Has there been any suggestion or technology out there that would indicate the desire for the railroads to control locomotives by means of a person at a computer desk at a yard office?
Running remotes from the yard office may be technologically feasible but the potential for accidents is so high as to make it impractical and unrealistic.
That, and you’d still need someone on the ground to uncouple cars, tie handbrakes, and operate handthrow switches.
Aren’t some humpyard engines controlled by a central yard computer when shoving cuts of cars over the hump? They still have to have an engineer onboard. I seem to remember reading that this type of system is automated once the first car gets to the top of the hump. In other words the same computer that correctly lines the switches for the cars as they roll down into the bowl of the yard automatically cues the locomotive to pu***he next car over via a radio remote control system…
Certainly technically feasible, even to throwing the switches, but, as mentioned, it’s the cuts and couples that pose the problem. Unlike a model railroad, there are no uncoupling magnets buried under the track [swg]. Safety continues to be an issue, unless there are no people or other crews in the area.
A local cogen plant uses an RC switcher to advance cars through the unloader. I’ve never seen it, but it’s possible they do so via some sort of console. When shuffling strings of cars to and from the unloader, the locomotive is manually operated.
So they’re probably working on it right now. 
Dave
http://www.dpdproductions.com
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