Alyth Yard, Classification Hump

A view of the classification yard and the hump yard is in full action.

Category:

Travel & Events

Tags:

• gp7
• gp9
• sd40
• sd90
• ac4400cw
• switcher
• cp
• alyth
• calgary

[cactuarizamoron]

so a loco pushes the car then lets it roll?

[oubliettehoggle]

Yes, but retarders slow the wagon to the correct speed to allow it to get to the road its needed without smashing into other cars

[quadking100]

What slows the cars down? iv always wondered..

[oubliettehoggle]

The wagons are slowed down by retarders on the tracks. The wagon is weighed on the way down, then wind direction and distance to travel are automatically worked out by the computer. This feeds the information to the retarders which squeeze the wagons wheel flanges until the right speed is reached. 99% of the time the wagon rolls onto anotehr wagon and couples OK.

[quadking100]

ahh ok i see. and what about the other 1% ahah :P :P

[oubliettehoggle]

They have to send a loco into the yard to push it to the correct place.

[CPWindsorsub]

@edbelfor2 oh, railfans arent welcome? can you prebook something?

[edbelfor2]

@CPWindsorsub Unless you work at Alyth,

you'll only get in by trepassing.

There's a tower right by the main entrance.

[starguard]

I don't see why they don't have something that can pick them up and throw them where they want them to go, like my little brother does with his train set!

[CPWindsorsub]

if i ever take a trip out west i definatly want to stop in Alyth yard, im in WIndsor Ont and theres a couple yards, but nothing as big as this place

[CSX2665]

Cool,this yard reminds me of the CSX Rocky Mount yard,pretty cool video but over here in the CSX Rocky mount yard there is no hump it's just a large normal yard.

[busrailfan]

Oh very interesting! I railfan in Calgary all the time and see the Hump trains in operation, but I have never been able to see that end of it to see how the whole thing works! Excellent video! And I must say, I would so love to have the chance to see this operation from the view that you have recorded here! Thanks again for sharing this video! It's in my favorites list for sure now! WOW.

[aaronwmalone]

this shit is bad ass. where is this yard located? let me know asap. im about to go to the railroad and i want to start out in some thing like this.

[GEES44DC]

@skinnyshit8888 Autoracks are not supposed to be humped under and circumstance. The long drawbars create problems for coupling and raise derailment concerns when they smash together crossed. On CN, we hump everything but big dimensional loads.

[GEES44DC]

@thepostfk There are next to no unit auto rack trains in Canada. Also, just because the entire train is all auto racks doesn't mean all the cars are blocked properly according to where the cars are going.

[thepostfk]

@skinnyshit8888 I was thinking the same thing. But usually when I see a train with autotracks its nothing but autotracks, so why hump them anyway?