How far usually can you hear the train whistle?

Trains.com General Discussion (Trains.com)
1

In a typical city, such as Great Toronto Area, How far generally u can hear a train whistle? what is the most diffifcult object/sound berrier for the horn to overcome? tall skyscrapes? modern highways?

If not speaking about too quiet place (such as some northern small towns in Canada), I found that the maximum distance to hear a whistle is about 4.2km(sorry we use KM here) and it’s a very quiet night in the quiet semi-rural Scarborough city of Toronto, the whistle is so faint that only a good pair of ears(as mine :P) can detect it. I wonder how it is possible for the whistle to be heard for 100KM in Alaska as reported in some science book, sure it is a place almost no human inhabitants and no background noise?

BTW, is the horn DB different from train to train? like some horn is loud and some are weak? isn’t there is a regulation about the DB level?

It is part of my analysis of physics courses to say how sound wave can be spreaded, so the more details the more appreciated.

THANK YOU.

2

Regardless of what the song says, you can NOT hear the whistle blow 100 miles. [:D]

3

On a good day I can hear a horn 7 or 8 miles in the distance. On a bad day it’s half a mile.

4

Thank you for the reply. btw, how do u define a good or a badday? what’s the condition? where do you live? background noise? Any sound barrier or obstacle?

Or is it simply the train didn’t blow its horn on that bad day, but indeed blown on that good day?

5

Well, it’s not that chu-chu song :stuck_out_tongue: it’s a scientific book.

6

On quiet and still nights, I can easily hear the horns in Clearing Yard, about a mile away and occasionally from the IHB, about 2 1/2 miles away. I hear the squealing from Clearing’s retarders almost any time.

7

Keep in mind weather conditions play a part. In the humid summer months, I can hear that thing a long ways off. The most I’ve ever heard around here was 11 crossings away for an outgoing train, 9 crossings away for an incoming, both at night, with no highway noise and deep-pitched horns. In fact, I can often hear the train come rumbling out of the plant long before it even appears or blows its horn the first time. Rivers also seem to carry the sound well, and hills nearby will also seem to help carry the sound, as well as producing the lovely echo. In the winter, I’m lucky if I hear thar horn 1 crossing away. The pitch of the horn also plays a role. As would be expected, those deep-sounding horns can be heard in the distance far more often than the high-pitched ones. Some horns also seem louder than others right from the start, so starting volume of course makes a difference. In a city, skyscrapers will hinder the sound if they’re in the way, but the main problem for you is all the road noise. You’ll surely have a better time at night.

8

I live in a pretty dense urban New York City neighborhood with lots of hi-rise apartments around, and I can hear the Long Island Railroad’s airhorns 1 mile away on their main line.

From the speed of the doppler change, I can usually tell if it’s an EMU commuter train versus that of a coach train pulled by a DM30AC dual-mode diesel loco…

Years ago, I used to be able to tell when an LIRR GP38-2 is passing by here at my house one mile away from the main, because in addition to the airhorn you’d hear the LOUD jackhammer bang-bang-bang-bang rumble of its normally-aspirated non-turbocharged engine. The Geep 38’s are long gone though. :frowning:

The new DM30ACs are nowhere near as loud as the GP38-2s used to be…

9

Wind direction is also a significant factor. If the wind is blowing from the east, I can hear the UP whistling in Austin, some 8-10 miles east of where I live. Most days, the wind is from the west, and nary a sound.

Art

10

Well, the Iowa Northern tracks are about 4 miles from me and if it’s a realatively quiet day (not more than 10MPH wind) I can hear the air horns for each crossing that they blow for (3 in town, and one just outside of town). It’s not too hard to hear. Heck, one day when they crossed my road (4miles down) the horns were actually almost loud! It was just enough to disrupt a conversation.

Also, if its a quiet day (little or no wind) I can hear the rumbling sound of the moving cars.

11

At least once in my life I could hear the train “whistle” (isn’t it really a series of 5 horns?) for about 350 miles. It was the night my wife and I had a bedroom on Amtrak’s The Three Rivers from Akron to Chicago. The sleeper was placed directly behind the locomotives and for the next eight hours we heard the engineer blow the horn for every single grade crossing. By the time we arrived, we not only had missed a night’s sleep, she was ready to kill me should I ever suggest Amtrak again. I dreaded the return train trip needlessly; there were some head-end and other cars in front of ours and we had a most pleasant journey.

Living but a few blocks from a busy CSX ex-B&O grade crossing I can attest to the difference atmosphere makes to the distance the horn sound travels. Some nights I hardly hear anything, sometimes in the summer it seems the eastbounds are coming right into my bedroom!

I miss whistles. Nothing stirs, excites, or grabs the attention like an honest-to-God whistle, whether it be on a steam locomotive, an interurban, or, needless to say, a ship. I doubt any poets or writers will ever rhapsodize about a Nathan Chime Horn.

12

I hear em as far as 3 miles some nights. I know that as long they dont short toot on that main everything is fine. I almost can tell which power is going thru. The Coal screams, Pacer Stacks musical, military just wails and so on.

However the whistle of the EBT pulling in off Mike #17 is in my memory like it was yesterday.

13

When I used to live in Ravenna, OH for 11 years, the tracks were about two miles away from me (they are now three since I live in Firestone Park, OH). I used to be able to hear alot at Ravenna, even on one of my “family” get togther tapes.

You hear the horn then a bunch of clattering (NS trains go 60 mph through there, CSX goes 45) Usually on NS, you could hear the doppler effect in action, the horn would sound as if it were coming, and then it would kind of make that “narrrrrrwwww” noise, then you would hear it in the distance blowing four miles or so away.

I could tell if it was a Dash 9. CSX, on the other hand was quieter. Only going 45 mph in all, I used to hear the SD40-2’s, that were loud, like a church organ, and even the GE Wide and Narrow Noses, that sound sort of quiet.

Sometimes on REALLY quiet days, I would hear a slight “ding-ding-ding-ding…” of the crossing gates lowering in the distance at Diamond St. (2 miles away) in Ravenna, OH.

I could tell what type of load it was, because the coal trains would go “bang bang bang bang…” the intermodal’s would create a sort of swooshing sound and the manifest would just be clattering. The nightly Amtrak, well, for starters, I could tell the P42’s horn anywhere. It sounds kind of high pitch.

But it used to go 69 mph through Ravenna, and you would hear it just toot, it never blew longs. The doppler effect could be heard by those two, and the passenger cars and roadrailers sound the same, they make a rattling noise.

Rich

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14

The closest I get to any rail line from my home is NS’s Michigan Line, approximately 12 miles due north, milepost 67.5, at a spot known as Leoni, Michigan. Many evenings (or mornings), I can hear the whistles between Grass Lake (mp 65) and CP East Jackson (mp 72.7), roughly in a 12-15 mile arc from my house.

Ian

15

I live 1 mile away from the north shore senic railroad and i can hear the nathan air chime on our NW5 at my house…BUT I can hear our SD18 nathan P5 at least 4 mi on a good day and our GP 30 Leslie RS5T up to 7 mi away if the winds in my direction.

16

In the spring it is hard to hear the train whistle over the tornado sirens. =)

17

I live about 3/4 mile from NS’s Harrisburg line. I can hear the horns clearly everytime. If the trains are slugging uphill, I can hear the roar of the locomotives. On a quite day, I can also hear the cars themselves. Coal trains sound very different from intermodal and intermodal from mixed freight.

Nick

18

Well, there are significant differences between whistles and airhorns, one of which is that an airhorn is much louder. If it reverberated, you may be able to hear it 100KM (notice KM, not M)

19

Hi, anyone can prove that? in order to hear 100km, what circumstance u need?

20

Thanx for the reply.

However, as I did a research on google map, and looked at what you have described being ‘2miles away’ in Ravenna, OH, the whole town(Ravenna) only span about 1 mile in diameter… I wonder how you measure it to be 2miles…maybe you live really off the town? The Diamond St, is located in the south part of the town and there are only 2 crossing gates there.