tnagle192034Thank you so much for all of that information it will be very helpful! I was wondering one thing. what format is the length in? feet? amount of cars?
CSX state length in FEET. The length of each car is calculated from the length field in the UMLER (Universal Machine Language Equipment Register) that cars in Interchage Service MUST be registered and most of a carriers non-interchange cars are also registered. There are a number of Car Service Rules the carriers must comply with about which cars can be Interchanged between carriers without restrictions.
In addition to the train length displayed on the Train Documents for a train, some Defect Detectors will announce a train length over the road radio channel along with the Defect Report for the train, Defect Detectors will also announce the number of axles that were inspected for the train - a number which should agree with the axle count on the Train Documents. Length announced by Defect Detectors can be at varience from the length shown on the Train Documents depending on whether the slack is bunched or stretched when passing over the Defect Detector.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
I think by 1980 almost all ETTs, and still today, give siding capacity in feet. Some at one time gave both car and footage capacity.
I recall seeing one in later years stated the car capacity was in 50 ft car length.
Jeff
CSSHEGEWISCHI'm not sure of the current practice but I have some older ETT's that list siding length by number of 40-foot cars.
Car Length measurement was common in the days before computer generated Train Documentation. Back in those days there was no 'easy' way to determine the length of each car and there were fewer car types and lengths.
My Father and I both worked the same yard in Baltimore - 30-40 years apart. He would regale me with stories of all the room the yard had to handle its traffic load - the era of 36 foot, 40 foot and the rare 50 foot cars. When I worked the yard the predominate cars were 89 foot auto racks and high cube box cars intermixed with 60 foot boxes and 53 foot gons - rare was a 40 or 50 foot car; needless to say my perception of the yard was the it was band box small and had too much traffic for its track space.
Siding length specified in Employee Timetables is 'measured' between Clearance Points. When push comes to shove - it is possible get a little extra 'length' by bunching the slack and using all the track space between the signals that govern the siding.
Tha ABSOLUTE LAST THING you want to hear a Train Dispatcher utter "What do you mean you don't fit!"
croteauddtnagle192034: This thread is from over 20 years ago and seeing it brough back vivid memories of old posters, such as Anonymous, the late edbysard and his late wife Mookie! Concerning an interesting tidbit that I personally saw as a kid probably 60-65 years ago in Colton, Calif., reference your inquiry, tnagle192034, was a very wide move, obviously arranged by towermen (3) and dispatchers (2). There were two main tracks, six track altogether. A gigantic cylinder was on Main 2, and it was moved onto a well-used sidetrack that had manual crossovers on each side of the main street in town. Another train came on Main 1, and passed without incident. Then the big cylinder was moved back onto Main 2, and its train took off! Imagine how exciting that all was for a young kid! Your post inquiry triggered that memory. Hope you found it as exciting as I did decades ago!
edblysard & mookie were not husband and wife. Ed was a trainman in Houston. mookie was railfan from middle America. Both are missed.
Clearance moves have specific 'wires' that govern their movement across the railroad from the shipments origin to its destination. That wire and its restrictions are required reading for everyone, train crew, yard personnel and Train Dispatchers that are involved in the movement. The higher and wider, the more restrictions the shipment will have. Those restrictions will include what specific track the shipment must occupy at specific location because of fixed geographical objects or man made obstructions. There may be restrictions where a train carrying the restricted car(s) CANNOT pass another train. There may be restrictions where trains with the restricted car(s) can pass trains without restricted cars but one train must be stopped and the other train can only pass at 10 MPH.
A number of years ago, CSX took delivery of a trainload of wind generation blades and nacells - that had myriad of restrictions over all the routes from Baltimore to New Castle, PA (end of my territory) a distance of approximately 300 rail miles and four non-InterDivisional crew districts. As I recollect it took three weeks to get the trainload shipment from origin to off the division at New Castle and moving toward its ultimate destination, which I believe was interline through Chicago. I believe after charting my way through the restrictions there were about 50 miles where the shipment could move 'without restrictions' - the single track miles between sidings on the Old Main Line subdivision between Baltimore and Point of Rocks. It too two or more crews to get the train across each of the crew districts. Needless to say, this ended up being a one time shipment. The train was too heavily restricted to be able to move it with all the other traffic that was competiting for track time.
There are a number of online webcam and most of those will have corresponding scanners. It is very interesting as a railfan to watch these webcams and also listen in to the interaction between crews, dispatchers, and MOW crews. Also the defect detectors will chirp in info also. Very good entertainment.
ed
BaltACDedblysard & mookie were not husband and wife. Ed was a trainman in Houston. mookie was railfan from middle America. Both are missed.
Indeed. Both are definitely missed. As I recall, though, Mookie's husband was named Ed, too.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
BaltACD Tha ABSOLUTE LAST THING you want to hear a Train Dispatcher utter "What do you mean you don't fit!"
Tonight we put fitting into a siding to the test. Coming into our away from home terminal, instead of going down to the depot the dispatcher wanted us to go into the siding and change out there. We were 8200 feet long and, from experience, there's 8600 feet in the siding between the signals.
Even though I new we would fit, PTC makes it hard to get in the clear when clearance is tight. I was down to 1 mph trying to get in. I hit my counter when we entered the siding, but as it turned out it was off. I buzzed up the dispatcher to ask him to let me know when his screen showed us clear. He said we had just cleared. The counter showed we had gone a bit over 7500 feet when we got stopped.
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