Shortline Railroad Signalling

[Danny252]

What level(s) of signalling are plausible for a shortline railroad in the US (or Canada, not to be too exclusive!)? Having played around with the CC&LE route, it struck me as being heavily signalled for a small line (not that my enjoyment of the route has been reduced). However, perhaps it's more typical than I think!

Is it common for lines to be almost entirely unsignalled, with train control done by train order only? Alternatively, are there lines with more complete signalling, either old inherited signalling, or fairly modern signalling following investment? Feel free to list all sorts of situations and examples - I'd love to have some ideas to play around with for routebuilding.

 

[flyboy559]

Short answer, it varies from railroad to railroad. Generally, most running on former Class 1 railroad trackage will have more signals while others, like the Sierra Railroad don't have any signals and use train orders instead, although when you only run about 4 trains a week, you don't have to worry about opposing traffic much.

 

[JCitron]

Hi Danny,

All of the above and everything in between.

 

[cascaderailroad]

Not every track in a yard has signals, most backwoods RR's have no signals at all ... I use BNSF50 Invisible Signals (and there are many others)

 

[bnsfc]

Short answer, it varies from railroad to railroad. Generally, most running on former Class 1 railroad trackage will have more signals while others, like the Sierra Railroad don't have any signals and use train orders instead, although when you only run about 4 trains a week, you don't have to worry about opposing traffic much.

And then there is the case of the Iowa interstate who run on the old rock island. When they took over the trackage the signals where in such bad shape they scraped them because it was cheaper and not needed for the volume or traffic they see.

 

[Vern]

Of course, depending on how "hands on" you want to be with despatching while also driving or the level of AI traffic, for the purposes of Trainz it may be beneficial to include a fuller signalling system to protect movements so you don't end up with any cornfield meets!