misrouted 10:10 pm Stamford local train - 1/9/08

On a wrong route a train should be able to stop within 3 or so train lenghts or only two trainlenghts into interlocking, a lot easier to back up with permission than clearing interlocking and then backing up.

I can't remember now
Is the Woodlawn Tower still standing
or was it torn down

No woodlawn tower was partially razed, only bottom part of structure is still there,

DutchRailnut wrote:Even under NYC system you could not always tell if you were diverting or just following another train.
Or if you were diverting from one track to other in the interlocking or heading up the other line.

Correct. Any qualified engineer will tell you that, just because you got a medium clear or limited clear, it didn't mean you're being misrouted. Signal aspects can mean many different things, but officially and by the rules they mean only one thing, and that's printed in the rulebook. As Dutch noted, you could have gotten a medium clear at Woodlawn going track 1 to the New Haven or going track 1 to 3 on the Harlem. Same indication, different route.

The only aspect that definitively told you what route you were lined for was the all red aspect, and that meant (and means) "Stop."

Misroutes were no less common in the days of towers and wayside signals than they are now with CTC and cab signals without waysides.

Jim

Misroutes can happen, and they are no big deal. If the train was able to see the route indicator and stop before the signal, the RTC would have to remove the proceed indication and change the route. Before that can be done, a timer has to run down. That protects against changing routes while trains are approaching at high speed. Track speed determines the length of the run down on the timer. Except...... in the old days, tower operators knew this and before they would change a route they *could* insert a matchbook cover (or a piece of paper) in the relay that started the timer. The route could be changed quickly and a delay avoided. Remaining in service depended on whether or not you got caught defeating a safety device. In the days before black boxes, you could get away with such things as long as there were no adverse consequences.

Any reason why the route indicator could not be moved back say a mile before the switching point? This way if an engineer saw he was being lined for the wrong route, he could stop in time and the dispatcher could correct it without all the delay of having to back-up the train.

Again why are railfans worried about a misroute that takes place maybe once every two years. Their not gone move them, If railroad suspected that half engineers probably never look at them they would probably remove them.

Hey, it makes common sense to me. I was about to suggest it myself until I got up to Head-End View's post and saw he had already beaten me to the punch.

If trains are going so fast that the route indicators are useless AT the interlocking, they should be moved further ahead to a point where there's still time to stop OR, as you suggested, just remove them.

As RTC said, there are occasions where the computer messes up and swaps train ID's. What's so bad about moving the route indicators up to a point where a second set of eyes (the engineer's) could help avoid a problem? It doesn't matter whether it happens 1 time every 6 years or 6 times every 1 year. If moving the lights up would help it happen zero times ever, that's worth the cost. And it's not like installing a brand new system -- it's just a matter of moving the existing signals to a different location. It could probably be done in a day. Two at most.

Without getting into the argument over whether it's a smart/worthwhile idea, I'd like to remind the non-railroaders here that, on the railroad, anything that seems easy to do usually isn't. In the case of signal systems, that's doubly true. With the signal system, nothing is "easy". For one thing, how do the relocated indicators get connected back to the CIL? Who runs those cables, and how do they do it...pole line? Nope. Trenches? There's a project. Wireless? Never happen. And that's the easiest part of it.

On top of any technical complexity, you have regulatory issues. And yes, the FRA cares about *everything* you do with the signal system, even something as innocuous as moving a route indicator light.

Let's stop worrying about how to make the indicators better and move on to better topics. If you ever ride a train that's misrouted, consider yourself lucky to have experienced a rare event, and go back to reading your paper. :)

Jim

Ok my scenario route indicator 1/2 mile before interlocking, train comes up to interlocking but has no route yet, after going by route indicator the signal picks up, how would engineer know he/she is not misrouted.
Again a lot talk for a non event, railroaders have no problem with the current situatiuon, only railfans do