A long distance train driver presumably may start his shift in one city, then at the end of a full working day he may end up in another city hundreds of miles away.
Where does he sleep? Does he have to get a hotel? Does the station have it’s own accommodation for drivers?
Or maybe my premise is wrong. Does a driver maybe drive halfway, then change trains and drive another train back to his starting station?
I suppose the answer probably varies from location to location.
I live in a town where the railroad is a fairly large employer. I’ve known a few engineers (not ‘drivers’) who operated the engine on freight trains.
IIRC, their shift couldn’t be longer than 10 or maybe 12 hours. So if they were an engineer on train that left Chicago, their ‘shift’ would end perhaps when the train arrived in Kansas City. At that point, a new crew would take over. The crew leaving the train would spend the night in a hotel contracted by the railroad company.
They are doing “crew van” on some of the long-haul routes in Aus now. “Specially designed crew-van carriages, equipped with sleeping quarters and facilities for domestic activities, provide accommodation for drivers during non-work periods.”
I think perhaps part of the reason is that the small towns that used to have crew-change barracks have disappeared, taking the crew-change barracks with them.
Thanks for the reply. Would this hotel cater exclusively to train crew? Or open to general public?
At least in the USA where trains are few and the country is large, no hotel could survive on just the handful for train workers staying in any given location.
Note that @Peter_Morris is British. Train operators are ‘drivers’ there.
You didn’t ask, but airline practice is similar. When the shift ends, the company has pre-arranged a hotel and transportation from airport to hotel. Often a van operated by the hotel itself, sometimes a local transport company.
What gets difficult, for both airlines and railroads / railways is when delays result in a crew running out of legal shift time in an awkward unplanned location. At least for airplanes, that always happens, by regulation at an airport, not halfway between here and there.
I understand that under at least some circumstances, when a train crew runs out of legal work time, they just halt the train wherever out in the countryside, then wait for the company to run a van out to them to rescue the crew and perhaps bring a spare crew to keep the train moving forward. That sounds like a grueling end to an already too-long day. Especially in the US’s wide open spaces where towns might be a 2-hour drive apart.
Thanks. Did not know that. Ignorance fought again!
That happens around here frequently. There’s a dedicated company that does nothing but shuttle train crews hither and yon. It must not be great work, as they are always advertising for drivers.
I often drive a highway that parallels a busy rail freight route. It’s not uncommon to see a train parked on a stretch of rail where there are two sets of tracks, waiting for the relief crew.
And also in Georgia, I guess.
