Comment by FridayoLeary

Comment by FridayoLeary 2 days ago

From wikipedia

> United States – BNSF Railway and Union Pacific Railroad (UP) regularly operate intermodal container trains exceeding 5,000 metres (16,500 ft) in length on main lines in the western United States. On the UP, these trains can stretch to over 6,100 metres (20,000 ft) with 5 locomotives and 280 well cars.

Those are incredible figures. It would almost be a shame to ban such amazing monuments to engineering. Not to mention that it's probably the most efficent and enviromentally friendly way to do things.

hypercube33 2 days ago

It's not due to the logistics of rail labor and a bunch of other things. I forget the math but smaller trains can run more often without sitting for hours and take advantage of fuel and labor better.

the podcast well there's your problem covered it in deep detail

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Wowfunhappy 2 days ago

IMO the freight companies should be able to pay to build longer sidings if they need them, but they should have to pay for it.

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tschwimmer 2 days ago

They're not going to build a 4 mile siding, which is the length that many freight operate at. At that point it's like building a second set of tracks.

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- Wowfunhappy 2 days ago
  
  Then don't build 4 mile trains. It needs to be possible for trains to pass each other.
  
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bluGill 2 days ago

a lot of rail is 2 track so no sidings are needed.

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- guappa 2 days ago
  
  Because trains never go the other direction anyway.
  
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  bombcar 2 days ago
  
  Dual track isn’t really a two way road, with signaling it ends up being infinite sidings, and is used almost more for passing than for two-way traffic - if it exists outside cities.
  Unfortunately much of the USA is single or effectively single tracked.
  
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