Train schedule

“ In those it is described as an extra and treated as any other train, but in the meantime it must keep out of the way of all regular trains, and the Dispatcher must keep it in hand and especially guard against having more than one extra on the same part of the track at the same time. Here is an element of danger where the necessities require frequent extra trains. Whenever practicable, trains should be run on a regular schedule, but it will often happen that there is no regular train upon which signals « 123 » may be carried for a train that must be run, and it must go as an extra. ”

“ The precaution is observed of requiring superior trains to stop at schedule meeting-points unless the switches are seen to be right and the track clear, and to run cautiously, prepared to stop at other points where a train may be met that has not been met at a schedule meeting-point. ”

“ All regular trains have right of track against No. 1 between Moscow and Berlin.
This order gives to any regular train of inferior right receiving it the right of track over the train named in the order, and the latter must clear the schedule times of all regular trains, the same as if it were an extra. ”

“ There is nothing but the care and skill of the Dispatcher to prevent the opposing orders from differing in some particular. When we consider the care necessary in preparing a time-table, to properly show the running time and meeting-places of the several trains, we must see that the risk, in the process described, of getting something wrong, must far outweigh any supposed convenience in a train having an order showing a continuous schedule of its meeting-points for several opposing trains. ”

“ The schedule is slow compared with that in England and on some roads in America, twenty-five miles an hour being as fast as trains run. Long delays take place at stations, for when a passenger train stops it often seems as if it had been abandoned. ”

“ The night train-master will meet your needs. He will act as the agent of the railroad and arrange, while you hold the telephone receiver in your fingers, the entire schedule for you. Trains will be held, connections made; the telegraph is capable of arranging the details. If you demand speed, the railroad will give it to you—if you are willing to pay the price and give a release against damage to your precious bones. Increased speed means increased risk to your railroader.
Maude Adams uses a special many Saturday nights to carry her down to her Long Island farm at Ronkonkoma. ”

“ If, therefore, communication is not quickly restored it is perfectly safe and proper to provide that an operator shall permit a train, in such case, to proceed on its schedule rights without orders. If, on the other hand, "O K" has been given and acknowledged, the correct reception of the order is assured, and a period is reached when the men of a train may, and often must, be permitted, on arrival, to sign for and act on the order before the arrival of the other at the point where the order is awaiting it. ”

“ I studied a minute, then turned to the dispatcher.
"Tell Norman to send them out as second 4; that gives the right of way over every wheel against them. If they can't make it on that kind of schedule, it isn't in the track."
It was extraordinary business, rather, sending a train of wheat through on a passenger schedule, practically, as the second section of our east-bound flyer; but we took hair-lifting chances on the plains.
It was noon when the orders were flashed. At three o'clock No. 4 was due to leave Zanesville. ”

“ It is evident that, if the inferior train is an extra, it has no schedule time by which the superior train can be guided, and hence the latter, as provided by the rule, cannot go beyond the designated point until the extra has arrived.
The careful discussion of the question here involved is justified by the fact that practical « 113 » men hold different views respecting it, and many rules determine it differently or leave it wholly or partly unsettled. ”

“ No precaution need be taken by the motorman as nothing can get into the tube and only one train is allowed in a section at one time. Certain hours are given to passenger traffic and others to freight traffic. An immense amount of freight can thus be carried in one hour. It is possible to send a through freight car two thousand miles in ten or twelve hours. Express cars are never connected with passengers cars. They are run on their own schedule and sometimes attached to freight cars. ”

“ Their schedule beats ours by ten minutes. We must beat them by two hours. The test run began at ten o’clock this morning. Porter and Winston, both good men, run as far as Portland. I am not afraid in broad daylight. Nearly all the trouble has been east of that point--you understand?”
“Perfectly,” assented Ralph--“you are afraid of some trickery on the part of our rivals?”
“Yes. I want you to reach Portland and catch the special at four p. m. If the new locomotive crew look good to you, just superintend. But rush that train into the yards by the stroke of eleven p. ”

“ Train No. 49 on the schedule was a mixed freight, leaving Unionville at midnight and being due at Lewistown passing siding at 3:04 A. M. As all railroad men know, scheduled freights on a single track system are not on time once in six months. They invariably run on special orders, owing to work and other delays along the road keeping them far behind their scheduled time. On the night in question, however, No. ”

“ A road doing a large passenger business must accommodate the public as far as possible as regards the time of departure and arrival, and the connections with other roads. A freight road must regard more the character of the road. Some classes of freight (ice, beef, etc.) do not admit of delay. As we increase the number of trains, the ratio of time employed in actual work to the whole train under steam is decreased, as there must be much time lost on sidings in waiting for trains to pass. Liability to accidents is also incurred. ”

“ Some of the State railroad commissioners have done and are doing noble service in this direction, and should be vigorously supported by their constituencies. The demands of the public, re-enforced by the exigencies of competition, have made Sunday trains in many localities almost as common as on week-days, so that many train and station men work seven days in the week. In addition to this, holidays oftener increase their work than diminish it, so that there is room for a considerable reform in this regard. ”

“ The night schedule for the Mountain Division west ran the wires, then miscellaneous messages. All this was like reading a book to Ralph, while his mind formed a mental map, a picture of conditions all along the line.
It grew dreadfully monotonous by nine o’clock, however. Grizzly grumbled while getting a heap of work out of the way, Mason went to sleep and snored in his chair by the stove. A sudden diversion, however, aroused him. There was the sound of the lower outside door slamming shut. Ralph could look down at the stairway. Someone had appeared ascending it. ”

“ Every superintendent and higher official should remember that if the same train order is given every day there must be something radically wrong with the time table. All over this broad land, day after day, hundreds of unnecessary train orders are being sent because many time tables are constructed on the models of forty years ago. At that time, in fact as in name, there were two classes of trains, passenger and freight. To-day there are in reality at least two distinct classes of passenger trains and two classes of freights, or at least four in all. ”

“ Lose time in the customary manner, and allow the train to arrive at the stated station half an hour late. Permit the passengers to descend and to enter the refreshment-rooms. The moment they are served, drive them back hurriedly into the carriages with the threat that if they are not immediately seated in their places they will be left behind. When the passengers are once more in their compartments, the carriage-doors should be securely locked, and the train can then remain waiting beside the platform for three-quarters of an hour. ”

“ The law requires them to post bulletins of delayed trains at every station in advance of the delayed train, in order that passengers may be put upon notice. This law is of great consequence to the traveler. If the train is one, two, or three hours late, and the traveler can learn that fact upon his arrival at the depot, he can dispose of himself to the best advantage during the interval. ”

“ There are at the moment of our visit 115 locomotives and 2000 cars in service in the Cut. About 160 loaded trains go out daily, and, of course about 160 return empty. Three hundred and twenty trains in the eight-hour day, with two hours’ intermission at noon, means almost one train a minute speeding through a right of way 300 feet wide and much cluttered up with shovels, drills and other machinery. ”

“ While the first and second trick men, have perhaps more train order work attached to them, the third is about on a par with them as far as actual labor is concerned, because, in addition to the regular train order work, a new train sheet has to be opened every night at twelve o'clock, which necessitates keeping two sheets until all the trains on the old one have completed their runs. ”

“ We wait patiently upon a long siding until everything else has been moved—through fast expresses heavily laden with opulent-looking Pullmans, jerky little suburban trains, long draughts of empty coaches, being drawn by consequential switch-engines in and out of the train-shed of the passenger station. Finally a certain semaphore blade drops, we cross over to the important main line and begin pulling on a sharp curve, across the river, clear of the station with its confusion, through and past the city to a busy division yard. ”

“ On shot the locomotive, like an arrow from the bow, the men throwing over the ties until the train was well nigh unloaded, when just as they were close to the curve by which the train arrives at the station, they saw the dreaded cars strike a tie, or something equally of service, and with a desperate plunge rush down the embankment, some fifteen feet, to the little valley, and creek below. ”

“ It should be understood that, while a few of the larger railroads are double-tracked, the great bulk of the railroad business of this country is done over single-track roads. On these roads, points of meeting or passing must be at sidings, upon which one train can run while the other passes on the main « 219 » track. Such sidings are usually at stations, and the problem of making the trains meet there is a very delicate one.
In order to accomplish this with the least delay, the trains are divided into classes. The east-bound passengers always have the right of way, and expect a clear track. ”

“ It is the busiest railway junction in the worid. More than two thousand five hundred trains pass through here every twenty-four hours – that is an average of two a minute all through the day and night. Actually, at the peak period, there is a train passing about every twenty seconds, and it has been worked out that about two thousand passengers ride through the station every minute during the morning and evening peak periods. ”

“ To the fantastic mood which possesses you equally, sleeping or waking, the stoppages of the train have a weird character, and Worcester, Springfield, New Haven, and Stamford are rather points in dreamland than well-known towns of New England. As the train stops you drowse if you have been waking, and wake if you have been in a doze; but in any case you are aware of the locomotive hissing and coughing beyond the station, of flaring gas-jets, of clattering feet of passengers getting on and off; then of some one, conductor or station master, walking the whole length of the train ”

“ At any rate, there is not much pleasure in running on railroad time. If the week or fortnight at your disposal is up before the journey is done, take a train and go home, with the wheel in a baggage-car; but on no account hurry. You have your road-map with you, and can see at a glance that Johnstown is three miles further on, and Brownstown is ten. If at Johnstown you don't want to stop, make for Brownstown. ”

“ For the trains must be moved, and as nearly on time as human effort could do it. There is no stopping a railroad because of unfavourable weather. The movement of trains ceases only when an accident breaks the road in two or wreckage blocks the track, and then only until arrangements can be made to détour them past the place where the accident has occurred. When this cannot be done, a train is run to the spot from either side, and passengers, mail, and baggage transferred. ”

“ In other words, the working time table, by definition a general law, has no more practical value, as between such trains, than an advertising folder. A train order by its very nature is an exception to the general law, the time table. When the exception becomes the rule it is high time to head in or to put out a thinking flag. Some years ago your old dad after much persuasion induced his superiors to let him make four classes of trains on a pretty warm piece of single track. ”

“ Block-Telegraph Signalling.—However complete the outdoor signals and interlocking at any station, they can only control the movement of trains within their range, and something more is requisite to ensure the safe working of the traffic over the long lengths of line between stations. For some years a time-interval was allowed for the working of trains following one another on the UP and DOWN lines of a double line railway, no train being allowed to leave a station sooner than a fixed number of minutes after a previous train had started in the same direction. ”