I was poundering if railroads had runaway ramps, lengthen to a mile long. If they lose control going down hill in mountainous terrain with helpers attached or not. Like on highways when truckers lose control of their truck. It has that little hump to slow it down.
Have you tried searching for this? Maybe without the word “ramp” since that would only possibly apply to old time piggyback usage? Try “runaway” or some such. Or did you just want to post?
There was an article on in Trains magazine many years ago. On a steep downhill grade, there was a switch to a spur that sloped uphill from the main. The sole purpose of the spur was to safely stop runaway trains. It was manned by a signalman whose job was to set the switch to the spur ahead of any runaways. The loco engineer would signal a runaway by blowing the whistle. I don’t remember the location.
Found this from Google search for steepest railroad grade: The Saulda Grade in North Carolina at one time had two runaway tracks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saluda_Grade
Search for “runaway tracks” found:
Railway Review Vol 58 - Feb 12, 1916 has an article about a collision at Rockridge Tenn. The collision was not a runnaway, but there was a runaway track at that location.
Railway Preservation News Forum - Runaway Safety Tracks
I wonder if the OP is using the European term for what Americans typically call ‘grade’ or ‘hill’. As noted, many railroads had runaway tracks, Saluda’s being particularly well-documented both in arrangement and operation.
A problem is that many of the methods used on ‘runaway truck roads’ (humps of gravel, etc.) won’t work effectively on runaway trains. Wheels have to remain supported on rails and guided by flanges to avoid a pileup and hence there is a limitation both due to adhesion and presumable brake fade or failure. Likewise you would not want sharp or heavy retardation of the leading cars with a trailing load. I have to wonder if, in many cases, the track is intended as aform of ‘triage’, arranging to cause a more-or-less-catastrophic stoppage of the train, but away from the main line proper.
I wonder if a method like sequential spring retarders would produce adequate braking, at an appropriate rate, to be useful on a runaway track.
If they were to use retarders, would they need a separate track? What problems would unengaged retarders cause to a regular mainline track vs the cost and problems having a second track for the retarders? At the very least a separate track needs land, and a switch, and trains do sometimes split switches.
Once again the scope is totally underestimated.
Retarders are designed to slow a car or two from less than 10 mph down to maybe stop. they are not designed to stop a train moving 60 mph. At 6 mph on a single car, you can put fairly substantial clamping force on the wheels. With a 5000 ton train moving 60 mph, if you clamp the wheels on the lead cars the following cars will just shove them off their trucks (just like when a car derails, the trucks dig in and stop, and the car comes off the trucks).
Most runaway tracks are designed to divert a train away from the main and then pile it up away from the main or to stop a couple cars that rollout of an industry (way more common than a runaway train.) On a major railroad, trains run away maybe once every 5-10 years. Cars roll away maybe three or four times a year.
You would need a couple miles of track to stop a train (assuming you could control it). If you are going to build a slope up, then you would need a slope roughly equivalent of the slope down.
By the way, if you have a slope up, once you stop the train, how do you keep it on the slope up (its a runaway because the brakes aren’t working or can’t hold the train.) The train would roll back out of the sloped track the other way and continue see-sawing until it stopped in the low spot.
On Saluda Hill, the switches at the runaway tracks (there were two, originally) were set to divert a train from the main, and the engineer of a train coming down the hill would give the switchtender a signal if he had his train under control so that the switchtender would line the switch(es) for the main.
Awe come on now. That’s a little harsh. It sounds like the work of a curious mind. There’s nothing wrong with that. Besides, couldn’t every question posed on these forums elicit the same answer? Where would that get us?
The whole video is worth watching, but skip to the 9 minute mark to see the section on the runaway tracks at Saluda.
The definitive article on the Saluda Grade and its “safety tracks”:
“Saluda - America’s steepest mainline grade” by Clodfelter, Frank - from Trains, November 1984, pg. 26 &etc. |
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Fortunately, it’s available in “PDF” format here:
http://www.polkcounty.org/saludagrade/saluda%20grade.pdf
From:
http://www.polkcounty.org/saludagrade/the_saluda_grade.html
http://www.historicsaluda.org/?page_id=448
It was even used once or twice in the diesel era 1964 and 1971 - see:
“Selected railroad reading: The other side of Saluda - memories of Saluda Grade”, by McCall, Charles C., from Trains, May 1981, pgs. 31 - 32.
See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saluda_Grade
- Paul North.
I agree with Murphy Siding, that last remark was totally uncalled for. It’s not necessary to belittle anyone’s questions.
Thanks, Paul, for the reference. I remembered reading the article, for I was quite interested in the grade, for I have long been intrigued by it.–but I did not remember that it was printed more than thirty years ago.
I have been down the grade twice, and up it once, always on a passenger train.
You’re welcome, Johnny.
Any recollections you can share with us ?
- Paul North.
My thoughts exactly; maybe a bad day. Thank the Lord, I have never had one - that I can remember!
Danke!
dubch87,
That is an excellent video in the way it explains all of the technicalities of taking heavy trains down such a steep grade. The precision of the method is amazing.
Paul, what I remember particularly from my first trip down (from Asheville to Hayne, in 1964) was sitting in an empty roomette, talking with the conductor and flagman–I do not remember which two of us shared the upholstered seat and which one sat on the non-upholstered seat. I had bouth a roundtrip ticket to Spartanburg, and when I told the conductor that I was going right back on #27, he told me to get off at Hayne–to make sure that I was not left in Spartanburg (27, 28, 33, and 34 were scheduled to be in Spartanburg at the same time, with enough time to make any connection). Going back up was different, for we met the weedkiller train as it came down, spraying poisoned oil, at the last siding at the bottom. I do not remember just what the problem with our sanders was, but we had great trouble going up, taking more than an hour as I recall.
I also remember going in to Asheville that morning from Black Mountain–taking my first ride on the Asheville Special–I was attending a conference in Montreat (two miles north of Black Mountain), and my roommate drove me down to Black Mountain after I had told him I planned to walk down.
My second trip down, from Knoxville to Columbia, in 1967, was also unspectacular. I knew, on both trips, that great care was to be taken before and during the descent.
[quote user=“NDG”]
C.1900 CPR had run away tracks West of the Divide where the switch was lined normal for the run away track.
There was an adjacent shanty for the switch tender who would line the switch thru for the Main for uphill trains ( Duh! ) and for downhill movements ONLY when he received a Whistle Signal from the Engineer that he had his train under control.
A sad thing about these forums are folks who always seem to have something nasty to say similar to Mr. Midget.
No, he is NOT alone.
Not quite the example one might want to present to younger folk who could be looking to the Elders for guidance and reassurance for advice?
We all know how dumb we were and felt on the first day on the job on the Rwy?
I trained a new-hire decades ago and said we can do this the Company Way, sit inside and read the Rules and Safety Booklets, OR we can go outside and look at the Railway itself.
I walked him to a Switch ( Turnout ) and showed him how a flanged wheel could cross the other rail at the Frog. He had wondered about that already. I then gave him my key and let him ‘throw’ the Switch, the correct place and how to stand and observe how the points moved in relation to the handle. A brief talk on targets and the position that the switch should be locked and left. Yard switches often had hooks.
I then took him down to a cut of cars and illustrated how a coupler knuckle worked with the operating lever and that one had to pull the knuckle open and sometimes move the whole drawbar over to line it up.
DO NOT BE COUPLED in here, no matter what!!
Safety First!!
A lesson on coupling air hoses, and angle cocks, with no pressure, just to see how, and how to stand over the rail.
Then a hand brake up high, as cars still had running boards on the roof, and the reason for the adjacent retainer.
There was a GP9 on hand for another train, and he learned the basics in motion of ’
In the video the reduction of the leading consist’s dynamic brake around the tight curve was very revealing. never had thought about turning the outside rail turn over but does make sense.