Live train tracker - is there a website for this? (security, http)
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I'm looking for a website that tracks trains real time. The idea came to me while waiting on an amtrack this morning. I started wondering where they came from, where they're heading, etc.
I did a search & found sites like this in Chicago, Maryland, etc.. but mostly for commuters/subways.
Does something like this exist for freight trains?
If you type the term "freight train symbols" into a search engine, you van find listings for most of the major carriers, plus some historical data on the practices in an earlier day. At one time there might have been markets, such as New York-Chicago, with multiple schedules on the same day, but one daily (or less often) schedule between to points is usually the rule. And many services operate only a couple of days a week or on an as-needed basis. There may also be multiple freight yards or intermodal terminals in some cities
I'm posting a link that should give you a couple of places to look:
but it needs to be emphasized (as in the first link), freight trains do not run on a strict schedule -- there's no reason for it since the advent of centralized dispatching, and crews and power aren't always immediately available. But the material in the posted links is very useful when listening in on railroad radio, or building an ATCS monitor like the one previously described.
Last edited by 2nd trick op; 07-15-2014 at 09:09 PM..
As a former locomotive engineer, I can tell you that you don't want to know what is being hauled through town on a daily basis.
Do you know if freight rail companies such as Union Pacific would make available freight trains gps locations so that we can know when they will be passing by?!
As previously outlined, an ACTS system will locate train movements, but it won't identify them with regard to origin, destination, etc. By this time, Internet technologies might be evolving toward a point where some "railfans" might make their hobby activities available to the public.
Fostoria, Ohio, probably has the most intense rail traffic of any community of similar size; Up to nearly 150 trains daily descended upon it a few years ago, though declining coal traffic may have downplayed things a bit. And Fostoria had a live ATCS monitor at one time.
Here's a relevant link; I'm not sure of the current status
Most railroad mainlines also feature automated defect detectors; these are unmanned locations where dragging equipment and overheated axle bearings (commonly called "hotboxes") can be identified and the dispatchers and crew notified automatically, if you live within a reasonable distance, a commercially-available radio scanner will pick them up. as it will railroad radio communications.
Last edited by 2nd trick op; 04-26-2015 at 01:44 PM..
I have to agree with the other posters on here which are/were freight RR employees. I am a retired 42 year veteran of a freight railroad. I can tell you that the RR always knows the location and the commodities in each and every car.
You would be shocked to know what is hauled in freight trains and the gold mine of electronics and other goodies being shipped in intermodal trains.
I think I can say with some certainty that this information is not available to the public for what I consider obvious reasons. Most likely one could only access this information from a secure encrypted RR program. I also suspect that certain RR employees which are on a need to know basis could access this information from their home computers. I also suspect that any decent hacker could probably hack the system.
This opinion of course is only based and freight trains.
Amtrak does have a train tracker, but I looked at it just now, and it's not real time at all. Go to their website and click the link to train status, then scroll down and click the "track a train map" icon.
I don't know about you Tek_Freek, but i agree with Virtual Beekeeper and hhheights77007. I wish we could have some way of tracking what goes through our towns, so that we are more aware, in case something happens to the train(s) and people have to evacuate. People kinda like to refuse to evacuate, because they don't know why and if nobody tells them why, then they won't leave there home and most likely end up dying.
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Rail Freight Question
