For American passenger trains, it’s a mix of diesel and electric. Inter-city lines in heavily travelled regions, like the Northeast Corridor between Washington and Boston, are electrified, but many long-distance trains are diesel. Most suburban commuter rail is electric. Freight trains, however, are mostly diesel.
There are also two systems of electricification, catenary wire and third rail. Catenary wire is high-voltage overhead cables strung above the center of the tracks that connect to the train through a pantograph, a bar supported on a diamond-shaped or triangular frame. The thrid rail is a high-voltage electrical rail a few feet outside the tracks supported a few inches above the rail bed that connects to the train by a metal shoe outside the wheels. I believe that Amtrak only uses catenary wire, while commuter rail systems are mixed.
Yeah, they’re self-powered – big-ass diesels turning generators that drive electric motors.
I’ve never ridden a real train (just the narrow-gauge amusement-park ones like the one that circles Disney World), but even the little, slow ones sway a lot. It can only get worse going 70 mph on top of a taller (therefore more radius of sway) fullsize car, with the added factor of wind resistance/turbulence.
Freight cars, at least, do have ladders at the ends, and passenger cars have connecting doors and probably ladders. Most of the traintop chases I’ve seen in movies have been freight or mixed passenger/freight trains, carrying the bad guy’s Evil Secret Weapon.
Ahh, usually the opposite, actually. The wider the tracks are apart, the less rocking and the more stable the train is. Think about why sportcars have their wheels further apart. However, with wider tracks the corners have to be larger radius, which is why narrow gauge is used in confined areas.
I’m ashamed to say that I have intimate knowledge of this subject. Some time back, when I was younger and immortal ;), I was living in Pakistan. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen the pictures where you have 30-40 people clinging to the side of a light truck? Usually decorated to the hilt with flags, mirrors, lights etc? This is where they come from. I was on a train journey from Karachi to Rawalpindi, winding up the Indus valley, visiting every little whistlestop in sight. The train looked like one of those pictures - people leaning out the windows, standing in the doorways, sitting on the roof, inside they were in the aisles, the seats, sleeping in the luggage rack - everywhere. I was with a group that had hired a whole (extra) private carriage. They had some-one guarding the corridors to make sure the other passengers didn’t take over that car as well, even though it was pretty crowded in there as well.
I got bored, and decided to visit the rest of the train - there was supposed to be dining carriages etc there somewhere. I discovered that it is very hard to move through corridors packed with people, but if I got up onto the roof it was clearer. I spent quite some time wandering up and down the train along the roof, visiting different parts of the train and talking to people. I discovered the following:
the roof sways more than the floor of the train for any given bump, but it’s not that bad. I ran along the roof a couple of times in each direction without major problems. But once the train picks up a lot of speed, the wind becomes a hassle, and it’s better to be sitting down. Running towards the back of the train with the wind behind you is a real rush, until you have to stop.
it’s better to face forward or back than sideways if you have a tendancy to get motion-sickness. The ground rushing past in a blur does not help.
If you hear a shout from the front of the train, drop flat first and look to see what caused it later.
I’ve got to say, the things I did back then, I’m surprised I lived long enough to look back and see how dumb it was.
Yep. When I first started thinking about the question, I thought it was kind of odd that I couldn’t remember being on a train, so I racked my brain until I was sure. Of course, I’ve been in the Pacific Northwest since I was a little kid, where trains are primarily cargo vehicles and passengers ride the rails only as an occasional break from flying.
And thanks for the informative and entertaining responses, y’all. This especially cracked me up:
So, drawing a conclusion from what’s been said so far: Would it be safe to say, in general, that although running on top of a moving train, particularly one that’s up to speed, is in fact a potentially dangerous activity, the reasons for that danger don’t really come across on the movie screen, which is why those action scenes seem so repetitive and dull to someone like me who has no practical knowledge about what being on a train is really like?
As an additional data point, the commuter train (as in rail, not subway/elevated) system in the Chicago area is almost entirely diesel, except for one electric line. To the best of my knowledge, all of the diesel lines (10 or so) use pre-existing railways, and I believe still share the tracks with freight and Amtrak trains. I’m not sure what system the one electric line uses, though something’s telling me it’s the catenary wire system.
Our elevated/subway train system is entirely electric, with a third rail system in place.
I’ve walked between cars on both, but cannot at the moment recall if there are any ladders mounted on the ends of the cars.
The commuter trains have an upper level of seating, and I can say from experience that there are times when sitting up there can feel quite precarious, and definitely moreso than when you are seated on the lower level.
Plus these commuter trains can go fast - up to 70 mph or so when in express mode, IIRC. The Amtrak trains can run at least that fast. Freight trains move considerably slower; I think I estimated one being around 40 mph when I was driving alongside a track on a road, and tried to match my speed to one of the boxcars.
