title: Manitou Incline

text: The Manitou Springs Incline, also known as the Manitou Incline or simply the Incline, is a popular hiking trail rising above Manitou Springs, Colorado, near Colorado Springs. The Incline ascends on the east slope of Rocky Mountain which is itself on the eastern flank of Pikes Peak. The trail is the remains of a former narrow gauge funicular railway whose tracks washed out during a rock slide in 1990. The Incline is famous for its sweeping views and steep grade, with an average grade of 45% (24°) and as steep as 68% (34°) in places, making it a fitness challenge for locals of the Colorado Springs area. The incline gains of elevation in horizontal. Currently the Incline has approximately 2,744 steps from the bottom to the summit, although the top step is numbered "2768". The number of steps changes occasionally with trail maintenance and deterioration.


title: Manitou Incline

text: Reservations are still currently required to hike the Manitou Incline which can be made at the Manitou Incline page on the City of Colorado Springs website.


title: Manitou Incline

text: The Incline was constructed under the ownership of Dr. Newton N. Brumback as a funicular in 1907, for the purpose of providing access to water tanks at the top of the mountain that would provide gravity-fed water pressure to the cities of Manitou Springs and Colorado Springs. Originally, the railroad was constructed to access a hydroelectric plant and service the water pipes. Shortly after its construction, the Manitou and Pike's Peak Railway was opened as a tourist attraction.


title: Manitou Incline

text: The Incline's original summit house was a rudimentary building constructed from left-over materials from the Incline's construction. It burned down in 1914. The summit house was quickly rebuilt into a more elaborate, comfortable, and safer structure, offering shelter from storms and the elements. The 1914 structure remained until 1958 when it was replaced by an updated summit house, which remained until it was dismantled after the Incline's closure. The Incline operated under the Pikes Peak Cog Railway until a rock slide in 1990 washed out the rail bed and the Cog Railway decided to not repair the tracks.


title: Manitou Incline

text: During the COVID-19 pandemic, the Manitou Springs City Council, under emergency declaration, voted to close the Incline on March 17th, 2020. The closure was a result of health concerns over a lack of social distancing and other health measures, as well as a way to mitigate the number of incidents on the Incline that the fire department would have to address. Manitou Springs stated in a press release on March 18th, 2020, "the first responders who address emergencies on the Incline are put into a high risk situation." The Mayor of Manitou Springs, John Graham, stated: "While we were reluctant to close the Incline, we had far more grave reservations regarding public health." On August 4, 2020, the Manitou Springs City Council approved a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between Colorado Springs and Manitou Springs to reopen the Incline. Within this MOU was protocol for a free online reservation system that managed the number of users, with all reservations being handled by the City of Colorado Springs.


title: Manitou Incline

text: Though the Incline is a popular hike and fitness destination for locals, its existence since its public closing in 1990 has been controversial. Many locals and some National Forest Service officials wanted to keep it closed to allow it to revegetate, either by reseeding or allowing nature to reclaim the scar.


title: Manitou Incline

text: Another controversy centered on parking rights at the base of the trail head, which is co-located with the Barr Trail trailhead and the Pikes Peak Cog Railway. All three sit in the narrow Ruxton Canyon, and the popularity of the Incline has caused major parking conflicts with these entities. The land through which the Incline passes on its ascent is owned by three entities: the bottom portion is owned by the City of Colorado Springs, the middle section is owned by the Pikes Peak Cog Railway, and the top portion is owned by the US Forest Service. The controversial land swap known as "Strawberry Fields" between Colorado Springs and the Broadmoor traded 14 sections of land totalling 371 acres for 189.5 acres of Colorado Springs land. The part of the Incline of owned by the Cog Railway was included in this land swap making all of the Incline now publicly owned land. The Strawberry Fields land swap was approved but was challenged in court by a citizens group.


title: Manitou Incline

text: The legal battles over the conversion of the Incline to a public hiking trail were finally resolved in January 2013, after the issue was settled by the United States Congress.


title: Manitou Incline

text: Since its closure as a railway in 1990, the trail has steadily grown in popularity as a hiking trail and fitness challenge. The base of the Incline sits at and the trail climbs in about . Hiking the trail should not be undertaken by the physically unfit, as there is no vehicle access to the trail and anyone injured or suffering a medical emergency will have to walk or be carried down by other hikers. At the top of the Incline, there is a tie-in to the Barr Trail that allows for hikers to descend without going back down the Incline. (This descent is approximately , with a much gentler slope.) Due to the close proximity to the large and active population center of Colorado Springs, the large military population of nearby Army and Air Force bases, and the US Olympic Training Center, the Incline has become a popular fitness destination for those seeking an intense workout.


title: Manitou Incline

text: About of the way up, a Barr Trail switchback passes just a few yards from the Incline, and there is a pathway that allows those who wish to exit the Incline the opportunity to take the Barr Trail back down as a 'bailout'. In 2020 two new bailouts were added that exit to the right (north) and lead to the Ute Pass trail. The first, the Lower Ute connector, is at step #395 and the second, the Upper Ute connector, is at step #1300 which is about 500 steps below the Barr trail bailout. These two new bailouts give hikers the option to exit a very difficult trail and also serve the purpose of alleviating some of the heavy traffic on the lower Barr Trail. The Incline is at its steepest grade just after the Barr Trail bailout for about another , when it reaches the 'false summit', a semi-crest in the trail that obscures the true summit to hikers due to its extreme grade. Those who reach the false summit are about of the way to the top, but still have several hundred feet to climb.


title: Manitou Incline

text: The verifiable satellite-tracked record was set September 25, 2015, of 17:45 by US mountain running team member Joseph Gray. Also notable is the time of twelve-time champion of the Pikes Peak Marathon Matt Carpenter (18:31). The female Incline record is attributed to Allie McLaughlin of Colorado Springs (20:07).


title: Manitou Incline

text: In 2012, local resident Ed Baxter, 58, became the first person to complete the "Inclinathon", 13 consecutive trips up and down the Incline in one day. Baxter completed the effort in just over 13 hours. In 2012, Brandon Stapanowich broke the speed record for an Inclinathon at 11 hours 46 minutes. In 2014, Stapanowich also completed the first ever Ultra-Inclinathon, completing 22 laps of the Incline in 24 hours, the most ever completed in a day. He gained of altitude in this endeavor. On May 16, 2015, Wade Gardner broke the speed record for the Inclinathon with a time of 10 hours, 34 mins.


title: Manitou Incline

text: In 2011, Greg Cummings (a local resident with Type-I Diabetes) became the first person to hike the Incline more than 500 times in one year. Cummings hiked the Incline 601 times and ascended Pikes Peak 34 times, setting the World Record for elevation climbed in one year at just under . In 2013, Roger Austin ascended the Incline 719 times and reset the World Record to roughly hiked/climbed in one year. In 2014, Greg Cummings ascended the Incline 1,400 times in 330 consecutive days, before the Incline closed for repairs. Along with other ascents, Cummings reset the World Record to climbed in a year. In 2015, Roger Austin ascended the Incline 1,719 times and again reset the World Record to . Along the way, Austin set the record for most Inclinathons in one year at 26. On January 11, 2020, at the age of 62, Greg Cummings retook the one year Incline ascent record by completing 1,825 ascents in the previous 365 days and reset the World Record to 3.6 million vertical feet (1,100,000 metres) climbed in one year.


title: Falernum

text: Falernum ( ) is either an 11% ABV syrup liqueur or a nonalcoholic syrup from the Caribbean. It is best known for its use in tropical drinks. It contains flavors of ginger, lime, and almond, and frequently cloves or allspice. It may be thought of as a spicier version of orgeat syrup.


title: Falernum

text: The form can be alcoholic (syrup liqueur) or nonalcoholic (syrup). Versions with alcohol are generally lower in proof (≅15 ABV), adding rum and emphasizing the clove, ginger, or allspice flavoring aspects for use in mixing cocktails, typically tropical or tiki drinks. It is also enjoyed on the rocks.


title: Falernum

text: Depending on sugar content, the consistency is often thick and is therefore sometimes referred to as "velvet falernum" because of the feeling it leaves on one's tongue. Brands vary and the color can be white to light amber, and it may be clear or translucent.


title: Falernum

text: The origination of falernum may date back to the 18th century, when it was made as a punch in the areas around Barbados. Some disagreement exists over the origin of the name, and whether the earliest versions would have included the steeping of almonds.


title: Falernum

text: In the literary magazine "All the Year Round", owned by Charles Dickens Jr. at the time, an unnamed author wrote of falernum in 1892, describing it as "a curious liqueur composed from rum and lime-juice".


title: Falernum

text: The earliest known reference in bar manuals seems to be the 1930s. One producer claims his recipe dates to 1890, winning awards as early as 1923.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: Shaandaar () is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language romantic comedy film directed by Vikas Bahl and produced by Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane. It stars Shahid Kapoor and Alia Bhatt in lead roles, with Pankaj Kapur and Sanjay Kapoor in supporting roles. Principal photography began in August 2014 in Leeds, and the film released on 22 October 2015.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: Alia Arora is an insomniac orphan adopted by Bipin Arora, whose wife Geetu Arora and mother Kamla Arora are extremely business minded and greedy. Alia is ignored by both Geetu and Kamla, but deeply loved by Bipin, as well as his biological daughter Isha. Since Alia is unable to sleep, Bipin draws her a dream every night before going to bed, hoping it will encourage her to sleep.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: With Isha set to get married at a destination wedding in London, the family drives to the wedding venue. On the way, Bipin's car is hit by Jagjinder Joginder aka JJ driving his motorcycle, leading to a comical altercation between them. It is later revealed that JJ is the event manager for Isha's wedding. The marriage is arranged between the Aroras and the Fundwanis, a family headed by Mr. Fundwani. The Aroras need the marriage to occur as they have become bankrupt, and are hoping to access the money of the seemingly wealthy Fundwanis. The groom, Robin Fundwani, is fitness-obsessed and vain; he looks at Isha with contempt because of her weight and her love of food. It is evident that he was getting married only at the behest of his older brother.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: Through some magical and funny moments, Alia and JJ (who is also an insomniac due to losing his parents in anti-Sikh riots) become romantically interested in one another, eventually curing each other's insomnia and falling asleep together. Bipin who is very protective of Alia tries to separate the couple leading to several comic moments, and this leads to him inadvertently revealing that Alia is his biological daughter with his ex-girlfriend, whom he briefly dated before marrying Geetu under family pressure. Under the coaxing of Isha and after observing the couple, Bipin begins to slowly accept JJ and Alia's relationship.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: Isha becomes increasingly upset with Robin, with Robin escalating this friction by insulting Isha's weight and making fun of her. Although the Aroras are bothered by Robin's treatment of Isha, they turn a blind eye to it to avoid any disruptions to their business deal with the Fundwanis. Before the wedding, Arora matriarch Kamla, during an argument with her younger son, sneezes and dies, which threatens to derail the wedding. The Aroras, desperate for the wedding to carry on, pretend she is still alive.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: Isha arrives at the wedding dais ready to marry Robin for her family's sake. But when Robin begins to laugh at her after her dress rips during the ceremony, she decides not to get married, and her speech inspires every one to believe in themselves and their self-worth. Frustrated, Mr. Fundwani tries to physically force the marriage to continue by holding everyone at gunpoint, and it is revealed that the Fundwanis are also bankrupt. JJ, Alia, Bipin, Isha and Robin escape from the scene and fly away in a helicopter.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: Deepanjana Pal at "Firstpost" described the writing as sloppy, commenting that, "it's more a series of YouTube sketches than a proper story." "Indian Express" felt that Kapoor's character Jagjinder Joginder was "badly-written", noting, "He can be such a natural charmer, but here the charm offensive is not allowed to stop, and finally just overtakes him." Saibal Chatterjee of NDTV, felt that while there were "flashes of smart writing", that there was also "[a lack] of sustained narrative force, especially in the second half". Chatterjee described the interaction between Kapoor and Bhatt as "spontaneous chemistry", an opinion that was not shared by the "Indian Express" reviewer, who wrote, "Shahid and Alia look good together, but there's not very much else they manage between the two of them."


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: Ibnlive described the movie as "The film is bizarre and wildly inconsistent". India TV stated "There is nothing Shaandaar about this Shahid-Alia starrer". TimesofIndia gave two stars to the film.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: The music and background score for the film is composed by Amit Trivedi. The first song titled, ""Gulaabo"" was released on 10 September 2015, followed by "Shaam Shaandaar" which was released on 16 September 2015. The music rights for the film have been acquired by "Zee Music Company". The full audio album was released on 24 September 2015.


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: The opening day collection was . After taking a good opening the collections dropped but the overseas collection were good and first five-day collections were . After 16 days in theatres, the worldwide collection was estimated as .


title: Shaandaar (2015 film)

text: The film was declared as a box-office failure after a full run in theatres. The success of "Pyaar Ka Punchnama 2" was considered to add to the film's failure.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Industrial wastewater treatment describes the processes used for treating wastewater that is produced by industries as an undesirable by-product. After treatment, the treated industrial wastewater (or effluent) may be reused or released to a sanitary sewer or to a surface water in the environment. Some industrial facilities generate wastewater that can be treated in sewage treatment plants. Most industrial processes, such as petroleum refineries, chemical and petrochemical plants have their own specialized facilities to treat their wastewaters so that the pollutant concentrations in the treated wastewater comply with the regulations regarding disposal of wastewaters into sewers or into rivers, lakes or oceans. This applies to industries that generate wastewater with high concentrations of organic matter (e.g. oil and grease), toxic pollutants (e.g. heavy metals, volatile organic compounds) or nutrients such as ammonia. Some industries install a pre-treatment system to remove some pollutants (e.g., toxic compounds), and then discharge the partially treated wastewater to the municipal sewer system.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Most industries produce some wastewater. Recent trends have been to minimize such production or to recycle treated wastewater within the production process. Some industries have been successful at redesigning their manufacturing processes to reduce or eliminate pollutants. Sources of industrial wastewater include battery manufacturing, chemical manufacturing, electric power plants, food industry, iron and steel industry, metal working, mines and quarries, nuclear industry, oil and gas extraction, petroleum refining and petrochemicals, pharmaceutical manufacturing, pulp and paper industry, smelters, textile mills, industrial oil contamination, water treatment and wood preserving. Treatment processes include brine treatment, solids removal (e.g. chemical precipitation, filtration), oils and grease removal, removal of biodegradable organics, removal of other organics, removal of acids and alkalis, and removal of toxic materials.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The specific pollutants generated and the resultant effluent concentrations can vary widely among the industrial sectors.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Battery manufacturers specialize in fabricating small devices for electronics and portable equipment (e.g., power tools), or larger, high-powered units for cars, trucks and other motorized vehicles. Pollutants generated at manufacturing plants includes cadmium, chromium, cobalt, copper, cyanide, iron, lead, manganese, mercury, nickel, silver, zinc, oil and grease.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: A centralized waste treatment (CWT) facility processes liquid or solid industrial wastes generated by off-site manufacturing facilities. A manufacturer may send its wastes to a CWT plant, rather than perform treatment on site, due to constraints such as limited land availability, difficulty in designing and operating an on-site system, or limitations imposed by environmental regulations and permits. A manufacturer may determine that using a CWT is more cost-effective than treating the waste itself; this is often the case where the manufacturer is a small business.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: CWT plants often receive wastes from a wide variety of manufacturers, including chemical plants, metal fabrication and finishing; and used oil and petroleum products from various manufacturing sectors. The wastes may be classified as hazardous, have high pollutant concentrations or otherwise be difficult to treat. In 2000 the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency published wastewater regulations for CWT facilities in the US.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The specific pollutants discharged by organic chemical manufacturers vary widely from plant to plant, depending on the types of products manufactured, such as bulk organic chemicals, resins, pesticides, plastics, or synthetic fibers. Some of the organic compounds that may be discharged are benzene, chloroform, naphthalene, phenols, toluene and vinyl chloride. Biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), which is a gross measurement of a range of organic pollutants, may be used to gauge the effectiveness of a biological wastewater treatment system, and is used as a regulatory parameter in some discharge permits. Metal pollutant discharges may include chromium, copper, lead, nickel and zinc.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The inorganic chemicals sector covers a wide variety of products and processes, although an individual plant may produce a narrow range of products and pollutants. Products include aluminum compounds; calcium carbide and calcium chloride; hydrofluoric acid; potassium compounds; borax; chrome and fluorine-based compounds; cadmium and zinc-based compounds. The pollutants discharged vary by product sector and individual plant, and may include arsenic, chlorine, cyanide, fluoride; and heavy metals such as chromium, copper, iron, lead, mercury, nickel and zinc.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Fossil-fuel power stations, particularly coal-fired plants, are a major source of industrial wastewater. Many of these plants discharge wastewater with significant levels of metals such as lead, mercury, cadmium and chromium, as well as arsenic, selenium and nitrogen compounds (nitrates and nitrites). Wastewater streams include flue-gas desulfurization, fly ash, bottom ash and flue gas mercury control. Plants with air pollution controls such as wet scrubbers typically transfer the captured pollutants to the wastewater stream.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Ash ponds, a type of surface impoundment, are a widely used treatment technology at coal-fired plants. These ponds use gravity to settle out large particulates (measured as total suspended solids) from power plant wastewater. This technology does not treat dissolved pollutants. Power stations use additional technologies to control pollutants, depending on the particular wastestream in the plant. These include dry ash handling, closed-loop ash recycling, chemical precipitation, biological treatment (such as an activated sludge process), membrane systems, and evaporation-crystallization systems. Technological advancements in ion-exchange membranes and electrodialysis systems has enabled high efficiency treatment of flue-gas desulfurization wastewater to meet recent EPA discharge limits. The treatment approach is similar for other highly scaling industrial wastewaters.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Wastewater generated from agricultural and food processing operations has distinctive characteristics that set it apart from common municipal wastewater managed by public or private sewage treatment plants throughout the world: it is biodegradable and non-toxic, but has high Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD) and suspended solids (SS). The constituents of food and agriculture wastewater are often complex to predict, due to the differences in BOD and pH in effluents from vegetable, fruit, and meat products and due to the seasonal nature of food processing and post-harvesting.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Processing of food from raw materials requires large volumes of high grade water. Vegetable washing generates waters with high loads of particulate matter and some dissolved organic matter. It may also contain surfactants and pesticides.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Aquaculture facilities (fish farms) often discharge large amounts of nitrogen and phosphorus, as well as suspended solids. Some facilities use drugs and pesticides, which may be present in the wastewater.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Animal slaughter and processing produces organic waste from body fluids, such as blood, and gut contents. Pollutants generated include BOD, SS, coliform bacteria, oil and grease, organic nitrogen and ammonia.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Processing food for sale produces wastes generated from cooking which are often rich in plant organic material and may also contain salt, flavourings, colouring material and acids or alkali. Large quantities of fats, oil and grease ("FOG") may also be present, which in sufficient concentrations can clog sewer lines. Some municipalities require restaurants and food processing businesses to use grease interceptors and regulate the disposal of FOG in the sewer system.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Food processing activities such as plant cleaning, material conveying, bottling, and product washing create wastewater. Many food processing facilities require on-site treatment before operational wastewater can be land applied or discharged to a waterway or a sewer system. High suspended solids levels of organic particles increase BOD and can result in significant sewer surcharge fees. Sedimentation, wedgewire screening, or rotating belt filtration (microscreening) are commonly used methods to reduce suspended organic solids loading prior to discharge.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The production of iron from its ores involves powerful reduction reactions in blast furnaces. Cooling waters are inevitably contaminated with products especially ammonia and cyanide. Production of coke from coal in coking plants also requires water cooling and the use of water in by-products separation. Contamination of waste streams includes gasification products such as benzene, naphthalene, anthracene, cyanide, ammonia, phenols, cresols together with a range of more complex organic compounds known collectively as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH).


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The conversion of iron or steel into sheet, wire or rods requires hot and cold mechanical transformation stages frequently employing water as a lubricant and coolant. Contaminants include hydraulic oils, tallow and particulate solids. Final treatment of iron and steel products before onward sale into manufacturing includes "pickling" in strong mineral acid to remove rust and prepare the surface for tin or chromium plating or for other surface treatments such as galvanisation or painting. The two acids commonly used are hydrochloric acid and sulfuric acid. Wastewaters include acidic rinse waters together with waste acid. Although many plants operate acid recovery plants (particularly those using hydrochloric acid), where the mineral acid is boiled away from the iron salts, there remains a large volume of highly acid ferrous sulfate or ferrous chloride to be disposed of. Many steel industry wastewaters are contaminated by hydraulic oil, also known as "soluble oil."


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Many industries perform work on metal feedstocks (e.g. sheet metal, ingots) as they fabricate their final products. The industries include automobile, truck and aircraft manufacturing; tools and hardware manufacturing; electronic equipment and office machines; ships and boats; appliances and other household products; and stationary industrial equipment (e.g. compressors, pumps, boilers). Typical processes conducted at these plants include grinding, machining, coating and painting, chemical etching and milling, solvent degreasing, electroplating and anodizing. Wastewater generated from these industries may contain heavy metals such as cadmium, chromium, copper, lead, nickel, silver and zinc; cyanide and various organic chemical solvents; and oil and grease.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The principal waste-waters associated with mines and quarries are slurries of rock particles in water. These arise from rainfall washing exposed surfaces and haul roads and also from rock washing and grading processes. Volumes of water can be very high, especially rainfall related arisings on large sites. Some specialized separation operations, such as coal washing to separate coal from native rock using density gradients, can produce wastewater contaminated by fine particulate haematite and surfactants. Oils and hydraulic oils are also common contaminants.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Wastewater from metal mines and ore recovery plants are inevitably contaminated by the minerals present in the native rock formations. Following crushing and extraction of the desirable materials, undesirable materials may enter the wastewater stream. For metal mines, this can include unwanted metals such as zinc and other materials such as arsenic. Extraction of high value metals such as gold and silver may generate slimes containing very fine particles in where physical removal of contaminants becomes particularly difficult.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Additionally, the geologic formations that harbour economically valuable metals such as copper and gold very often consist of sulphide-type ores. The processing entails grinding the rock into fine particles and then extracting the desired metal(s), with the leftover rock being known as tailings. These tailings contain a combination of not only undesirable leftover metals, but also sulphide components which eventually form sulphuric acid upon the exposure to air and water that inevitably occurs when the tailings are disposed of in large impoundments. The resulting acid mine drainage, which is often rich in heavy metals (because acids dissolve metals), is one of the many environmental impacts of mining.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The waste production from the nuclear and radio-chemicals industry is dealt with as "Radioactive waste."


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Researchers have looked at the bioaccumulation of strontium by "Scenedesmus spinosus" (algae) in simulated wastewater. The study claims a highly selective biosorption capacity for strontium of S. spinosus, suggesting that it may be appropriate for use of nuclear wastewater.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Oil and gas well operations generate produced water, which may contain oils, toxic metals (e.g. arsenic, cadmium, chromium, mercury, lead), salts, organic chemicals and solids. Some produced water contains traces of naturally occurring radioactive material. Offshore oil and gas platforms also generate deck drainage, domestic waste and sanitary waste. During the drilling process, well sites typically discharge drill cuttings and drilling mud (drilling fluid).


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Pollutants discharged at petroleum refineries and petrochemical plants include conventional pollutants (BOD, oil and grease, suspended solids), ammonia, chromium, phenols and sulfides.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Pharmaceutical plants typically generate a variety of process wastewaters, including solvents, spent acid and caustic solutions, water from chemical reactions, product wash water, condensed steam, blowdown from air pollution control scrubbers, and equipment washwater. Non-process wastewaters typically include cooling water and site runoff. Pollutants generated by the industry include acetone, ammonia, benzene, BOD, chloroform, cyanide, ethanol, ethyl acetate, isopropanol, methylene chloride, methanol, phenol and toluene. Treatment technologies used include advanced biological treatment (e.g. activated sludge with nitrification), multimedia filtration, cyanide destruction (e.g. hydrolysis), steam stripping and wastewater recycling.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Effluent from the pulp and paper industry is generally high in suspended solids and BOD. Plants that bleach wood pulp for paper making may generate chloroform, dioxins (including 2,3,7,8-TCDD), furans, phenols and chemical oxygen demand (COD). Stand-alone paper mills using imported pulp may only require simple primary treatment, such as sedimentation or dissolved air flotation. Increased BOD or COD loadings, as well as organic pollutants, may require biological treatment such as activated sludge or upflow anaerobic sludge blanket reactors. For mills with high inorganic loadings like salt, tertiary treatments may be required, either general membrane treatments like ultrafiltration or reverse osmosis or treatments to remove specific contaminants, such as nutrients.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The pollutants discharged by nonferrous smelters vary with the base metal ore. Bauxite smelters generate phenols but typically use settling basins and evaporation to manage these wastes, with no need to routinely discharge wastewater. Aluminum smelters typically discharge fluoride, benzo(a)pyrene, antimony and nickel, as well as aluminum. Copper smelters typically generate cadmium, lead, zinc, arsenic and nickel, in addition to copper, in their wastewater. Lead smelters discharge lead and zinc. Nickel and cobalt smelters discharge ammonia and copper in addition to the base metals. Zinc smelters discharge arsenic, cadmium, copper, lead, selenium and zinc.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Typical treatment processes used in the industry are chemical precipitation, sedimentation and filtration.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Textile mills, including carpet manufacturers, generate wastewater from a wide variety of processes, including cleaning and finishing, yarn manufacturing and fabric finishing (such as bleaching, dyeing, resin treatment, waterproofing and retardant flameproofing). Pollutants generated by textile mills include BOD, SS, oil and grease, sulfide, phenols and chromium. Insecticide residues in fleeces are a particular problem in treating waters generated in wool processing. Animal fats may be present in the wastewater, which if not contaminated, can be recovered for the production of tallow or further rendering.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Textile dyeing plants generate wastewater that contain synthetic (e.g., reactive dyes, acid dyes, basic dyes, disperse dyes, vat dyes, sulphur dyes, mordant dyes, direct dyes, ingrain dyes, solvent dyes, pigment dyes) and natural dyestuff, gum thickener (guar) and various wetting agents, pH buffers and dye retardants or accelerators. Following treatment with polymer-based flocculants and settling agents, typical monitoring parameters include BOD, COD, color (ADMI), sulfide, oil and grease, phenol, TSS and heavy metals (chromium, zinc, lead, copper).


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Industrial applications where oil enters the wastewater stream may include vehicle wash bays, workshops, fuel storage depots, transport hubs and power generation. Often the wastewater is discharged into local sewer or trade waste systems and must meet local environmental specifications. Typical contaminants can include solvents, detergents, grit, lubricants and hydrocarbons.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Many industries have a need to treat water to obtain very high quality water for their processes. This might include pure chemical synthesis or boiler feed water. Also, some water treatment processes produce organic and mineral sludges from filtration and sedimentation which require treatment. Ion exchange using natural or synthetic resins removes calcium, magnesium and carbonate ions from water, typically replacing them with sodium, chloride, hydroxyl and/or other ions. Regeneration of ion-exchange columns with strong acids and alkalis produces a wastewater rich in hardness ions which are readily precipitated out, especially when in admixture with other wastewater constituents.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Wood preserving plants generate conventional and toxic pollutants, including arsenic, COD, copper, chromium, abnormally high or low pH, phenols, suspended solids, oil and grease.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The various types of contamination of wastewater require a variety of strategies to remove the contamination. Most industrial processes, such as petroleum refineries, chemical and petrochemical plants have onsite facilities to treat their wastewaters so that the pollutant concentrations in the treated wastewater comply with the regulations regarding disposal of wastewaters into sewers or into rivers, lakes or oceans. Constructed wetlands are being used in an increasing number of cases as they provided high quality and productive on-site treatment. Other industrial processes that produce a lot of waste-waters such as paper and pulp production have created environmental concern, leading to development of processes to recycle water use within plants before they have to be cleaned and disposed.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: An industrial wastewater treatment plant may include one or more of the following rather than the conventional treatment sequence of sewage treatment plants:


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Brine treatment involves removing dissolved salt ions from the waste stream. Although similarities to seawater or brackish water desalination exist, industrial brine treatment may contain unique combinations of dissolved ions, such as hardness ions or other metals, necessitating specific processes and equipment.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Brine treatment systems are typically optimized to either reduce the volume of the final discharge for more economic disposal (as disposal costs are often based on volume) or maximize the recovery of fresh water or salts. Brine treatment systems may also be optimized to reduce electricity consumption, chemical usage, or physical footprint.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Brine treatment is commonly encountered when treating cooling tower blowdown, produced water from steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD), produced water from natural gas extraction such as coal seam gas, frac flowback water, acid mine or acid rock drainage, reverse osmosis reject, chlor-alkali wastewater, pulp and paper mill effluent, and waste streams from food and beverage processing.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Brine treatment technologies may include: membrane filtration processes, such as reverse osmosis; ion-exchange processes such as electrodialysis or weak acid cation exchange; or evaporation processes, such as brine concentrators and crystallizers employing mechanical vapour recompression and steam. Due to the ever increasing discharge standards, there has been an emergence of the use of advance oxidation processes for the treatment of brine. Some notable examples such as Fenton's oxidation and ozonation have been employed for degradation of recalcitrant compounds in brine from industrial plants.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Reverse osmosis may not be viable for brine treatment, due to the potential for fouling caused by hardness salts or organic contaminants, or damage to the reverse osmosis membranes from hydrocarbons.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Evaporation processes are the most widespread for brine treatment as they enable the highest degree of concentration, as high as solid salt. They also produce the highest purity effluent, even distillate-quality. Evaporation processes are also more tolerant of organics, hydrocarbons, or hardness salts. However, energy consumption is high and corrosion may be an issue as the prime mover is concentrated salt water. As a result, evaporation systems typically employ titanium or duplex stainless steel materials.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Brine management examines the broader context of brine treatment and may include consideration of government policy and regulations, corporate sustainability, environmental impact, recycling, handling and transport, containment, centralized compared to on-site treatment, avoidance and reduction, technologies, and economics. Brine management shares some issues with leachate management and more general waste management. In the recent years, there has been greater prevalence in brine management due to global push for zero liquid discharge (ZLD)/minimal liquid discharge (MLD). In ZLD/MLD techniques, a closed water cycle is used to minimize water discharges from a system for water reuse. This concept has been gaining traction in recent years, due to increased water discharges and recent advancement in membrane technology.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Most solids can be removed using simple sedimentation techniques with the solids recovered as slurry or sludge. Very fine solids and solids with densities close to the density of water pose special problems. In such case filtration or ultrafiltration may be required. Although flocculation may be used, using alum salts or the addition of polyelectrolytes. Wastewater from industrial food processing often requires on-site treatment before it can be discharged to prevent or reduce sewer surcharge fees. The type of industry and specific operational practices determine what types of wastewater is generated and what type of treatment is required. Reducing solids such as waste product, organic materials, and sand is often a goal of industrial wastewater treatment. Some common ways to reduce solids include primary sedimentation (clarification), dissolved air flotation (DAF), belt filtration (microscreening), and drum screening.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The effective removal of oils and grease is dependent on the characteristics of the oil in terms of its suspension state and droplet size, which will in turn affect the choice of separator technology. Oil in industrial waste water may be free light oil, heavy oil, which tends to sink, and emulsified oil, often referred to as soluble oil. Emulsified or soluble oils will typically required "cracking" to free the oil from its emulsion. In most cases this is achieved by lowering the pH of the water matrix.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Most separator technologies will have an optimum range of oil droplet sizes that can be effectively treated. Each separator technology will have its own performance curve outlining optimum performance based on oil droplet size. the most common separators are gravity tanks or pits, API oil-water separators or plate packs, chemical treatment via dissolved air flotations, centrifuges, media filters and hydrocyclones.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Hydrocyclone oil separators operate on the process where wastewater enters the cyclone chamber and is spun under extreme centrifugal forces more than 1000 times the force of gravity. This force causes the water and oil droplets to separate. The separated oil is discharged from one end of the cyclone where treated water is discharged through the opposite end for further treatment, filtration or discharge.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Biodegradable organic material of plant or animal origin is usually possible to treat using extended conventional sewage treatment processes such as activated sludge or trickling filter. Problems can arise if the wastewater is excessively diluted with washing water or is highly concentrated such as undiluted blood or milk. The presence of cleaning agents, disinfectants, pesticides, or antibiotics can have detrimental impacts on treatment processes.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: A trickling filter consists of a bed of rocks, gravel, slag, peat moss, or plastic media over which wastewater flows downward and contacts a layer (or film) of microbial slime covering the bed media. Aerobic conditions are maintained by forced air flowing through the bed or by natural convection of air. The process involves adsorption of organic compounds in the wastewater by the microbial slime layer, diffusion of air into the slime layer to provide the oxygen required for the biochemical oxidation of the organic compounds. The end products include carbon dioxide gas, water and other products of the oxidation. As the slime layer thickens, it becomes difficult for the air to penetrate the layer and an inner anaerobic layer is formed.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Synthetic organic materials including solvents, paints, pharmaceuticals, pesticides, products from coke production and so forth can be very difficult to treat. Treatment methods are often specific to the material being treated. Methods include advanced oxidation processing, distillation, adsorption, ozonation, vitrification, incineration, chemical immobilisation or landfill disposal. Some materials such as some detergents may be capable of biological degradation and in such cases, a modified form of wastewater treatment can be used.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Acids and alkalis can usually be neutralised under controlled conditions. Neutralisation frequently produces a precipitate that will require treatment as a solid residue that may also be toxic. In some cases, gases may be evolved requiring treatment for the gas stream. Some other forms of treatment are usually required following neutralisation.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Waste streams rich in hardness ions as from de-ionisation processes can readily lose the hardness ions in a buildup of precipitated calcium and magnesium salts. This precipitation process can cause severe "furring" of pipes and can, in extreme cases, cause the blockage of disposal pipes. A 1-metre diameter industrial marine discharge pipe serving a major chemicals complex was blocked by such salts in the 1970s. Treatment is by concentration of de-ionisation waste waters and disposal to landfill or by careful pH management of the released wastewater.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Toxic materials including many organic materials, metals (such as zinc, silver, cadmium, thallium, etc.) acids, alkalis, non-metallic elements (such as arsenic or selenium) are generally resistant to biological processes unless very dilute. Metals can often be precipitated out by changing the pH or by treatment with other chemicals. Many, however, are resistant to treatment or mitigation and may require concentration followed by landfilling or recycling. Dissolved organics can be "incinerated" within the wastewater by the advanced oxidation process.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Molecular encapsulation is a technology that has the potential to provide a system for the recyclable removal of lead and other ions from polluted sources. Nano-, micro- and milli- capsules, with sizes in the ranges 10 nm–1μm,1μm–1mm and >1mm, respectively, are particles that have an active reagent (core) surrounded by a carrier (shell).There are three types of capsule under investigation: alginate-based capsules, carbon nanotubes, polymer swelling capsules. These capsules provide a possible means for the remediation of contaminated water.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: To remove heat from wastewater generated by power plants or manufacturing plants, and thus to reduce thermal pollution, the following technologies are used:


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Some facilities such as oil and gas wells may be permitted to pump their wastewater underground through injection wells. However, wastewater injection has been linked to induced seismicity.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Disposal of wastewaters from an industrial plant is a difficult and costly problem. Although economies of scale may favor use of a large municipal sewage treatment plant for disposal of small volumes of industrial wastewater, industrial wastewater treatment and disposal may be less expensive than correctly apportioned costs for larger volumes of industrial wastewater not requiring the conventional sewage treatment sequence of a small municipal sewage treatment plant.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: Industrial wastewater plants may reduce raw water costs by converting selected wastewaters to reclaimed water used for different purposes. Industrial wastewater treatment plants may reduce wastewater treatment charges collected by municipal sewage treatment plants by pre-treating wastewaters to reduce concentrations of pollutants measured to determine user fees.


title: Industrial wastewater treatment

text: The international community has defined the treatment of industrial wastewater as an important part of sustainable development by including it in Sustainable Development Goal 6. Target 6.3 of this goal is to "By 2030, improve water quality by reducing pollution, eliminating dumping and minimizing release of hazardous chemicals and materials, halving the proportion of untreated wastewater and substantially increasing recycling and safe reuse globally". One of the indicators for this target is the "proportion of domestic and industrial wastewater flows safely treated".


title: IAI Lavi

text: The IAI Lavi (Hebrew: לביא, "Young Lion") was a single-engined fourth-generation multirole jet fighter developed in Israel, by Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI), during the 1980s. The decision to develop the Lavi was controversial, both with the Israeli public, due to the enormous associated costs, and particularly with the U.S. government due to competition with American jets on the export market. By 1984 Israel, with a population of 4 million, had the world's highest military expenditure as a proportion of GDP, at 24%, a rate of spending considered unsustainable. These issues contributed to the ultimate cancellation of the aircraft, by the Israeli government, during the flight-test phase of development in August 1987.


title: IAI Lavi

text: The Lavi performed successfully in flight-tests, with its flight handling described as "excellent" by test pilots. The Lavi was planned to be the mainstay of the Israeli Air Force, and considerable export sales for the aircraft had been forecast. The uniqueness of its design was in the combination of a small, aerodynamic, highly maneuverable plane, with sophisticated, software-rich systems, low armed drag, and the ability to carry a large payload at high speed and over long distances. As of 2012, two of the prototypes have been preserved, and have been placed on public display. The Israeli cabinet's late-stage cancellation of the program, by a 12–11 vote, continued to arouse controversy and bitterness in Israel for decades, with Moshe Arens stating in 2013 that if the project had not been cancelled the IAF "would be operating the world's most advanced fighter, upgraded over the years to incorporate operational experience and newer technology."


title: IAI Lavi

text: Conceptually, the Lavi had its origins in the idea espoused by IAF commander and Minister of Defence Ezer Weizman that Israel's combat aircraft should fall into 'two-tiers' – a small number of high performance aircraft and a larger bulk with less sophistication and complexity. In the mid-1970s, the plane that was to become the Lavi was meant to be a multirole fighter-bomber to replace aging IAF aircraft such as the Douglas A-4 Skyhawk and IAI Kfir; however continuous revisions of the proposed aircraft led to the incorporation of more advanced technologies and ideas to produce an ambitious aircraft in the class of the American General Dynamics F-16. The IAF was estimated to have a requirement for 300 aircraft, 60 of which were expected to be combat-capable two-seat trainers.


title: IAI Lavi

text: In February 1980, a milestone towards the development of the Lavi occurred when the Israeli government granted its authorisation for the IAF to present its list of technical specifications and requirements which sought the IAF's envisioned future fighter aircraft. While the Lavi was heavily influenced by these requirements, it was also affected by concepts of the wider strategic situation that Israel was confronted by. Menachem Eine, who headed the Lavi program, concluded that any proposed aircraft would be subject to a substantially greater threat than any envisioned US fighter, and would have to be developed with these threats in mind. Eine observed that the aircraft needed to not only take into consideration the best Soviet armaments that would be potentially faced in combat, but the best American equipment as well, as both Egypt and Saudi Arabia were being supplied with modern American fighter aircraft.


title: IAI Lavi

text: In addition to the primary intention to perform air-to-ground missions, the IAF sought to configure the Lavi to perform various other roles, as Israel perceived the likelihood of a potential sustained conflict under which there would be a need to fight for aerial supremacy against the efforts of multiple neighbouring adversaries to be high. The Lavi was therefore designed to possess both the flight performance and capabilities to perform as an effective supplement to the IAF's own F-15 fleet in carrying out aerial combat missions. As the Lavi was viewed as being relatively easy to fly, the aircraft was also under consideration as an advanced jet trainer as well.


title: IAI Lavi

text: Early on, IAI decided to adopt a delta wing configuration, of which the company was already familiar with through its work on the earlier Kfir, which was paired with large, steerable canards situated forward of the wing. The delta wing arrangement was relatively low-weight, provided space for considerable fuel capacity, a smooth low-altitude fight attitude, and high levels of directional stability while flown at high angles of attack (AOA). The canard generated additional lift and positive control when at high AOAs. While this configuration afforded excellent maneuverability, it also exhibited natural instability during flight. To compensate, the Lavi was fitted with a sophisticated digital fly-by-wire system which allowed the aircraft to take advantage of this particular wing design while eliminating this shortcoming. The Lavi was one of the first aircraft to feature this type of configuration, which has since become more commonplace amongst fighter aircraft.


title: IAI Lavi

text: The adoption of certain components, such as an engine produced by Pratt & Whitney, were viewed as foregone conclusions; the Beit Shemesh engine plant already had an established relationship with the company and planned to co-produce the engine, thus enabling some of the manufacturing to be carried out domestically in Israel. Some elements of the engine had to be manufactured in the US due to some of the design aspects having been classified as secret. The development of the Lavi was viewed by some figures in Israeli military and government circles, most notably Moshe Arens and Shimon Peres, as being an important program to modernise Israeli industry overall and to increase its technical ability, helping the nation progress towards becoming a developed nation.


title: IAI Lavi

text: The development program was planned to involve a total of five prototypes of the Lavi being completed, three of which were to have used a two-seat cockpit configuration.


title: IAI Lavi

text: On 31 December 1986, the first prototype took off on its maiden flight. The test pilot, Menachem Shmul, head of IAI's Air Operations section, took off at 13:21 and stayed in the air for 26 minutes, during which he checked the engine and controls. The handling was described as "excellent", with a high degree of stability in crosswind landings. About three months later, a second "Lavi" prototype took to the air; it featured improvements and additional features over the first, with a belly-mounted fuel tank, a special midair refuelling probe and several new avionic systems. Both B-01 and B-02 were tandem two-seaters, with the rear cockpit occupied by test equipment. By August 1987, the month in which the Lavi was canceled, a total of 82 sorties had reportedly been flown between the two completed prototypes, during which a significant proportion of the flight envelope had been explored.


title: IAI Lavi

text: While the Lavi had attracted the steadfast support of IAF veteran and Likud minister Moshe Arens, there was considerable dissent over the development. While the U.S. was a key partner in the aircraft's development, there was vocal political opposition to financing the Lavi, which may have been a competitive aircraft in the export market against American aircraft such as the F-16C/D and the F/A-18C/D. The Lavi would have also required a great deal of other competing military requirements and sought investments to be abandoned, thus there were elements of the armed forces that did not support the project and those officers who felt that the F-16 possessed similar performance to the Lavi and was readily available already, making the foreign F-16 cheaper and easier to procure. IAF Major General Avihu Ben-Nun argued in favour of canceling the Lavi and acquiring 75 F-16s instead.


title: IAI Lavi

text: Proponents, such as the Minister without Portfolio Moshe Arens, advocated that the Lavi was a high prestige program, asserting Israeli technological capabilities and would work to the nation's economic advantage. A failure to proceed with the development could lead to significant job losses and possibly contribute to emigration; the Israeli State Comptroller argued the resulting unemployment was negligible. Arens was keen to promote potential partnerships and technology exchanges in regards to the Lavi. Perhaps optimistically, IAI had projected export sales of the Lavi to be as many as 407 units to customers including South Africa, Chile, Taiwan, and Argentina; there were reports of significant South African interest and involvement during the early development of the Lavi. In later development, however, Israel had given the U.S. explicit guarantees that the Lavi would not be made available to export.


title: IAI Lavi

text: Prior to and following the cancellation, IAI employees organised numerous demonstrations and public appeals to rally support for the Lavi; public opinion was roughly evenly divided on the subject of the Lavi. In the US, there was considerable opposition to the Lavi program from the Pentagon due to the fear that the heavy financial costs would impair other military capabilities, there were also questions about the financial soundness of the project and that Lavi technologies may be shared with South Africa, which had a history of close military cooperation with Israel. The financial burden of developing the Lavi were such that the Governor of the Bank of Israel, Michael Bruno, publicly stated that Israel could not realistically afford the "luxury of producing fighter-aircraft" and would harm overall economic growth.


title: IAI Lavi

text: On 30 August 1987, Israel's cabinet conducted a decisive vote on whether to continue the development of the Lavi; this development was influenced by considerable lobbying by the U.S., who made several compensatory proposals in exchange for the cancellation. The vote was highly politicised, the Israeli Labor Party ordered its members to vote against the project. The Cabinet rejected the continuation at a margin of 12–11, with one cabinet member abstaining. Following the outcome of the vote, Lavi supporter Moshe Arens offered his resignation, refusing to be associated with the decision to terminate the aircraft. Shortly afterwards, Israel approved the purchase of 90 F-16Cs from the United States, which acted as an effective replacement to the Lavi. It was reported that China and South Africa were interested in continuing with the development of the Lavi.


title: IAI Lavi

text: When the Lavi project was canceled in 1987, a total of five airframes had been manufactured. Prototypes B-01 and B-02 had been completed, while B-03, B-04, and B-05 were incomplete. Parts from B-01 and B-02 were pulled to complete B-03. The gutted airframe of B-02 was subsequently placed on static display at the Israeli Air Force museum at Hatzerim Airbase; the remaining units, B-01, B-04 and B-05, were all ultimately scrapped. Two years after the project's cancelation, IAI completed the third Lavi prototype (B-03), which made its first flight on 25 September 1989. B-03 proceeded to serve as a technology demonstrator and as a flying testbed for various internal IAI development projects; the aircraft saw later use as a ground testbed as well.


title: IAI Lavi

text: While the Lavi project had been terminated without any production aircraft being produced, the development represented an important opportunity to demonstrate and advance the capabilities of Israel's aerospace industry. Many of the aircraft's subsystems, avionics, and components went on to be developed and made commercially available, fueling defense export sales and proving to be a lucrative business in its own right. The EL/M-2032 pulse doppler radar, which had originally been developed for use on the Lavi is one such example; it has since been exported and equipped upon a wide range of operational aircraft.


title: IAI Lavi

text: Despite the Lavi's cancellation, the investment in its development had significant results. The technological knowledge accumulated during the development contributed to the achievement of Israel's first launch of a satellite into space in 1988. It resulted in a new level in avionics systems, and contributed to Israel's high-tech boom of the 1990s by releasing into the economy the technological talents of around 5,000 Israeli scientists and engineers who had been employed on this one project; many, for example, were reemployed on the Arrow anti-ballistic missile program.


title: IAI Lavi

text: In July 2013, the IAF announced that the Alenia Aermacchi M-346 Master, an advanced trainer aircraft that it was in the process of procuring at the time, would receive the name Lavi in Israeli service; a total of 30 M-346s are to be operated by the service from 2014.


title: IAI Lavi

text: In 2008, aviation publishing house Jane's alleged that China's development of the Chengdu J-10 had benefited from technical information from the Lavi project, citing Russian engineers who claim to have heard this from Chinese colleagues. In 2007, the J-10's designer, Song Wencong (宋文骢), denied any connection with the Lavi, pointing to similarities with the Chengdu J-9 developed in the 1960s. This was echoed by PLAAF major Zhang Weigang in a 2012 interview. There have been no public statements or formal claims along those lines; by 2000, however, advanced technology transfer of any origin had become anathema to the US, which forced Israel to cancel a sale of Phalcon airborne early warning planes.


title: IAI Lavi

text: The IAI Lavi was a single-seat, single-engine multirole fighter aircraft, principally designed to conduct high-speed penetration and first-pass bombing missions while maintaining a high level of manoeuvrability and survivability. The Lavi was almost 1,300 kg lighter in empty weight than its contemporary F-16 block 30 (7,030 vs 8,300 kg)


title: IAI Lavi

text: It was envisioned that the Lavi's lifecycle costs would be considerably beneath those of the F-16, efforts were also made to achieve a lower procurement cost as well. Like the F-16, the Lavi was an aerodynamically unstable aircraft, employing a quadruplex-redundant digital fly-by-wire system in order to provide stability and control; this was one of the aircraft's more innovative features.


title: IAI Lavi

text: The Lavi was powered by a single Pratt & Whitney PW1120 turbofan engine, capable of generating 20,260 lb of thrust and enabling the aircraft to attain a maximum speed of Mach 1.85. The engine, which was derived from the Pratt & Whitney F100 that powered the F-16, was the only aspect of the aircraft that Eine acknowledged to have created a dependency upon the US. While carrying eight 750lb bombs the Lavi possessed a combat radius of 250 nmi; an alternative armament of 2,000 lb bombs enabled a 650 nmi combat radius. Possessing a 1.1:1 thrust-to-weight ratio while equipped with a combat payload, the airframe of the Lavi was designed to be capable of routinely withstanding up to 9g.


title: IAI Lavi

text: The Lavi employed a mainly traditional airframe, the majority of development focus being upon the avionics and systems to provide the aircraft's performance edge instead. In order to meet the low structural weight requirements imposed, the use of composite materials was employed in elements such as the wing and its substructure, as well as the fin and the skin. The forward fuselage was shaped in a manner that resulted in it naturally directing air into the engine intake and to avoid inlet blanking while flown at a sideslip condition.


title: IAI Lavi

text: According to Eine, the Lavi's main area of advancement over its contemporaries was the level of integration of avionics and onboard electronics; it was claimed that the Lavi was "more computerised than any other system in the world". A key innovation was the use of a quadruplex-redundant digital fly-by-wire flight control system, which was co-developed by Lear Siegler and IAI. If it had been brought into service, the Lavi may have become the first operational aircraft to employ fully digital flight controls.


title: IAI Lavi

text: IAI subsidiary Elta held responsibility for the electronic warfare self-protection systems. These are claimed to have been capable of rapid threat identification and automated response, incorporating a suite of active and passive countermeasures, such as power-managed noise and deception jamming systems. Both podded and internal countermeasures were to be used. Elta also developed the EL/M-2032 Doppler multi-mode radar for the Lavi, which was equipped with a programmable signal processor and was capable of various air-to-air and air-to-ground modes, including high-resolution mapping, terrain avoidance, and look-down/shoot-down functionality.


title: Hytale

text: Hytale is an upcoming sandbox game by Hypixel Studios. Production began in 2015 by developers from the "Minecraft" multiplayer server "Hypixel" with funding from Riot Games, who later bought the studio in 2020. The developers are aiming to release the game on PC, consoles and mobile devices.


title: Hytale

text: "Hytale" features a procedurally-generated fantasy world composed of blocks of numerous shapes arranged in a three-dimensional grid, featuring different biomes, creatures, and dungeons. Players can participate in minigames similar to those found on the "Hypixel" server. Players will be able to build and share mods and custom content using a set of browser-based and in-game tools.


title: Hytale

text: "Hytale" includes several procedurally-generated areas of the world known as "zones", made up of many biomes and mobs. This mode will feature RPG-styled combat and include dynamic boss encounters and dungeon exploration. "Hytale" will feature block-based construction and includes many different world editing and cinematic tools players can use in-game. It will feature a scripting system that allows players to create and execute code in-game, as well as a web-based 3D modeling, texturing, and animation toolkit based on CraftStudio which players can use to create custom assets for the game. The game will feature both official and community-run servers with the ability to implement custom features and minigames including player versus player (PvP) games.


title: Hytale

text: "Hytale" is being developed by Hypixel Studios for PC, consoles, and mobile devices. Originally the client was being developed in C# with the server technology in Java, but in 2022 they announced that they'd started rewriting the engine (both client and server) in C++ to enable them to more easily release the game across-platforms and also for the performance benefits. Directed by Aaron Donaghey, the Northern Ireland-based studio consists of over forty employees who split off from Hypixel Inc., the company behind the development of the Hypixel server in "Minecraft". Development of "Hytale" started in early 2015. The idea for "Hytale" arose due to EULA changes by Mojang in 2014 which blocked servers from having microtransactions that affected gameplay, leading to an 85% drop in the Hypixel server's revenue. The developers realized they were not in control of their project and decided to make their own stand-alone game. They originally wanted to avoid making a voxel-based game, but eventually decided to do so as they had experience in that genre from the Hypixel server in "Minecraft".


title: Hytale

text: Hypixel Studios was at first self-financed with revenue generated by the Hypixel server. The studio subsequently received support from Riot Games, which invested several million dollars in the studio, along with an advisory group that includes businessmen Dennis Fong, Rob Pardo, and Peter Levine. The studio was fully acquired by Riot Games in April 2020. "Hytale" was announced via a trailer in December 2018, with it amassing over 31 million views within a month. The game, originally intended to be playable in 2021 and then delayed in 2023, now doesn't have a possible launch window, due to an increase of the game's scope, including an engine rewrite in C++.


title: Hytale

text: "Hytale" was nominated in the Most Wanted Game category at the 2019 Golden Joystick Awards but lost to "Cyberpunk 2077". The game was also named the most anticipated at the 2021 Northern Ireland Game Awards.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The railway system in Great Britain is the oldest railway system in the world. The first locomotive-hauled public railway opened in 1825, which was followed by an era of rapid expansion. Most of the track is managed by Network Rail, which in 2017 had a network of of standard-gauge lines, of which were electrified. These lines range from single to quadruple track or more. In addition, some cities have separate metro, light rail and tram systems (including the extensive and historic London Underground). There are also many private railways (some of them narrow-gauge), which are primarily short lines for tourists. The main rail network is connected with that of continental Europe by the Channel Tunnel and High Speed 1 (originally the Channel Tunnel Rail Link), which fully opened in 1994 and 2007 respectively.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: In 2019, there were 1.738 billion journeys on the National Rail network, making the British network the fifth most used in the world (Great Britain ranks 23rd in world population). Unlike a number of other countries, rail travel in the United Kingdom has enjoyed a renaissance in recent years, with passenger numbers approaching their highest ever level (see usage figures below). This has coincided with the privatisation of British Rail, but the cause of this increase is unclear. The growth is partly attributed to a shift away from private motoring due to growing road congestion and increasing petrol prices, but also to the overall increase in travel due to affluence. Passenger journeys in Britain grew by 88% over the period 1997–98 to 2014 as compared to 62% in Germany, 41% in France and 16% in Spain.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The United Kingdom is a member of the International Union of Railways (UIC). The UIC country code for United Kingdom is 70. The UK has the 17th largest railway network in the world; despite many lines having closed in the 20th century, due to the Beeching cuts, it remains one of the densest networks. It is one of the busiest railways in Europe, with 20% more train services than France, 60% more than Italy, and more than Spain, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Portugal and Norway combined, as well as representing more than 20% of all passenger journeys in Europe. The rail industry employs 115,000 people and supports another 250,000 through its supply chain.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: After the initial period of rapid expansion following the first public railways in the early 19th century, from about 1900 onwards the network suffered from gradual attrition, and more severe rationalisation in the 1950s and 1960s. However, the network has again been growing since the 1980s. The UK was ranked eighth among national European rail systems in the 2017 European Railway Performance Index for intensity of use, quality of service and safety performance.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: To cope with increasing passenger numbers, there is a large programme of upgrades to the network, including Thameslink, Crossrail, electrification of lines, in-cab signalling, new inter-city trains and new high-speed lines.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: According to historians David Brandon and Alan Brooke, the railways brought into being our modern world:


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The railways started with the local isolated wooden wagonways in 1560s using horses. These wagonways then spread, particularly in mining areas. The system was later built as a patchwork of local lines operated by small private railway companies. Over the course of the 19th and early 20th centuries, these amalgamated or were bought by competitors until only a handful of larger companies remained (see Railway Mania). The entire network was brought under government control during the First World War and a number of advantages of amalgamation and planning were revealed. However, the government resisted calls for the nationalisation of the network (first proposed by 19th century Prime Minister William Gladstone as early as the 1830s). Instead, from 1 January 1923, almost all the remaining companies were grouped into the "big four": the Great Western Railway, the London and North Eastern Railway, the London Midland and Scottish Railway and the Southern Railway companies (there were also a number of other joint railways such as the Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway and the Cheshire Lines Committee as well as special joint railways such as the Forth Bridge Railway, Ryde Pier Railway and at one time the East London Railway). The "Big Four" were joint-stock public companies and they continued to run the railway system until 31 December 1947.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The growth in road transport during the 1920s and 1930s greatly reduced revenue for the rail companies. Rail companies accused the government of favouring road haulage through the subsidised construction of roads. The railways entered a slow decline owing to a lack of investment and changes in transport policy and lifestyles. During the Second World War the companies' managements joined together, effectively forming one company. A maintenance backlog developed during the war and the private sector only had two years to deal with this after the war ended. After 1945, for both practical and ideological reasons, the government decided to bring the rail service into the public sector.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: From the start of 1948, the "big four" were nationalised to form British Railways (latterly British Rail) under the control of the British Transport Commission. Although BR was a single entity, it was divided into six (later five) regional authorities in accordance with the existing areas of operation. Though there were few initial changes to the service, usage increased and the network became profitable. Regeneration of track and railway stations was completed by 1954. In the same year, changes to the British Transport Commission, including the privatisation of road haulage, ended the coordination of transport in Great Britain. Rail revenue fell and in 1955 the network again ceased to be profitable. The mid-1950s saw the rapid introduction of diesel and electric rolling stock, but the expected transfer back from road to rail did not occur and losses began to mount.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The desire for profitability led to a major reduction in the network during the mid-1960s, with ICI manager Dr. Richard Beeching commissioned by the government under Ernest Marples with reorganising the railways. Many branch lines (and a number of main lines) were closed because they were deemed uneconomic ("the Beeching Axe" of 1963), removing much feeder traffic from main line passenger services. In the second Beeching report of 1965, only the "major trunk routes" were selected for large-scale investment, leading many to speculate the rest of the network would eventually be closed. This was never implemented by BR.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Passenger services experienced a renaissance with the introduction of the InterCity 125 trains in the 1970s. Passenger levels fluctuated since then, increasing during periods of economic growth and falling during recessions. The 1980s saw severe cuts in government funding and above-inflation increases in fares, In the early 1990s, the five geographical Regions were replaced by a Sectored organisation, in which passenger services were organised into InterCity, Network SouthEast and Regional Railways sectors.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: British Rail operations were privatised during 1994–1997. Ownership of the track and infrastructure passed to Railtrack, whilst passenger operations were franchised to individual private sector operators (originally there were 25 franchises) and the goods services sold outright (six companies were set up, but five of these were sold to the same buyer). The government said privatisation would see an improvement in passenger services and satisfaction (according to the National Rail Passenger survey) has indeed gone up from 76% in 1999 (when the survey started) to 83% in 2013 and the number of passengers not satisfied with their journey dropped from 10% to 6%. Since privatisation, passenger levels have more than doubled, and have surpassed their level in the late 1940s. Train fares cost 2.7% more than under British Rail in real terms on average. However, while the price of anytime and off-peak tickets has increased, the price of Advance tickets has dramatically decreased in real terms: the average Advance ticket in 1995 cost £9.14 (in 2014 prices) compared to £5.17 in 2014.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Rail subsidies have increased from £bn in 1992–93 to £bn in 2015–16 (in current prices), although subsidy per journey has fallen from £ per journey to £ per journey. However, this masks great regional variation, as in 2014–15 funding varied from "£1.41 per passenger journey in England to £6.51 per journey in Scotland and £8.34 per journey in Wales."


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The public image of rail travel was severely damaged by a series of significant accidents after privatisation. These included the Hatfield accident, caused by a rail fragmenting due to the development of microscopic cracks. Following this, the rail infrastructure company Railtrack imposed over 1,200 emergency speed restrictions across its network and instigated an extremely costly nationwide track replacement programme. The consequent severe operational disruption to the national network and the company's spiralling costs set in motion a series of events which resulted in the collapse of the company and its replacement with Network Rail, a state-owned, not-for-profit company. According to the European Railway Agency, in 2013 Britain had the safest railways in Europe based on the number of train safety incidents.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: At the end of September 2003, the first part of High Speed 1, a high-speed link to the Channel Tunnel and onward to France and Belgium, was completed, significantly adding to the rail infrastructure of the country. The rest of the link, from north Kent to London St Pancras opened in 2007. A major programme of remedial work on the West Coast Main Line started in 1997 and finished in 2008.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: In the 2010s, many upgrades are under way, such as Thameslink, Crossrail, the Northern Hub and electrification of the Great Western Main Line. Electrification plans for the Midland Main Line and the Transpennine line between Manchester and Leeds have been scaled back. Construction of High Speed 2 is underway, with a projected completion date of 2026 for Phase 1 (London to Birmingham) and 2033 for Phase 2. A poll of 1,500 adults in Britain in June 2018 showed that 64% support renationalising Britain's railways.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Currently five franchises are under public ownership (effectively nationalised), three of them, LNER, Northern Trains and Southeastern are operators of last resort owned by the Department for Transport, whereas Transport for Wales Rail is owned by Transport for Wales, a Welsh-Government owned company, with no current plans to re-privatise the latter. On 1 April 2022, ScotRail was put under public ownership by the Scottish Government, under Transport Scotland as ScotRail Trains operating on the same day.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: During 2020, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, all train operating companies (TOCs) entered into emergency measures agreements (EMAs) with the UK and Scottish Governments. Normal franchise mechanisms have been amended, transferring almost all revenue and cost risk to the government, effectively 'renationalising' the network temporarily.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: In September 2020, the Government permanently got rid of the rail franchising system. On 20 May 2021, the Government announced a white paper that would transform the operation of the railways. The rail network will be partly renationalised, with infrastructure and operations brought together under the state-owned public body Great British Railways. Operations will be managed on a concessions model. According to the BBC, this represents the largest shake-up in the UK's railways since privatisation. On 18 November 2021, the government announced the biggest ever public investment in Britain’s rail network costing £96 billion and promising quicker and more frequent rail connections in the North and Midlands. The so called Integrated Rail Plan (IRP) includes substantially improved connections North-South as well as East-West and includes three new High Speed Lines.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Passenger services in Great Britain were divided into regional franchises and run by mostly private (that is, non-state owned) train operating companies from 1995 to 2020. These companies bid for seven- to eight-year contracts to run individual franchises. Most contracts in England are awarded by the Department for Transport (DfT), with the exception of Merseyrail, where the franchise is awarded by the Merseyside Passenger Transport Executive. In Scotland, contracts for ScotRail, is awarded by Transport Scotland, and in Wales, contracts for Transport for Wales Rail, is awarded by Transport for Wales, although the latter is currently publicly-owned with no plans for franchising in the near future and ScotRail is planned to be publicly owned in 2022. Initially, there were 25 franchises, some franchises have since been combined, others nationalised. There are also a number of local or specialised rail services operated on an open access basis outside the franchise arrangements. Examples include Heathrow Express and Hull Trains. Many franchises were effectively abolished due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with a new state-owned public body, Great British Railways, operating a concession contract system on the network from 2023.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: In the 2015–16 operating year, franchised services provided 1,718 million journeys totalling (64.7 billion billion passenger km) of travel, an increase over 1994–5 of 117% in journeys (from 761 million) and just over doubling the passenger miles. The passenger-miles figure, after being flat from 1965 to 1995, surpassed the 1947 figure for the first time in 1998 and continues to rise steeply.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The key index used to assess passenger train performance is the Public Performance Measure, which combines figures for punctuality and reliability. From a base of 90% of trains arriving on time in 1998, the measure dipped to 75% in mid-2001 due to stringent safety restrictions put in place after the Hatfield crash in October 2000. However, in June 2015 the PPM stood at 91.2% after a period of steady increases in the annual moving average since 2003 until around 2012 when the improvements levelled off.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Train fares cost 2.7% more than under British Rail in real terms on average. For some years, Britain has been said to have the highest rail fares in Europe, with peak-time and season tickets considerably higher than other countries, partly because rail subsidies in Europe are higher. However, passengers are also able to obtain some of the cheapest fares in Europe if they book in advance or travel at off-peak times or purchase 'day-return' tickets which cost little more than a single ticket.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: UK rail operators point out rail fare increases have been at a substantially lower rate than petrol prices for private motoring. The difference in price has also been blamed on the fact Britain has the most restrictive loading gauge (maximum width and height of trains that can fit through tunnels, bridges etc.) in the world which means any trains must be significantly narrower and less tall than those used elsewhere. This means British trains cannot be bought "off-the-shelf" and must be specially built to fit British standards.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Average rolling-stock age fell slightly from the third quarter of 2001–02 to 2017–18, from 20.7 years old to 19.6 years old, and recent large orders from Bombardier and its acquirer Alstom, CAF, Hitachi and Stadler brought down the average age to around 15 years by March 2021.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Although passengers rarely have cause to refer to either document, all travel is subject to the National Rail Conditions of Carriage and all tickets are valid subject to the rules set out in a number of so-called technical manuals, which are centrally produced for the network.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Below are the estimated total number of journeys using heavy rail transport in Britain for each financial year. (This table does not include Eurostar, Underground or light rail services)


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The following table is according to the Office of Rail and Road and includes open access operators such as Grand Central and Hull Trains.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: There are 2,576 passenger railway stations on the Network Rail network. This does not include the London Underground, nor other systems which are not part of the national network, such as heritage railways. Most date from the Victorian era and a number are in or on the edge of town and city centres. Major stations lie for the most part in large cities, with the largest conurbations (e.g. Liverpool, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Manchester) typically having more than one main station. London is a major hub of the network, with 12 main-line termini forming a "ring" around central London. Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester, Glasgow, Bristol and Reading are major interchanges for many cross-country journeys that do not involve London. However, some important railway junction stations lie in smaller cities and towns, for example York, Crewe and Ely. Some other places expanded into towns and cities because of the railway network. Swindon, for example, was little more than a village before the Great Western Railway chose to site its locomotive works there. In many instances geography, politics or military considerations originally caused stations to be sited further from the towns they served until, with time, these issues could be overcome (for example, Portsmouth had its original station at Gosport).


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: High-speed inter-city rail (above ) was first introduced in Great Britain in the 1970s by British Rail. BR had pursued two development projects in parallel, the development of a tilting train technology, the Advanced Passenger Train (APT), and development of a conventional high-speed diesel train, the High Speed Train (HST). The APT project was abandoned, but the HST design entered service as the British Rail Classes 253, 254 and 255 trains. The prototype HST, the Class 252, reached a world speed record for diesel trains of 143.2 mph, while the main fleet entered service limited to a service speed of 125 mph, and were introduced progressively on main lines across the country, with a rebranding of their services as the "InterCity 125". With electrification of the East Coast Main Line, high-speed rail in Great Britain was augmented with the introduction of the Class 91, intended for passenger service at up to 140 mph (225 km/h), and thus branded as the "InterCity 225". The Class 91 units were designed for a maximum service speed of 140 mph, and running at this speed was trialled with a 'flashing green' signal aspect under the British signalling system. The trains were eventually limited to the same speed as the HST, to 125 mph, with higher speeds deemed to require cab signalling, which as of 2010 was not in place on the normal British railway network (but was used on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link). A final attempt by the nationalised British Rail at High Speed Rail was the cancelled InterCity 250 project in the 1990s for the West Coast Main Line.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Post privatisation, a plan to upgrade the West Coast Main Line to speeds of up to 140 mph with infrastructure improvements were finally abandoned, although the tilting train Class 390 "Pendolino" fleet designed for this maximum speed of service were still built and entered service in 2002, and operates limited to 125 mph. Other routes in the UK were upgraded with trains capable of top speeds of up to 125 mph running with the introduction between 2000 and 2005 of Class 180 "Adelante" DMUs and the Bombardier Voyager DEMUs (Classes 220, 221 and 222).


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: The first implementation of high-speed rail up to 186 mph in regular passenger service in Great Britain was the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (now known as High Speed 1), when its first phase opened in 2003 linking the British end of the Channel Tunnel at Folkestone with Fawkham Junction in Kent. This is used by international only passenger trains for the Eurostar service, using Class 373 and Class 374 trains. The line was later extended all the way into London St Pancras in 2007.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: After the building of the first of a new Class 395 train fleet for use partly on High Speed 1 and parts of the rest of the UK rail network, the first domestic high-speed running over 125 mph (to about 140 mph) began in December 2009, including a special Olympic Javelin shuttle for the 2012 Summer Olympics. These services are operated by the South Eastern franchise.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: For replacement of the domestic fleet of InterCity 125 and 225 trains on the existing national network, the Intercity Express Programme was announced. In 2009 it was announced the preferred rolling stock option for this project was the Hitachi Super Express family of multiple units, and they entered service in 2017 on the Great Western Main Line and 2019 on the East Coast Main Line. The trains will be capable of a maximum speed of 140 mph with "minor modifications", with the necessary signalling modifications required of the Network Rail infrastructure in Britain likely to come from the phased rollout of the Europe-wide European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS).


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Following several studies and consultations on high-speed rail, in 2009 the UK Government formally announced the High Speed 2 project, establishing a company to produce a feasibility study to examine route options and financing for a new high-speed railway in the UK. This study began on the assumption the route would be a new purpose-built high-speed line connected to High-Speed 1 to the Channel tunnel and from London to the West Midlands, via Heathrow Airport, relieving traffic on the West Coast Main Line (WCML). Conventional high-speed rail technology would be used as opposed to Maglev. The rolling stock would be capable of travelling on the existing Network Rail infrastructure if required, with the route intersecting with the existing WCML and the East Coast Main Line (ECML). A second phase of the project is planned to reach further north to Manchester, Sheffield and Leeds, as well as linking into the Midland Main Line.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: In June 2014, Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne proposed a high-speed rail link Northern Powerhouse Rail (also known as High Speed 3 or High Speed North) between Liverpool and Newcastle/Sheffield/Hull. The line would utilise the existing route between Liverpool and Newcastle/Hull and a new route from to Sheffield will follow the same route to Manchester Victoria and then a new line from Victoria to Sheffield, with additional tunnels and other infrastructure.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: In August 2009 the speeds of the fastest trains operating in Great Britain capable of a top speed of over 125 mph were as follows:


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: In 2011 the fastest timetabled start-to-stop run by a UK domestic train service was the Hull Trains 07.30 King's Cross to Hull, which covered the 125.4 km (78 miles) from Stevenage to Grantham in 42 minutes at an average speed of 179.1 km/h (111.4 mph). This is operated by a Class 180 diesel unit running "under the wires" on this East Coast route. This was matched by several Leeds to London Class 91-operated East Coast trains if their two-minute recovery allowance for this section is excluded from the public timetable.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: A number of towns and cities have rapid transit networks. Underground technology is used in the Glasgow subway, Merseyrail centred on Liverpool, London Underground centred on London, London Overground and the London Docklands Light Railway centred on London, and the Tyne and Wear Metro centred on Newcastle upon Tyne.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Light rail systems in the form of trams are in Birmingham, Croydon, Manchester, Nottingham, Sheffield and Edinburgh. These systems use a combination of street running tramways and, where available, reserved right of way or former conventional rail lines in some suburbs. Blackpool has the one remaining traditional tram system. Monorails, heritage tramways, miniature railways and funiculars also exist in several places. In addition, there are a number of heritage (mainly steam) standard and narrow gauge railways, and a few industrial railways and tramways. Some lines which appear to be heritage operations sometimes claim to be part of the public transport network; the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway in Kent regularly transports schoolchildren.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Most major cities have some form of commuter rail network. These include Belfast, Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, London and Manchester.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: There are four main goods operating companies in the UK, the largest of which is DB Cargo UK (formerly DB Schenker, formerly English Welsh & Scottish (EWS)). There are also several smaller independent operators including Mendip Rail. Types of freight carried include "intermodal" – in essence containerised freight – and coal, metals, oil, and construction materials. The Beeching Cuts, in contrast to passenger services, greatly modernised the goods sector, replacing inefficient wagons with containerised regional hubs. Freight services had been in steady decline since the 1930s, initially because of the reduction in manufacturing and then road haulage's cost advantage in combination with higher wages. Since 1995, however, the amount of freight carried on the railways has increased sharply due to increased reliability and competition, as well as international services. In 2000, the Department for Transport's "Transport Ten Year Plan" called for an 80% increase in rail freight.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Statistics on freight are specified in terms of the weight of freight lifted, and the "net tonne kilometre", being freight weight multiplied by distance carried. 116.6 million tonnes of freight was lifted in the 2013–4 period, against 138 million tonnes in 1986–7, a decrease of 16%. However, a record 22.7 billion net tonne kilometres (14 billion net ton miles) of freight movement were recorded in 2013–4, against 16.6 billion (10.1 billion) in 1986–7, an increase of 38%. Coal made up 36% of the total "net tonne kilometre", though its share was declining. Rail freight had increased its market share since privatisation (by net tonne kilometres) from 7.4% in 1998 to 11.1% in 2013. Growth was partly due to more international services including the Channel Tunnel and Port of Felixstowe, which is containerised. Nevertheless, as of 2008, network bottlenecks and insufficient investment in catering for 9' 6" high shipping containers restricted growth.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: A symbolic loss to the rail freight industry in Great Britain was the custom of the Royal Mail, which from 2004 discontinued use of its 49-train fleet, and switched to road haulage after a near 170-year-preference for trains. Mail trains had long been part of the tradition of the railways in Great Britain, famously celebrated in the film "Night Mail", for which W. H. Auden wrote the poem of the same name. Although Royal Mail suspended mail trains in January 2004, this decision was reversed in December of the same year, and Class 325s are now used on some routes including between London, Warrington and Scotland.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: At the time of privatisation, the rolling stock of British Rail was sold to the new operators, as in the case of the freight companies, or to the three ROSCOs (rolling stock companies) which lease or hire stock to passenger and freight train operators. Leasing is relatively commonplace in transport since it enables operating companies to avoid the complication associated with raising sufficient capital to purchase assets; instead, assets are leased and paid for from ongoing revenue. Since 1994 there has been a growth in smaller spot-hire companies that provide rolling stock on short-term contracts. Many of these have grown thanks to the selling-off of locomotives by the large freight operators, especially EWS.


title: Rail transport in Great Britain

text: Unlike other major players in the privatised railway system of Great Britain, the ROSCOs are not subject to close regulation by the economic regulatory authority. They were expected to compete with one another, and they do, although not in all respects.