Question about manual junction at a grade.

I am working on a route based on southern Indiana/Kentucky, US. It's mostly fictional as I like doing surveying and using DEM maps. My question is this, I have a spur to a coal mine joining a mainline not too far from a control point and I wish to make it a manual junction (indicated by the black arrow). What I am wondering is how in real life this might work because the ascending grade is close to 3% at this control point (indicated by the red arrow). This would mean a coal drag would have to proceed through the manual switch and then ascend that grade and then stop to allow the conductor to return the switch to normal, and then hold and wait for the conductor and then start again on a steep grade. Would it be better to make the coal mine spur join within the interlocking and make the spur switch a dispatch controlled switch? Are there any real world situations that are similar? How would you design this? Thanks!
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From a safety standpoint, you might want to go the automatic route because if you have manual switches setup, then the conductor has to switch the tracks manually after the train stops on that steep grade. Stopping on a grade is difficult enough and with the weight of a heave coal train, that makes stopping more difficult.

I saw a number of setups like this in eastern Pennsylvania back in 2013 when a fellow Trainzer and I took a trip down there to investigate the Anthracite country. Some of the junctions and track conditions for that matter, make our Trainz efforts look like pristine mainlines. There were all sorts of steep grades with switches on them similar to your setup.

While not as steep as yours, here's one that I remember seeing and have some pictures of in Duryea, PA https://goo.gl/maps/Fitt1A988AUYgTpG8 .

My photo actually shows a much steeper slope than this without zooming. The wide angle lens from Google's Cars don't do justice to the grade. This is a manual switch, by the way.

https://www.trainzportal.com/mytrainz/view_media_post?media_post_id=218276

Interesting. I wonder if there has ever been some remedy for these situations, maybe a remote switch dialed up on radio or something.

I figured it would be best to make it a "remote" switch. Controlled by "radio" and outside of the interlocking. Through a series of invisible junctions, signals, driver commands, time delays and EIT paths I found a simple solution to make it function like an industry spur with a switch lock timer. I may h ave to go through and apply this to all of my manual mainline switches that happen to be in and EIT path.

justinroth said:

I figured it would be best to make it a "remote" switch. Controlled by "radio" and outside of the interlocking. Through a series of invisible junctions, signals, driver commands, time delays and EIT paths I found a simple solution to make it function like an industry spur with a switch lock timer. I may h ave to go through and apply this to all of my manual mainline switches that happen to be in and EIT path.

Click to expand...

That makes sense. I've seen those timed interlockings in operation it's quite neat to see a train approach, the switches flip, the train crosses, and then the switch realign its self for the mainline. I did a bit of what you've done on my Gloucester Terminal Electric route. I have places where the trolleys (trams) need to cross over and take a branch. The problem is if there's an oncoming trains, the train will pass through the one crossing. I tried EITs, but for the three locations I needed this, they were overkill. I then instead opted for some invisible switches, requiring an AI driver to stop and flip with signals along with signals protecting the interlocking. With everything setup, the operation has been smooth as the AI wait kinda sort of patiently for their compatriots to pass by.