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A classification yard ( American and
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(
Canadian National Railway The Canadian National Railway Company (french: Compagnie des chemins de fer nationaux du Canada) is a Canadian Class I freight railway headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, which serves Canada and the Midwestern and Southern United States. CN i ...
use)), marshalling yard (
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,
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, Indian,
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, and Canadian English (
Canadian Pacific Railway The Canadian Pacific Railway (french: Chemin de fer Canadien Pacifique) , also known simply as CPR or Canadian Pacific and formerly as CP Rail (1968–1996), is a Canadian Class I railway incorporated in 1881. The railway is owned by Canadi ...
use)) or shunting yard (Central Europe) is a railway yard found at some freight train stations, used to separate
railway car A railroad car, railcar ( American and Canadian English), railway wagon, railway carriage, railway truck, railwagon, railcarriage or railtruck (British English and UIC), also called a train car, train wagon, train carriage or train truck, is ...
s onto one of several tracks. First the cars are taken to a track, sometimes called a ''lead'' or a ''drill''. From there the cars are sent through a series of
switches In electrical engineering, a switch is an electrical component that can disconnect or connect the conducting path in an electrical circuit, interrupting the electric current or diverting it from one conductor to another. The most common type ...
called a ''ladder'' onto the classification tracks. Larger yards tend to put the lead on an artificially built hill called a ''hump'' to use the force of gravity to propel the cars through the ladder. Freight trains that consist of isolated cars must be made into trains and divided according to their destinations. Thus the cars must be shunted several times along their route in contrast to a
unit train A unit train, also called a block train or a trainload service, is a train in which all cars (wagons) carry the same commodity and are shipped from the same origin to the same destination, without being split up or stored en route. They are disti ...
, which carries, for example,
car A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people instead of goods. The year 1886 is regarded as ...
s from the
plant Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae ex ...
to a
port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as ...
, or
coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dead ...
from a mine to the
power plant A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an electrical grid. Many ...
. This
shunting Shunting may refer to: * Ribosome shunting, a mechanism in protein biosynthesis * Shunting (rail), a rail transport operation * Shunting (neurophysiology), a concept in neurophysiology * Shunting (sailing) The crab claw sail is a fore-and-aft ...
is done partly at the starting and final destinations and partly (for long-distance-hauling) in
classification Classification is a process related to categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated and understood. Classification is the grouping of related facts into classes. It may also refer to: Business, organizat ...
yards.


Types


Flat yard

Flat yards are constructed on flat ground, or on a gentle slope, not enough to allow a free-fall operation without locomotives. Freight cars are pushed by a locomotive and coast to their required location.


Gravity yard

Gravity yards were invented in the 19th century, saving shunting engines and instead letting the cars roll by gravity was seen as a major benefit, whereas the larger amount of manual work required to stop the rolling cars in the classification tracks was judged to be not that important. Gravity yards were a historical step in the development of classification yards and were later judged as inferior to hump yards, because it became clear that shunting engines were needed anyway (at least in inclement weather like strong winds or icy temperatures when the oil in the bearings became thick), and because manual labour was getting relatively more and more expensive. Thus, only few gravity yards were ever built, sometimes requiring massive earthwork (one example is the first German gravity yard at Dresden). The historic technique of a gravity yard is today partly presented in
Chemnitz Chemnitz (; from 1953 to 1990: Karl-Marx-Stadt , ) is the third-largest city in the German state of Saxony after Leipzig and Dresden. It is the 28th largest city of Germany as well as the fourth largest city in the area of former East Germany ...
-Hilbersdorf gravity yard (museum). Most gravity yards were built in Germany (especially in the kingdom of
Saxony Saxony (german: Sachsen ; Upper Saxon: ''Saggsn''; hsb, Sakska), officially the Free State of Saxony (german: Freistaat Sachsen, links=no ; Upper Saxon: ''Freischdaad Saggsn''; hsb, Swobodny stat Sakska, links=no), is a landlocked state o ...
) and in Great Britain (so Egdehill, 1873), a few also in some other European countries, for example
Łazy Łazy is a town in Zawiercie County, Silesian Voivodeship, Poland. Until 1947 the town was the seat of the Rokitno Szlacheckie municipality. In the years 1975–1998 the town administratively belonged to the Katowice province. As of 2019, th ...
yard near Zawiercie on the Warsaw-Vienna Railway (in
Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populou ...
). In the USA, there were only very few old gravity yards; one of the few gravity yards in operation today is CSX's Readville Yard south of Boston, Massachusetts.


Hump yard

Hump yards are the largest and most effective classification yards, with the largest
shunting Shunting may refer to: * Ribosome shunting, a mechanism in protein biosynthesis * Shunting (rail), a rail transport operation * Shunting (neurophysiology), a concept in neurophysiology * Shunting (sailing) The crab claw sail is a fore-and-aft ...
capacity, often several thousand cars a day. They work similarly to gravity yards, but the falling gradient is limited to a small part of the yard, namely the hump. It is the heart of the yard—a lead track on a small hill over which an engine pushes the cars. Single cars, or a block of coupled cars, are uncoupled at or just before the crest of the hump, and roll by gravity onto their destination tracks in the area of the yard where the cars are sorted, called the ''classification bowl''. The first hump in Germany (Leipzig) was built in 1858 and in France (Saint-Etienne) in 1863. The speed of the cars rolling down from the hump into the classification bowl must be regulated according to whether they are full or empty, heavy or light freight, varying number of axles, whether there are few or many cars on the classification tracks, and varying weather conditions, including temperature, wind speed and direction. In regards to speed regulation, there are two types of hump yards—with or without mechanisation by retarders. In the old non-retarder yards braking was usually done in Europe by railroaders who laid skates onto the tracks. The skate or
wheel chock Wheel chocks (or chocks) are wedges of sturdy material placed closely against a vehicle's wheels to prevent accidental movement. Chocks are placed for safety in addition to setting the brakes. The bottom surface is sometimes coated in rubber ...
was manually (or, in rare cases, mechanically) placed on one or both of the rails so that the treadles or rims of the wheel or wheels caused frictional retardation and resulted in the halting of the railway car. In the United States this braking was done by riders on the cars. In the modern retarder yards this work is done by mechanized "rail brakes" called retarders, which brake the cars by gripping the wheels. They are operated either pneumatically or hydraulically. Pneumatic systems are prevalent in the United States, France,
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, Russia and
China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...
, while hydraulic systems are used in Germany, Italy and the
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.Rangierdienst A-Z, VEB transpress-Verlag, Berlin, 1986. Classification bowls in Europe typically consist of 20 to 40 tracks, divided into several fans or balloons of tracks, usually with eight classification tracks following a retarder in each one, often 32 tracks altogether. In the United States, many classification bowls have more than 40 tracks, which are often divided into six to ten classification tracks in each balloon loop.
Bailey Yard Bailey Yard is the world’s largest railroad classification yard. Employees sort, service and repair locomotives and cars headed all across North America. Owned and operated by the Union Pacific Railroad (UP), Bailey Yard is located in North Pl ...
in
North Platte, Nebraska North Platte is a city in and the county seat of Lincoln County, Nebraska, United States. It is located in the west-central part of the state, along Interstate 80, at the confluence of the North and South Platte Rivers forming the Platte River. ...
, United States, the world's largest classification yard, is a hump yard. Other large American hump yards include Argentine Yard in
Kansas City, Kansas Kansas City, abbreviated as "KCK", is the third-largest city in the U.S. state of Kansas, and the county seat of Wyandotte County. It is an inner suburb of the older and more populous Kansas City, Missouri, after which it is named. As of ...
, Robert Young Yard in
Elkhart, Indiana Elkhart ( ) is a city in Elkhart County, Indiana, United States. The city is located east of South Bend, Indiana, east of Chicago, Illinois, and north of Indianapolis, Indiana. Elkhart has the larger population of the two principal cities of t ...
, Clearing Yard in
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,
Illinois Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rockf ...
, Englewood Yard in
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,
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, and Waycross Rice Yard in
Waycross, Georgia Waycross is the county seat of, and only incorporated city in, Ware County in the U.S. state of Georgia. The population was 14,725 at the 2010 Census and dropped to 13,942 in the 2020 census. Waycross includes two historic districts ( Downtow ...
. Notably, in Europe, Russia and China, all major classification yards are hump yards. Europe's largest hump yard is that of Maschen near
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, Germany; it is only slightly smaller than Bailey Yard. The second largest is in the port of
Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,
, Belgium. Most hump yards are single yards with one classification bowl, but some, mostly very large, hump yards have two of them, one for each direction, thus are double yards, such as the Maschen, Antwerp, Clearing, and Bailey yards. According to the PRRT&HS PRR Chronology, the first hump yard in the United States was opened May 11, 1903, as part of the Altoona Yards at Bells Mills ( East Altoona). Other sources report the PRR yard at Youngwood, Pennsylvania, which opened in the 1880s to serve the Connellsville coke fields, as the first U.S. hump yard. Almost all gravity yards have been retrofitted with humps and are worked as hump yards. Examples include Dresden Friedrichstadt and Nürnberg (
Nuremberg Nuremberg ( ; german: link=no, Nürnberg ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the second-largest city of the German state of Bavaria after its capital Munich, and its 518,370 (2019) inhabitants make it the 14th-largest ...
) Rbf (Rbf: ''Rangierbahnhof'', "classification yard"), both in Germany.


Image gallery

File:Kornwestheim Ablaufberg 20060318.jpg , A switch engine pushes a car over the hump at Kornwestheim yard File:ZVBf-Rollberg-02.webm , Hump yard operation in Vienna, Austria (video) File:Classification yard Kijfhoek 01.jpg , Kijfhoek, Netherlands, seen from . Hump is at upper right. File:Dowty-Retarder1.JPG , Hydraulic " dowty retarders" allow fine adjustment of speed. File:Trainyard.bradleygee.jpg , North Yard in
Denver, Colorado Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unite ...
, a typical U.S. classification yard in 2009 File:CNW yard, Chicago.jpg ,
Chicago and North Western Railway The Chicago and North Western was a Class I railroad in the Midwestern United States. It was also known as the "North Western". The railroad operated more than of track at the turn of the 20th century, and over of track in seven states befor ...
's Proviso Yard in
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, December 1942 File:201805 Nanxiang Station Yard III.jpg , Nanxiang Classification Yard in Shanghai, China


See also

*
Goods station A goods station (also known as a goods yard or goods depot) or freight station is, in the widest sense, a railway station where, either exclusively or predominantly, goods (or freight), such as merchandise, parcels, and manufactured items, are l ...
*
List of rail yards This article is a list of important rail yards in geographical order. These listed may be termed Classification, Freight, Marshalling, Shunting, or Switching yards, which are cultural terms generally meaning the same thing no matter which part of th ...
*
Rail yard A rail yard, railway yard, railroad yard (US) or simply yard, is a series of tracks in a rail network for storing, sorting, or loading and unloading rail vehicles and locomotives. Yards have many tracks in parallel for keeping rolling stock or u ...
*
Siding (rail) A siding, in rail terminology, is a low-speed track section distinct from a running line or through route such as a main line, branch line, or spur. It may connect to through track or to other sidings at either end. Sidings often have light ...
*
Shunting (rail) Shunting, in railway operations, is the process of sorting items of rolling stock into complete trains, or the reverse. In the United States this activity is known as switching. Motive power Motive power is normally provided by a locomotive kn ...


References

*International Railway Journal (IRJ), New York. ''Special editions about hump yards in various countries:'' issues II/66, II/70, VI/75, II/80. * * Rhodes, Michael: ''The Illustrated History of British Marshalling Yards.'' Sparkford: Haynes Oxford Publishing & Co, 1988. . Out of print. * Kraft, Edwin: ''The Yard: Railroading's Hidden Half.'' In:
Trains In rail transport, a train (from Old French , from Latin , "to pull, to draw") is a series of connected vehicles that run along a railway track and transport people or freight. Trains are typically pulled or pushed by locomotives (often kno ...
(vol. 62) 2002. Part I: VI/02, pp. 46–67; part II: VII/02, pp. 36–47. . * Wegner, Robert: ''Classification yards. Map of the Month.'' In: Trains IV/2003, pp. 42–43. * Rhodes, Michael: ''North American Railyards.'' St. Paul (USA): Motorbooks International (MBI Publishing Company) 2003. .


External links


Refuge Sidings, Exchange Sidings and Marshalling Yards

Villon – transportation terminal simulation tool

Time-lapse video of German hump-shunting yard operation
{{DEFAULTSORT:Classification Yard Articles containing video clips Rail yards Railway sidings