Quantifying Recent Trends in Class 1 Freight Railroad Train Length and Weight by Train Type

Railroads have a strong economic incentive to maximize the length and weight of freight trains. Since the mid-1990s, various technological innovations have facilitated operation of longer and heavier trains, and railroads have made infrastructure investments to accommodate them. Recent shifts in railway operating and management strategies have placed added emphasis on long trains but have also drawn public and agency scrutiny. The advantages and disadvantages of increased train size are difficult to analyze because public data on train length and weight over time are limited. Articulated intermodal railcars, artificially short local trains, and light empty unit trains skew industry averages across all train types and mask trends over time. To provide greater insight on the average and distribution of train length and weight for different train types over time, the research team conducted a detailed analysis of Class 1 railroad annual report financial data and Surface Transportation Board waybill sample data collected for the years 1996 through 2018. Dividing traffic statistics by train type allows for a specific focus on loaded unit train length and weight distributions that isolates many factors skewing overall averages. Over the past 23?years, the average length and weight of loaded non-hazmat unit trains have steadily increased. Train size distributions indicate that unit trains exceeding 140 railcars in length have become more frequent over the past 10?years, whereas hazmat unit trains are typically smaller in size. This information can aid researchers and industry practitioners in assessing the benefits and disadvantages of operating longer trains.

• Record URL:
  https://doi.org/10.1177/03611981211031534
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/issn/03611981
• Supplemental Notes:
  • C. Tyler Dick https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2527-1320 © National Academy of Sciences: Transportation Research Board 2021.
• Authors:
  • Dick, C. Tyler
  • 0000-0002-2527-1320
  • Zhao, Jiaxi
  • 0000-0002-8706-970X
  • Liu, Xiang
  • 0000-0002-4348-7432
  • Kirkpatrick, Steven W
  • 0000-0001-9590-7980
• Publication Date: 2021-12

Language

• English

Media Info

• Media Type: Web
• Features: References;
• Pagination: pp 890-903
• Serial:
  • Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board
  • Volume: 2675
  • Issue Number: 12
  • Publisher: Sage Publications, Incorporated
  • ISSN: 0361-1981
  • EISSN: 2169-4052
  • Serial URL: http://journals.sagepub.com/home/trr

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Freight trains; Length; Trend (Statistics); Weight
• Subject Areas: Freight Transportation; Planning and Forecasting; Railroads;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01782036
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
• Created Date: Sep 20 2021 4:58PM