Since most of us have limited space, in general our trains are much shorter than prototype. Which leads me to a question of how long a real world train is too big to backup into a stub end yard or anywhere for that matter. Does the prototype back up mile long trains at all with power at only one end? What kind of distance and/or speed restrictions would it have?
Yes. But they avoid it if they can.
There is no specific distance limitation, generaly if its going to be shoved over a mile or two by plan it will have a caboose or “shoving platform”. That’s because whether its one car or 1000 cars, there has to be somebody protecting the shove, a person riding the leading car watching where they are going, unless they know the track is clear. The speed is limited to 20 mph, whether they have one car or 1000 cars. In a one off situation then they wouldn’t have a shoving platform.
Just outside of the yard limits about 3 miles in one of the terminals I worked there was a small lumber company that would get 2-3 cars a week.
No passing siding in the nearby area so we’d ride the shove from the yard in order to service customer. Only other option was going 15 miles out of the way and then running around.
On the Chessie (C&O) we would back 80-90 empty coal hoppers around three miles to the load out three to four times a week.
I suppose NS still backing mile long empty hopper trains to a flood loader on the Pokey. I suppose CSX does to at some loadouts.
Speed will depend on the railroad operating rules some may allow for track speed reverse moves while others will not.
Western Pacific detour to SP rails at Binney Jct California when High Line temporarily shut down due to rock slide in the Canyon.
The train I was watching derailed on the connecting track while backing.
Detour by Donald Schmitt, on Flickr
The first thing you do during a shoe movement is bunch in the slack from the front of the train to the rear, then shove the cars to their destination.
In Marion, Ohio, the Erie (later Erie Lackawanna) had their main route going through town, which was shared with the New York Central (later Penn Central), and just west of the crossing with the C&O and N&W, the Erie had the Dayton branch heading southwest out of Marion. The Erie’s Marion yards were just to the west of the junction on the east-west main. So, trains coming up from Dayton to Marion would pull past the junction and then back into the yard. Likewise, trains from Marion to Dayton would back out of the yard and past the junction to then pull forward and down the Dayton branch.
Kevin
As explained above by others, yes long trains can back up…
And many commuter passenger trains operate as “push-pull” operations. They have a loco at one end, and commuter cars with a control stand on the other end.
They are coupled with tight lock couplers, and the loco pushes the train in one direction and pulls it in the other. The engineer can run the train from either end.
This goes all the way back to 1959…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Push–pull_train
Sheldon
I know once they made a 8000 ft manifest back up about 7 miles to clear a crossover so they could go around a broken rail.
Jeff
Did they place a engine on the rear or use a company truck for flag protection at crossings or did some poor sap have to ride the side of the end car or did this happen in the days of the caboose??
It happened a couple of years ago. As far as I know, the conductor rode the rear car. I don’t think it had a distributed power unit on the rear.
Jeff
Thanks Jeff… I have no doubts that poor man had some stiff and sore muscles.
I know that the Bessemer and Lake Erie and Buffalo and Pittsburgh both did so in Butler PA. BPRR even has a pretty spiffy piece of equipment for doing it
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2041747
No humble shoving platform here! Has more in common with a commuter cab car than anything else.
Streamliners use wye tracks to turn around and face the direction from which they came. When a Streamliner entered the station and after everyone had gotton off, the locomotives that were pulling the train uncouple and move to a sidding, while a yard switcher pulls the train out of the station, takes it through the wye track to turn it around, mooves from the back end of the train to the front, and pushes it back into the track it came on so the observation car is facing the track bumper and the locomotives are also wyed around and recoupled to the front of the train, facing the direction away from the station.
All passenger trains in St.Louis backed into the station…IIRC some was wyed before they could reverse move into the station…The locomotives was removed for servicing and a switcher(TRRA?) removed the REA,Baggage mail and diner. The diner had to be throughly cleaned and inspected by the FDA before it was allowed to be restocked.
On subdivisions with only one or two 6,000’ sidings and 10,000’ trains, a branch line junction was the saviour. One train would back down the branch and wait for the opposing train. Since the meets usually involved a considerable wait, it provided time for the conductor to walk back towards the head end for the eventual departure. The alternative of heading down the branch, and later backing up, was less efficient but also happened.
We may pity the poor crewman having to walk two miles over rough terrain in miserable weather, but that was not something that senior management in their warm offices cared greatly about!
My guess would be if a real railroad had to back a mile long freight into a freight yard that they wouldn’t do it as one unit. Maybe the engine(s) up front would take part of the train and back it in, then a switcher from the yard would come out to the main and bring the other part of the train in. Of course, if they had to do that a lot, they’d probably change the track arrangement to stop having to back in.
Or they would add engines to the rear of the train and have the conductor to protect the shove and sound the bell or horn if there was a need.
That would be cheaper then adding a track-considering the NIMBY’s protests and possible class action lawsuits from various animal right groups,tree huggers and those NIMBYs… Then there’s the EPA that would need to make studies on the environmental impact of adding a track…
And why tie up a yard job and add even more terminal dwell time?
Used to back 100+car trains into yards fairly often in the 1960s and 1970s. Conductor would drop off at the beginning of the track (moving slow because you’re in the yard). Flagman would ride the caboose (or cabin car) to protect the shove and stop with the air before the end of the track, then the conductor would make a cut in the clear and set whatever wouldn’t fit in the first track into another track. No radios needed. I don’t know what they do nowadays.
Hello all,
In Denver, Colorado, the Amtrak train backs down the tracks into Union Station.
Last time we rode the train I believe the conductor said they back the train about a mile.
Hope this helps.