Question about tracking real trains

Bossman284 posted:

Rail line near my home has had lots of interesting freight traffic lately.  Is there a site I can check to see when things are scheduled to roll through town?

Not to my knowledge. Most railroads do not "schedule" their freight trains, let alone release such information to the public.

Hot Water posted:

Bossman284 posted:

Rail line near my home has had lots of interesting freight traffic lately.  Is there a site I can check to see when things are scheduled to roll through town?

Not to my knowledge. Most railroads do not "schedule" their freight trains, let alone release such information to the public.

Oh, OK.  I thought there would be something.  So everyone that railfans, just sits there and hopes for a train to pass?

There is a system that you can build that will allow you to  use a computer to see the same screen the dispatcher sees, but it only works on certain rail line that use ATCS.

CLICK HERE to begin your education about this.

Here’s a video showing it in action...

Try "ATCsmon"

This is software to track trains in your part of the country.

It is free, from a Yahoo group.

You might also try Trainorders.com. A lot of railfans hang out there. Also, Railfan & Railroad Magazine has a railroad by railroad breakdown of news and operational changes.

    I know the approximate times of some local freights.    If that is off, I know something non-local is gonna pass real soon. But I can also see the line from home now that the trees are empty.

Another possibility is a scanner to monitor radio traffic. There are some online channels for that as well.  If you go to one of the virtual railfan streaming sites offered through YouTube many of them have the links in their descriptions.  Not available for all areas through the internet but if you can learn the channels for your area an analog scanner is going to pick up any chatter.

I can't speak for other railways, but CN tends to run the trains around here on a fairly typical, but not necessarily tight, schedule. I live near the mainline and most of the scheduled trains seem to run within an hour or less of the same time each day. I found the best things I did this past summer was purchase a scanner. It has helped for me to determine what is coming and when. You'll need to check local/state laws as some areas frown on using them. There is also a trackside guide available for CN and CP as well as other Canadian railways. The guide lists train numbers with their route and approximate times throughout Canada and the US and scanner frequencies. You can likely find a number of special interest groups to join as well. Some of them usually will have "spotter" postings to use as reference.

I told someone once railfanning is a lot like fishing: The best times are early in the morning or later in the evening, it takes some patience and you never really know what you're going to catch!  

Rob

A couple of words about ATCSmon.  It's run by volunteers.  It can be complex to set up to use.  The volunteers who run it expect you have read the wiki material before questions are asked.  Oh, the volunteers who run it more more Hams then railfans.  

Not all railroads use ATCS, or use it in a way the public can access it.  For example, CSX uses it, but they have moved the traffic off radio to cell/IP and microwave technologies that can't be legally monitored, so all of CSX has gone dark.  Amtrak uses their own technology.  When I was in Washington State this year, I was able to use it to monitor BNFS traffic, but only in limited areas where volunteers had set up servers.

And whatever you do, on the yahoo group, don't ask if will run on a Mac, Android or IOS/iPhone.  PC only.  Unless you want to volunteer to rewrite many years of software and really integrate yourself into their world.

Else, when it works, it transforms your railfan experience... unless you like just hanging around for hours not knowing when the next train is coming.

Bob

“...so all of CSX has gone dark.”

I’ve been out of the loop for too long, didn’t realize this had occurred. 

Just to clarify, he means that CSX trains can no longer be seen on the ATCsmon system.

They have not shut down all their signal systems.

I hope not!   Yes, I understood. 

To start, buy a decent scanner with a decent antenna, program in the radio channels for the RRs in your area and monitor them. Also research the lines for mileposts, control points and defect detectors. You will gradually pick up what goes on. It will take some time but you will catch on. If you meet another rail fan by the track talk to him.  I watch the  Virtual Railfan  You Tube site for the Horseshoe Curve. Lots of info available in the  Pa. and NJ area. I get more there than some of the other sites.  Good luck.