Thanks for all the replies. The point I was trying to make is of most of the yards mentioned and the ones I have seen, are small, just a few tracks. SEPTA really lacks a large yard, Aurora Ill. comes to mind with a large yard, where Metra stores a large number of trains. I think most of the Metra Lines have large yard at the end of the line. Just an observation on my part. You would think Trondale would have been a great place with all that flat empty space. But I realize the bulk of the trains only go to Malvern and the yard empty land is Amtk.
train2 wrote:Thanks for all the replies. The point I was trying to make is of most of the yards mentioned and the ones I have seen, are small, just a few tracks. SEPTA really lacks a large yard, Aurora Ill. comes to mind with a large yard, where Metra stores a large number of trains. I think most of the Metra Lines have large yard at the end of the line. Just an observation on my part. You would think Trondale would have been a great place with all that flat empty space. But I realize the bulk of the trains only go to Malvern and the yard empty land is Amtk.A key difference between SEPTA and other railroads is SEPTA's through-running, which means they have a much more symmetric inbound/outbound flow even at peak times. They also run more regular off-peak service. These two facts combined mean only a limited number of trains stored at the extremeties / deadheads are necessary to provide peak services.