving a train is literally just "speed up" and "slow down". That's it. Why is taking so long to automate train drivers away?
  It's knowing when to speed up and more importantly slow down. It's detecting that there is something on the tracks that shouldn't be (and slowing down if so.) Granted obstacle detection is likely simpler than for a car, since the train follows a limited path and you don't need near as many "maps" that define what "normal" is as you would for automobile automation, but you still need to detect if you should perform an unscheduled stop. Driving a train also involves monitoring the mechanical performance - reporting problems (and maybe stopping the train) if there are issues with the engine or breaks. A human driver would notice the sound and maybe feel the vibrations caused by a stuck break, broken coupling, or various engine problems. I am not saying that automation could not include audio, force, and vibration monitoring, but they are not necessarily trivial, and are more than just speeding up and slowing down at preset points along the route.
4. Re:"challenging"? by Mr307 · 2019-01-01 06:08 · Score: 1
  
  A sensor breaks down or just reports wrong values somewhere or some 'simple' logic in the programming doesn't cover an infinite number of 'unforeseeable circumstances' the new better and cheaper than a human robot will cause an accident as well.
  This is nothing new in engineering, human failures in imagination have caused innumerable disasters over history
  Cue someone coming in and blithely saying 'but bounds checking and error control you eediot11!!', and the answer is you cannot foresee all the possibilities, its not a controlled lab, even then surprising problems can arise that were not even considered in planning.
  Yes yes 99.99% of it will be ironed out, and I have no doubt it will be very reliable but an accident will still happen where human interaction could have prevented it.
5. Re:"challenging"? by Mr307 · 2019-01-01 06:15 · Score: 1
  
  Was just thinking about this some more, and I dont know if the average commercial or custom robot control system is hardened to external bit shifts, that happens often enough to be a worry.
6. Re: "challenging"? by orlanz · 2019-01-01 06:39 · Score: 1
  
  Because it's the real world, that's why.
  People fear automation as the next big thing that will take their jobs. But it isn't. It's been the thing that can take their jobs for atleast the last 50 years. It just hasn't for non-technical reasons. Technical ability has the most say in why something isn't automated but the least say in why something IS automated.
  When I audit business processes, I see atleast 3/5 positions or stages that could have been replaced by automation 10-20 years ago.
  Forget my personal experience, just look at something as common, standard, and ancient as "construction". You will see a various levels of automation across the world. Things that have been automated decades ago in one part of the world are still manual in another.
  Why something isn't automated is a combination of various reasons. Some of which are societal aversion/fear, risk of change, inability to commit, economic instability, lack of resources, expense to humanize, loss of (social) power, unreal expectations, etc. And that's ignoring all the obvious reasons not to automate; no money, no local knowledge, cheaper labor, laws & regulations, number of requirements, etc.
  The story here isn't what specifically was automated, but how big of an operation was automated. It's news worthy because the scale of the operation & the size of the economic impact can be easily grasped by the common man. Doesn't hurt that it can be cheaply headlined about the largest robot; stirring all kinds of visuals in the human imagination.
7. Re:"challenging"? by Aighearach · 2019-01-01 07:02 · Score: 1
  
  Trains can't actually stop for stuff on the tracks. They stop too slowly. They stop after hitting something regardless of when you start applying the brakes. They have to stop so the authorities can do the required investigation, but the stopping distance/reaction time rarely matters.
  Knowing when to speed up and slow down is done by reading the speed signs along the route, and hopefully following them. Accidents happen because they were ignoring the signs; either due to being macho assholes, or being distracted.
  Computers are hard to distract, and are rarely programmed to be macho.
8. Re:"challenging"? by Aighearach · 2019-01-01 07:06 · Score: 1
  
  the answer is you cannot foresee all the possibilities, its not a controlled lab, even then surprising problems can arise that were not even considered in planning.
  There is nothing you can do about possibilities that were unforeseen. Trains don't react fast enough for that to even be a thing. You would absolutely need planning for the human in the train to be able to do anything to solve some sort of problem.
9. Re:"challenging"? by Mr307 · 2019-01-01 07:53 · Score: 1
  
  the answer is you cannot foresee all the possibilities, its not a controlled lab, even then surprising problems can arise that were not even considered in planning.
  There is nothing you can do about possibilities that were unforeseen. Trains don't react fast enough for that to even be a thing. You would absolutely need planning for the human in the train to be able to do anything to solve some sort of problem.
  And I consider that a perfect example of lack of imagination, you are suggesting that there is 'nothing ever' that could be done? Certainly if it was the best robot 'AI' today then I agree, but a human can do orders of magnitude more than the best AI today let alone a good expert system robot.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
10. Re: "challenging"? by Chris+Mattern · 2019-01-01 08:46 · Score: 1
  
  People fear automation as the next big thing that will take their jobs. But it isn't. It's been the thing that can take their jobs for atleast the last 50 years.
  Try 250 years. Used to be almost everybody worked in agriculture, because that was the only way mankind could feed itself, and even then it wasn't enough now and then. Farm machinery eliminated the vast majority of those jobs, making it so that only a small percentage of the population could easily keep the rest fed. (yes, there are still famines, but they can always be traced back to political problems keeping agriculture or distribution from working properly. The world easily makes enough food to keep everyone well fed. While doomsayers hold forth the possibility of future food shortages because of environmental problems and may be right, the world makes plenty of food right now)
11. Re:"challenging"? by b0s0z0ku · 2019-01-01 08:48 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  If the train slows down even by 25%, kinetic energy is approximately halved. Also, slowing down even a bit might give whatever is on the tracks more time to move out of the way.
12. Re:"challenging"? by thegarbz · 2019-01-01 09:42 · Score: 1
  
  What the hell is so challenging about automating trains?
  
  The effect of failure causes an immediate and very high risk to safety and lives. Especially an iron ore train. Rio Tinto's competitor BHP has only recently shown what needed to be done when a the automation fails: https://www.abc.net.au/news/20... After forcing the train to derail the result was 1.5km of damaged railway and a huge mess to clean up, combined with a lot of luck that in this remote part of Australia it's possible to derail a train without injuring people.
  There are many automation projects for trains. They almost always represent short loop runs without any complicated network logic to manage. e.g. Paris Metro line 14.
13. Re:"challenging"? by gravewax · 2019-01-01 11:06 · Score: 1
  
  These are Ore trains weighing upwards of 30,000 tonnes. No driver can stop that in time regardless of what they see on the track.
14. Re:"challenging"? by gravewax · 2019-01-01 11:32 · Score: 1
  
  far more likely for an automated system whose concentration doesn't lapse over long hours of monotonous travel and who can monitor hundreds of items independently to react faster when needed.
15. Re:"challenging"? by aberglas · 2019-01-01 12:21 · Score: 1
  
  An object weighing gigatons has gigatons of weight on its wheels to help it stop, assuming that it has decent brakes on each axel. It is not harder or easier for a big object to stop than a small one.
  Now, a faster object is quite a different matter. Ships are a bit different due to the nature of their friction.
16. Re:"challenging"? by Mr307 · 2019-01-01 13:31 · Score: 1
  
  Again, complete lack of imagination, the fact that you can put forward of 1 scenario out of an infinite supply of them is nonsense, the point of what i'm saying is that a human is much more capable of handling random problems, certainly we can get robotic control to some number of 9's, for the routine operation 99.99% who knows but something out of the ordinary happens 1/10000 then the computer at best can just brake, report a failure and stop.
  And pay attention, i'm not arguing against computer controlled trains, just that its far from the trivial 'challenging?' the OP started with, thats all.
17. Re:"challenging"? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-01 14:26 · Score: 1
  
  Brakes don't work by applying weight to the axles, you know that right?
18. Re:"challenging"? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-01 14:58 · Score: 1
  
  go back to first grade maths. Learn about mass and braking and surface area. Hint, they are restricted to the surface area touching the tracks to brake, when you have 30,000 tons of momentum you aren't stopping as fast as a train with 1 ton no matter how mazing your fairy land physics is.
19. Re:"challenging"? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-01 15:07 · Score: 1
  
  The amusing part of your comment is saying ships are different, It is the same fucking problem. The friction between the train wheels and track is limited and therefore the amount of braking you can apply is also limited as mass and momentum increases so does the distance for braking as the surface area between the tracks and wheels does not change with weight.
20. Re:"challenging"? by Type44Q · 2019-01-01 16:30 · Score: 1
  
  Why aren't all trains automated by now?
  Your question is a microcosm for all the idiocy behind the self-driving push.
  By the way, the answer to your [rhetorically-intended] question is "Exactly."
21. Re:"challenging"? by onkelonkel · 2019-01-01 19:16 · Score: 2
  
  You don't actually know anything about trains, and talking based on intuition isn't working. Big freight trains have ridiculously long stopping distances. A 20k ton ore train will need damn near 2 miles to stop from 55 mph on level ground. The notion that a train driver could see something on the tracks and stop or even slow down enough to make a difference is entirely incorrect. A stuck brake (spelling matters) is not going to make vibrations that a driver can feel. A broken coupling will cause the train to separate, followed immediately by the train (air brake) line separating, followed thereafter by the train stopping as the pressure in the brake line drops to zero and all the brakes come on. Engines and also generator/alternators and traction motors are already instrumented and alarmed, and an automated system can be programmed to handle most faults.
  
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22. Re: "challenging"? by gravewax · 2019-01-01 23:36 · Score: 1
  
  A person is limited by their vision and hearing. anything in earshot or visual range of a human is already to close to be stopped for, their simply isn't time. I would much prefer a robot/computer in those situations as they would have a chance to detect the situation long before a human could and certainly react faster. The reality is on a train you really have only 3 things you can do, slow down/stop (can take a few kilometres to do), speed up or send a signal.
23. Re: "challenging"? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-01 23:54 · Score: 1
  
  There are actually a shit load of reasons. obviously a fully loaded train brakes massively differently to an unloaded one, but I am assuming you mean length providing the difference in weight. Braking between carriages will not be uniform/consistent due to a range of factors (wear/heat/weight distribution etc), this results in additional force being transmitted to the other carriages. The more carriages you have the less efficient your brakes becomes thus extending the braking distance. These trains are over 200 carriages long and braking is a well planned exercise over many kilometres.
24. Re:"challenging"? by mjwx · 2019-01-02 01:51 · Score: 1
  
  What the hell is so challenging about automating trains? I can't believe train conductors are still a thing, and they're still crashing trains. What's simpler to automate than a train? The tracks are fixed. There are very few tracks or trains in any system. The trains can only go two directions on the tracks. Why aren't all trains automated by now?
  One crashed earlier this year.
  
  Having lived up there the challenge is in both the distance they have to travel, the sheer length and weight of the train as well as the method of loading.
  
  The trains are travelling through the most inhospitable places on earth. Unlike most other automated trains these are not well fenced in self contained units within easy reach of a control team. The trains will travel 400+ KM though areas that can get in excess of 40 degrees in the day and can have a temperature variance of 30 degrees between night an day. That tends to have quite and effect on iron rails. Beyond this, you have the Australian wildlife. Kangaroo's are common up there, imagine a moose that stands upright, jumps and is easily spooked.
  
  The trains in question are 200-300 ore cars pulled by up to 9 locomotives (3 is typical for the Rio Tinto trains). The cargo weighs in at 25,000 tons and they easily exceed 2 KM in length. They can also take up to 9 KM to stop from their usual speed of around 100 KPH. So you've got a train that weighs over 25,000 tons and is 9 KM long to manage and control.
  
  Finally, the trains are loaded 1-10 cars at a time depending on how the mine is set up. The train will need to keep track of loaded and unloaded cars. Compared to the previous two, this is really the least challenging to automate but trains often make several stops at different sites.
  
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25. Re:"challenging"? by geoscodin · 2019-01-02 02:25 · Score: 1
  
  I agree with having an extra set of eyes, but typically a car stuck on the tracks is going to be hit simply because of how long it takes to stop a train, The average freight train is about 1 to 1.25 miles in length (90 to 120 rail cars). When it's moving at 55 MPH, it can take a mile or more to stop after the locomotive engineer fully applies the emergency brake. An 8-car passenger train moving at 80 MPH needs about a mile to stop.
26. Re:"challenging"? by jbengt · 2019-01-02 02:51 · Score: 1
  
  Conductors do more than collect tickets and open and close doors. They're responsible for safety. For example, when our commuter train comes to a dysfunctional crossing gate (stuck open) we can't pass, but the conductor will get out, close the crossing gate by hande, the train will pass and stop, the conductor will open the gate and get back on. Conductors will also inspect brakes, etc.
  Also, engineers do more than starting and stopping the train. Traditionally, they're responsible for taking care of the engine and other mechanical issues in the locomotive.
  There are also more people involved, such as the dispatchers that are responsible for positions of the switches & schedules and keeping trains from colliding.
  That said, it does seem that the actual starting, stopping, and switching of the train could be automated relatively easily.
27. Re:"challenging"? by jbengt · 2019-01-02 02:54 · Score: 1
  
  Driving a train is literally just "speed up" and "slow down".
  Said the Slashdot AC suffering from the Dunning-Kruger effect.
28. Re:"challenging"? by jbengt · 2019-01-02 03:04 · Score: 1
  
  . . . there is nothing about running a train that hasn't been solved thousand times over before. Can you even comprehend how many safety critical systems are being built every damn day?
  Yes, this has all been worked out before, and there are still train crashes and derailments. And now you want to start almost from scratch and redesign all the safety critical systems for trains to be fully automatic with no human intervention, and you think that will automatically solve problems that cause crashes and derailments.
29. Re:"challenging"? by CanadianMacFan · 2019-01-02 03:36 · Score: 1
  
  But you won't have engineers exceeding the speed limit causing the train to derail such as this one where the train was going 80 mph in a 30 mph zone.
30. Re:"challenging"? by ceoyoyo · 2019-01-02 04:56 · Score: 1
  
  Most safety critical systems on trains ARE fully automatic.
  About 75% of train accidents are due to human error. The situation is similar with aircraft.
Better metrics needed by Nkwe · 2019-01-01 05:38 · Score: 3, Insightful

While a million automated kilometers (of automated operation) may sound impressive in a headline, I doubt that the statistic really means anything. For a train running on a track, the distance traveled isn't very interesting, particularly if the track runs through the middle of nowhere. I would think statistics on numbers of automation decisions made would be more useful, particularly decisions that would have otherwise been made by a human operator. Perhaps statistics on number of grade crossings (where roads cross the tracks) traversed; counts on how many times the train sounded the warning horn, slowed down or stopped, because there were animals or people on the tracks; statistics on how the automation handled other abnormal events such as sticking breaks, loss of cargo, or other mechanical failures.
1. Re:Better metrics needed by guruevi · 2019-01-01 05:53 · Score: 1
  
  A robot operator does all that a lot better. Detecting obstructions and mechanical failures is a lot better with the right sensors. And even so, for a train it doesn't matter much what is on the tracks, by the time it's detected it's probably too late.
  
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2. Re:Better metrics needed by Nkwe · 2019-01-01 06:18 · Score: 1
  
  A robot operator does all that a lot better. Detecting obstructions and mechanical failures is a lot better with the right sensors. And even so, for a train it doesn't matter much what is on the tracks, by the time it's detected it's probably too late.
  I don't disagree. My point is that to make the argument for automation, more meaningful statistics should be used.
Big deal by rsilvergun · 2019-01-01 05:41 · Score: 1

does it have beam sabres?

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Re:Why is everything a robot? by MightyYar · 2019-01-01 05:52 · Score: 1

Why is everything a robot? Because we've entered the future where they are becoming ubiquitous. This train is far more autonomous than the pre-programmed "robot" arms of the 1960s.

--
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Important Details by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-01 05:53 · Score: 1

This company has 400(!) train drivers with some making $240,000/Yr.(!)
They claim to have not let anyone go(forced redundancies), yet. But, no company is going to continue paying $50million per year if they don't have to.
I'm amazed that a train driver(engineer) is paid so much. I'm amazed that they have 400 drivers for 200 trains.
I'm wondering how people will find 400 such highly paid jobs in the near future and forever after.
1. Re:Important Details by VeryFluffyBunny · 2019-01-01 06:33 · Score: 1
  
  That's $170,000 USD & what that's worth depends on where you live. Also, bear in mind that the drivers/engineers spend a lot of time on trains travelling through the Australian outback. I bet it's a boring, lonely, & highly-skilled job. At least if you work on an oil-rig at sea, you have a large-ish crew, entertainment, cafeteria, etc.. I can't imagine the trains are very well equipped.
  
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2. Re:Important Details by AbRASiON · 2019-01-01 08:50 · Score: 1
  
  RIO Tinto does mining almost in the middle of nowhere, true dessert / wilderness stuff. The trek is probably at least 2 days if not 3 or 4 solid to get back to civilisation.
  These guys with a little upskilling will be able to do a 'normal' train driver job (again?) which may be a downgrade of a full 50%, but it's still high paying work.
  With the insanely off the chart, ridiculous immigration ponzi Australia is running, surely the major cities are hiring more and more train drivers? Right?.... Surely...
3. Re:Important Details by gravewax · 2019-01-01 11:23 · Score: 1
  
  $50 million is only a part of what it costs them. many are FIFO workers, they have flight and accommodation costs as well as all the training, you are probably looking at 75-100million a year.
I think I read the ending to this by Urinal+Pube · 2019-01-01 06:57 · Score: 1

Have they named it Blaine yet?
Re:Why is everything a robot? by Sique · 2019-01-01 07:45 · Score: 3, Informative

Actually, the term robot is much older and can be traced back to the czech author Karel apek and his 1920 play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots). The czech term roboti means "workers" or "slaves".
Everything else is just semantics. Do a mechanical robot have to look like a human, or is it enough if the robot autonomously does the job he was designed for?

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Re:Why is everything a robot? by Sique · 2019-01-01 07:46 · Score: 1

Sorry. Slashcode ate the C with the hacek on it.

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Re:Why is everything a robot? by MightyYar · 2019-01-01 08:08 · Score: 1

Yeah, if you want to go back to origins, his "robots" were artificial biological life forms engineered to serve humanity - so we have no robots by that definition.

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Automated Driving to the Aussies by fluffernutter · 2019-01-01 08:20 · Score: 3, Interesting

It's kind of funny. While American companies fuss with the uphill battle and endless stream of edge cases that self-driving represents, the Australians will be collecting reams of useful test data because it is a case that is fully realizable and profitable. Seems they are more interested in building on top of demonstrable successes rather than making empty promises.

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1. Re:Automated Driving to the Aussies by thegarbz · 2019-01-02 03:04 · Score: 1
  
  What are you talking about. There's a world of difference between autonomous cars making a decision on the go on public roads, and a set of carriages able to chose between going forwards or backwards along a 1700km of straight tracks with a couple of privately controlled and operated intersections.
2. Re:Automated Driving to the Aussies by fluffernutter · 2019-01-02 03:31 · Score: 1
  
  Exactly. A train has a reasonably digestible subset of basic AI that a car would need. Get that right first and you're well on your way to going onto, maybe a bus on a closed track, then a bus on an open track, then self driving cars.
  
  Putting it another way, painting the Mona Lisa won't make you Leonardo Di Vinci. You have to start with the basics and work up.
  
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3. Re:Automated Driving to the Aussies by thegarbz · 2019-01-03 00:47 · Score: 1
  
  And just when should good old Leo stop playing with his basics? We have fully autonomous rail systems all over the world and have had so for many years.
Not quite ready for prime time by BeaverCleaver · 2019-01-01 09:03 · Score: 3, Informative

A "semi autonomous" large ore train had to be deliberately derailed in November, because it was actually less destructive than letting it continue driving and come close to the "real" rail network or civilisation.
More info at https://www.abc.net.au/news/20...
So it's probably too early to claim success for autonomous trains, even though, as stated by earlier posters above, an autonomous train in the outback is a much easier challenge than one in the city. Far fewer level crossings, obstacles or pedestrians.

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1. Re:Not quite ready for prime time by OzPeter · 2019-01-01 10:41 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  A "semi autonomous" large ore train had to be deliberately derailed in November, because it was actually less destructive than letting it continue driving and come close to the "real" rail network or civilisation.
  More info at https://www.abc.net.au/news/20...
  So it's probably too early to claim success for autonomous trains, even though, as stated by earlier posters above, an autonomous train in the outback is a much easier challenge than one in the city. Far fewer level crossings, obstacles or pedestrians.
  Where in that article does it even mention semi-autonomous? The article talks bout a driver getting out of the cab and the train taking off. Nothing to do with the Rio Tinto trains.
  
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2. Re:Not quite ready for prime time by gravewax · 2019-01-01 11:11 · Score: 1
  
  That was a HUMAN driven train and the incident seems to have resulted from HUMAN error though the investigation is still underway. If anything this proves the need for this system, humans make mistakes.
3. Re:Not quite ready for prime time by BeaverCleaver · 2019-01-01 19:54 · Score: 1
  
  OP here. Yes, that might have been where I got mixed up. I guess you could say the BHP crash was remotely instigated, although the original reason it had to be crashed at all was human (driver) error.
  
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4. Re:Not quite ready for prime time by houghi · 2019-01-01 22:59 · Score: 1
  
  Not sure how it is where you live. I go by train every day from one city to another. There are almost no crossings anymore, because it IS in a civilized world. The crossings that exist and are not able to turn into a bridge or a tunnel are all guearded and if somebody is stupid enough to cross it, the only thing a train driver can do is close his eyes and hoot the horn.
  More crossings are in the middle of nowhere, so out there it would be harder than in towns. The number of crossings is not that relevant. What they need to do is look if something is on the tracks or not. If there is, hoot the horn and break.
  This can be done better by a robot than by a human who would be blinded by the sun or unable to see due to fog or just looking away for a second, because he is a human.
  The speed and what not are already determined by external factors. He is told how fast he is going and where he needs to stop and when he can move on.
  And remember we are talking about a train, not a tram. Stopping for an idiot who ignores lights and crosses right in front of them is not possible. Not by a computer. Not by a human. Just not possible, unless they change the laws of physics.
  One thing where it would be even easier is many closed cirquid(sp?) tracks, like a metro. No idea why they have not yet been all automated yet. Or at least made them remote controlled, so a human can drive 3 or 4 at the same time.
  
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5. Re:Not quite ready for prime time by thegarbz · 2019-01-02 03:07 · Score: 1
  
  A "semi autonomous" large ore train had to be deliberately derailed in November
  No it didn't. A non-autonomous runaway train with no controls and no driver had to be deliberately derailed in November.
  You're talking about a different project, different track, all run by a completely different company, and better still a completely different topic (autonomous vs driver controlled).
6. Re:Not quite ready for prime time by thegarbz · 2019-01-02 03:14 · Score: 1
  
  BHP crash was remotely instigated
  You can't really say that either from that source. Orchestrated and instigated are two different words. But while they did instigate the crash they had no control over this train what so ever, it was not at all automated. They derailed the train movie style, by switching the tracks while the train was already passing through a junction.
  That's no more semi-autonomous that cars are due to the presence of traffic lights.
7. Re:Not quite ready for prime time by jbengt · 2019-01-02 06:25 · Score: 1
  
  The link is for control of cranes in one of Metra's repair shops.
  I ride Metra every day, and they are also one of our biggest clients. I'm pretty sure none of their trains are remote controlled, even in the yards.
Re:Why is everything a robot? by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-01 11:04 · Score: 1

That is because you don't understand the definition of Robot! your own personal definition doesn't make the original incorrect.
Is it cheaper to derail the occasional train by rsilvergun · 2019-01-01 11:48 · Score: 1

than pay conductors? Then it's ready for prime time.

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The future aint what it used to be by aberglas · 2019-01-01 12:25 · Score: 1

Machines traditionally only replaced very repetitive jobs. But over the next 50 years they are going to become much smarter.
Sure, over the next 20 years most of the truck drivers etc. will find some sort of underpaid work elsewhere. But over the next 50 there will be very little unskilled work.
But, as per Parkinson, bureaucracies will grow and grow to take up the slack from those with mediocre intelligence.
And then, maybe in 200 years, computers will be able to program themselves, and will no longer need hungry humans to help them.
Also it's the first useful blockchain by Anonymous Coward · 2019-01-01 12:44 · Score: 1

Transports blocks of passenger in a chain, can only add, not remove (otherwise its a split i.e. two blockchains). Also usually issues its own tockens, called tickets.
Re:We have replaced the drivers with robots by arglebargle_xiv · 2019-01-01 12:54 · Score: 1

How long before the Beckett gang tries to hijack Rio Tinoto's new conveyex?
Re:Unions ... by arglebargle_xiv · 2019-01-01 13:06 · Score: 3, Informative

You may be joking with that comment, but with Australian unions this could actually be the case. For example Boeing had to redesign the two-man cockpits on their 767s to contain an unnecessary third person because the Australian unions demanded it, the only three-man 767 cockpits ever shipped.
Remote, yes, Robot, no. by os2fan · 2019-01-01 21:52 · Score: 2

The trains are being drive remotely, rather like the London Tube trains have been for years. There's still someone at the controls, but no one on the footplate. This means you can change staff half-way through a trip, without requiring a staff-car attached.
Given that in the news too, is where BHP derailed a train that ran away from the driver (who was inspecting the train), they used remote signalling control to throw a set of points and run it into a passing loop with no escape, it would be interesting. But this is a run-away train, the sort that has happened many times before on suburban networks.
I imagine that to forfill the full function of the driver, one needs to deal with the likes of hot axle boxes, cracked and broken tyres, and all sorts of other things before it would be fully remote.

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1. Re:Remote, yes, Robot, no. by os2fan · 2019-01-05 20:25 · Score: 1
  
  The Pilbara routes are short enough to do the trip in a day. But runs typically in the 600 mile run get staff-cars. The Westlander and Inlander in Qld run staff-rooms in the van. The main reasons for putting on staff-cars are to be able to close remote engine-sheds, like Charleville and Cloncurry.
  My brother worked coal trains, and they would depending on the company, work to Mooronbah (where quarters were provided), or crew change at points halfway between depots, so in and out of copperbella.,
  It's interesting that AC says that 'decisions about the control of the train are done in real time on the train' and then says 'these trains operate without any people on them'. This sounds like some kind of on-board computer is in place, so what are the people in Perth who oversee all this do?
  
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  OS/2 - because choice is a terrible thing to waste.
2. Re:Remote, yes, Robot, no. by os2fan · 2019-01-05 20:33 · Score: 1
  
  The runs on the LU are too short to do staff-changes in this way. It's easier to just have the new crew take over at some station. Most suburbab trains here don't have staff-cars. Staff who are travelling to a point do so in the passenger cars.
  In Australia, there are runs from Melbourne to Darwin, or Sydney to Perth, which are handled by sets of on-board crew, these change at various places where there is no staff-room or even town. Because there are a lot of companies operating, each company would provide its own facilities, and as such one would have a coach behind the engines, where the off-duty crew would ride on.
  The Inlander is a main-line passenger train from Townsville to Mt Isa, of some 600 miles. Mount Isa is the terminus, is an unstaffed halt, so the train-crew do things there too. The journey used to be 24 hours when I travelled on it, and they don't have staff-points along the way.
  
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  OS/2 - because choice is a terrible thing to waste.
Re:Why is everything a robot? by Applehu+Akbar · 2019-01-01 22:24 · Score: 1

Rabota is the Slavic root for 'work' in general.
Re:Why is everything a robot? by ceoyoyo · 2019-01-02 04:40 · Score: 1

Perhaps you should read a bit about the history of the term "robot?"
Re:Why is everything a robot? by ceoyoyo · 2019-01-02 04:46 · Score: 1

Apek's robot looked like a human (because it was one) but the first real robots in the 1940s were basically clunky Roombas and CNC machines.
"Android" is an even older term that specifically refers to more or less human-appearing robots. Wikipedia notes that the first known use of the term was describing a wooden toy that looks like Pinocchio riding a bicycle.
Re:Like a train on Mars by umghhh · 2019-01-02 05:31 · Score: 1

If the train AI is really intelligent somebody surely will suit for real cruelty - this much boredom etc.
The war on miners continues by whitroth · 2019-01-02 06:08 · Score: 1

All you folks who used to work here? G'day, and don't let the door hit you on the way out. What will you do for a living? Sorry, we don't care about that, that's got nothing to do with ROI for our CEO.
Those silly drivers... by mykro76 · 2019-01-06 14:04 · Score: 1

and their odd tendency to get off and inspect the train when they think something may be wrong.
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/1...
Solution: get rid of the drivers!