Voith presents efficient and sustainable solutions for urban transportation

From the rails to the road to water, the drive specialist is involved in virtually every form of public urban transportation. On site, visitors to Booth 2L122 can take a closer look at models of the next generation of the DIWA automatic transmission and the Tomlinson coupler.

More than half the world’s population today lives in metropolitan areas. This creates enormous amounts of traffic in a city. In megacities such as Tokyo, São Paulo or New York, gridlock is increasingly becoming a threat – with some serious consequences for the economy even today. To boost their attractiveness and quality of life, cities are planning increased use of auto-free zones and high road tolls, in Oslo for example. However, this approach can only be implemented on a sustainable basis if the public urban transportation system is expanded at the same time.

Besides subways and metros, operators are increasingly making use of high-performance Bus Rapid Transit systems (BRT). Express bus lines, due to their marginal effects on city infrastructure and the relative ease and cost-effectiveness of implementing them, represent an effective addition to the rail system. The concepts are generally based on a combination of dedicated lanes, short headway, special bus stops and buses being given right of way at intersections.

The future of urban transportation with the DIWA automatic transmission

For the first time in North America, Voith will be showing at the conference its study on the next generation of the DIWA automatic transmission for buses. The concept is still based on the proven differential converter principle but is supplemented with a central recovery unit that requires virtually no extra installation space. The 48-volt electric motor is integrated around the vibration damper. Consequently, no extra systems need be integrated into the driveline for partial hybridization.

The Tomlinson coupler: Automatic coupling in North America

As a system manufacturer, Voith offers solutions covering the entire driveline of rail vehicles. Operators benefit from additional reliability and efficiency as the components are optimally matched. Voith is exhibiting its Tomlinson couplers for railcars and subways in the North American market. This coupler is used, for example, on the Toronto Rocket, the current vehicle generation in the subway network serving the city of Toronto, Canada, and its population of more than 2.6 million.

Service: Minimum downtime using exchange pools

With its service network, Voith supports operators of buses and rail vehicles in reducing their downtimes even more during maintenance and repair. Using regional exchange pools, old units can be replaced simply and even at short notice with counterparts that have undergone general overhauling – anywhere in the world and often within one day. These “Reman” units are always up to the current state of engineering and pass the same quality test as a newly manufactured alternative.

Voith then completely overhauls the used components. Many components can be reused in this process following cleaning and intensive testing. In this way, operators don’t just save money, they also contribute to protecting the environment.