why do RR’s run trains contrary to normal right left lanes,i.e.,engineer in the middle on double tracks?Would it not be safer to have the engineer on the outside or ditch side?
Some situations require left hand running. On Cajon pass the steeper track is used for downhill mostly and it’s the south track, therefore at frost the tracks swap sides with a flyover and they run lefthanded. On the former CNW lines in chicago it’s because the arrangment of the passenger stations the commuters use.
Huh?
In most cases where double track (as opposed to two-main-track CTC) is still in operation, trains keep to the right–with the engineer on the right side of the cab, he is on the outside.
With most accidents, it makes little more difference which side of the cab you’re on than it would make to be on a certain side of a crash-landing plane. And, at least on railroads of today, if it isn’t the engineer who’s on the side nearest the adjacent train, it’s someone else.
You mean it isn’t who gets to the engine first gets to choose?
[%-)]
No, It’s who calls shotgun first on the way to the head end.[;)]
Which trains run on which track in multiple track territory is a function of what is required to keep the territory fluid…does one or more trains have ‘station work’ at a particular location…has a train activated a defect detector and needs to stop and inspect the train…has a train had an undesired emergency application fo the brakes and needs to be inspected…has a train exceeded the Hours of Service Law and is stopped waiting on it’s recrew…does the operational priority of trains dictate that one train must pass another…all of these situations and more enter into the Dispatchers decisions of which trains must operate on which tracks over a territory.
While West on #1 and East on #2 tracks is easiest to implement (and is generally preferable because of the availability of set off spurs for bad orders as a hold over from the Current of Traffic signal systems on multiple track territory) situations and prioritys dictate which track a train operates on.
Baltacd brings up a point. csx has a yard here at our local gm plant and cars are picked up and dropped off in the yard all the time.so they use the crossovers to get the other trains around.sometimes just after the yard and sometimes down by the csx track building.
stay safe
Joe