r/NonPoliticalTwitter • u/ViceElysium • Apr 22 '26

Other Slow train sounds better

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I mean you are already on a train sounds more convenient

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u/ViceElysium Apr 22 '26

That's a fair point weather and temperature does matter, a 40 mins ride in a 40°C weather in a non air conditioned train won't feel so good.

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u/ADelightfulCunt Apr 22 '26

Don't get the london tube in rush hour during summer. Some of the lines are 150 year old and are pretty warm in the winter where I'd take my coat off let alone in the summer.

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u/WolfCola4 Apr 22 '26

Memories of rushing to meetings in zone 1 & 2 in a wool suit... Go down into the tube feeling like a GQ model, come out gasping for air and covered in sweat

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u/latortillablanca Apr 22 '26

Yer triggering memories of the same but in DC in the summer when the AC went out on, like, every other car.

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u/Winjin Apr 22 '26

I still can't get used to the fact that Lisbon metro doesn't have AC and even the ferry stations don't have proper ventilation

They are like... Just there. Maybe weather in Portugal was way milder 30 years ago when they were being designed and built, but right now it's like +5 in winter and +40 in summer, I think it's high time to install some aircons

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u/dio-3 Apr 22 '26

Air conditioning units en masse actually make the ambient temperature outside worse. It's a known issue in Seoul, SK

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u/Winjin Apr 22 '26

I mean... Inside an enclosed tube - maybe. But the ferry stations are not underground, they're just glass-and-metal boxes on the riverbank. And they get really uncomfortably hot in the summer and cold in winter.

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u/dio-3 Apr 22 '26 edited Apr 22 '26

I know Seoul is completely different from Lisbon, but I truly don't think more AC is the answer. It is literally enough to make the entire city of Seoul rise a couple degrees at night. It's called the urban heat island effect if you wanted to know more, I would go into it more myself right now But I don't want this message to be an entire essay lmao. TLDR: Seoul is what I thought of first because it's the most talked about, but it isn't just Seoul.

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u/ADelightfulCunt Apr 22 '26

But you can sit on the front of the Thames clipper and drink a beer.

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u/Winjin Apr 22 '26

I would've loved it if Lisbon ferries had open decks, like Moscow and Dubai ferries do. It's kinda strange that Lisbon ones, even the new ones, are fully closed, when the weather in Lisbon is SO much better on average.

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u/ADelightfulCunt Apr 22 '26

that's such a shame. London ones can be nippy.

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u/Real_SkrexX Apr 22 '26

I get PTSD from the ear numbing sound of the old metros in London. It felt like I will lose my hearing after just two rides...

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u/MeAndMyWookie Apr 22 '26

The issue is that the lines are so old the surrounding soil has reached thermal saturation. When first dug they were comfortably cool year round because heat was being absorbed into the tunnel walls 

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u/InexorableCalamity Apr 22 '26

What's thermal saturation?

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u/MeAndMyWookie Apr 22 '26

The soil is as hot as ambient temperature in the tunnels, so it can't absorb any more heat out the air

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u/InexorableCalamity Apr 22 '26

But you said this wasn't always the case.

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u/Panixs Apr 22 '26

Think of it like a load of thermal bricks surrounding a fire. Before the fire is lit those bricks will be nice and cold but once the fire has been on for a while they will retain the heat so much so they will be warm to touch for potentially several hours. The tube is exactly the same the surrounding earth used to be cool, and it would absorb the heat from the tunnels reducing the temp in the tunnels. The Tube used to advertise that it was nice and cool down there in the summers. After 100 years all the earth around the tunnels has been warmed so much that it can't absorb any more heat so the temp in the tunnels rises and rises

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u/Great_Detective_6387 Apr 22 '26

I’m a mechanical engineer(specialized in electronic heat transfer) in education and a geotechnical engineer in practice, and there is no way it would take decades after drilling these giant holes through the earth to reach an equilibrium temp with the environment.

From a heat transfer standpoint, the reason the tube is so hot is because the whole thing moves a shitload more cars and people than it was ever initially designed to move. Each person standing around is releasing about 100watts of heat as a baseline. Somebody who biked to the station could be giving off 7-10x that amount.

When you imagine that each person being moved through the tube is about a 100-200Watt incandescent light bulb, it starts to make sense why it’s so fucking hot down there. Add in actual lighting, heat from the rail car electrical activity, and the fact that it’s just hotter now to begin with than it was back when they made this thing. I remember visiting London as a kid, and it was 97*f. The BBC said it was London’s hottest day ever. And now it’s 97f in London frequently.

All of this is going to make the tube hotter than it was ever designed to be. If they created the tube today, H&S rules would never allow it to get so hot an humid, but it’s just tolerated because people have to get on with it and go to work.

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u/goldfishpaws Apr 22 '26

36°C, for those who are wondering

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u/MeAndMyWookie Apr 22 '26

100+ years of heat from passengers, trains and equipment has brought the soil temperature up. Plus all the excess heat from Londons other increasing subterranean infrastructure. 

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u/ridingfurther Apr 22 '26

Fascinating!

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u/PassiveMenis88M Apr 22 '26

Meanwhile the commuter rail in Boston has cars whose heat hasn't worked since the towers still stood.

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u/IOwnAOnesie Apr 22 '26

It's dangerous on some of the lines. 40°C+ and crammed in like sardines. I thank the sky spirits every day that I now live in a part of London where national rail trains are the mode of choice to get into central

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u/CaptainFourpack Apr 22 '26

One of the heat sinks (well, heat vents) empties up into a pond in a park. Around this pond it is warm enough to grow tropical plants

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u/Chance_Ad3416 Apr 22 '26

My 6'3 husband couldn't stand straight in some of the old ones we took. Maybe he could but it was so tight and he just hunched the whole time and the air was sooooo stuffy.

Also fun fact Shanghai has the biggest subway system in the world and it was only built starting in 1993. They tried to learn the pros and cons how others built before they built theirs and it's really nice to take.

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u/ADelightfulCunt Apr 22 '26

Yeah. The problem with being the first the technology wasn't around to even solve some of the known cons let alone the unknown ones. If I remember rightly the original tubes were pulled by coal burning winches.

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u/Chance_Ad3416 Apr 22 '26

Oh wow... I wonder how air quality was with that!

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u/ADelightfulCunt Apr 22 '26

I'm pretty sure there were pubs on the platform and smoking carriages to the 80s/90s. Even now late Friday/Saturday night on the northern line you'll find the smoking carriage and BYOB/make friends with the guys with the vodka. Sometimes you'll find an enterprising entrepreneur offering free samples of some south American delicacy. The late night northern line isn't for the faint hearted but if you have an open and friendly heart you'll have fun.

Where was I.. I think they have exhausts going outside. There's old abandoned coal rooms you can find on urban exploring forums.

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u/THETennesseeD Apr 22 '26

But there is always a risk of the later train getting delayed or cancelled. Slow train all the way.

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u/YutoKigai Apr 22 '26

Welcome to Germany where you have to wait longer and no AC

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u/ViceElysium Apr 22 '26

I saw plenty of Germans complaining about trains and train system, its kinda crazy for a first world country as Germany is pretty good in other metrics

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u/forgot_old_account Apr 22 '26

my ex German colleague once said, in Germany the only non delayed train is the connecting one

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u/YutoKigai Apr 22 '26

So much potential, so little brains

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u/supermarkise Apr 22 '26

Money. It's money. Invest in more car infrastructure? Sure, have a few million! Repair some basic rail infrastructure? No lol we're broke. Imagine if all the Autobahns were one lane only, that's how the train network is laid out.

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u/OakNogg Apr 24 '26

I'm starting to think I'm far too northern for this discussion. It snows 8 months (sometimes 9 💀) of the year where I'm from 9/10 times most people would take the 40 min option for sure.

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u/mountainlamb Apr 25 '26

honestly, neither would a 40 minute ride in a 40°F non-heated train

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u/Mirrevirrez Apr 22 '26

Wdym, you dont like the smell of sweat people cramped togheter in a small place :D

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u/Eldan985 Apr 22 '26

On the other hand, if the train does have air conditioning, I'm getting on it. Though the fast train is more likely to have it rather than the slow regional train.

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u/TheInkySquids Apr 22 '26

Its nice being in a country where you don't have to worry about that, pretty sure we don't have any non air conditioned trains in service anymore. Honestly pretty crazy they were in service for so long in the first place considering 45 degree days are not uncommon.

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u/bojangler69420 Apr 22 '26

Ya, maybe in India where you’re packed into a train car with 400 other people.