A rail line can do the work of how many road lanes?

Question

Explain how you arrived at the answer.

Answer 1

There isn't enough concrete in the county to bu1ld enough roads to be comparable to the tonnage this nation's rail lines move each day.

Lets assume 1 freight car has 100 tons net lading.  Though restrictions vary from state to state, here there is an 80,000 lbs limit, gross.  So, let's say 2 and 1/2 trucks to move the same amount of tonnage handled by 1 freight car.

How many loaded freight cars are out there on the move today?  Again, lets assume 100 car trains (short, by today's standards, with 120 or more being more the rule).  It only takes ten trains for 1,000 cars.  Lets assume there are only ten trains in each State of the Union (there is probably that many just in a 100 mile stretch of my house).  Now we have 48,000 loaded freight cars doing the work of 120,000 trucks, not to mention that many being loaded or unloaded as we speak.

So, we're talking a bare minimum of 240,000 trucks here, and that number is probably much, much less than the actual number, just to make up for 10 trains in each state.

The numbers become astronomical rather quickly.

Answer 2

CoolHand has the general idea.  But, also take into consideration -- 1 truck = 1 trucker.  7500 trucks?  7500 drivers.  7500 containers on a train?  depends on distance --at most 15 train crew members; and the train itself never has to stop for hours of service laws.

Answer 3

sf

Answer 4

One intermodal stack train can carry as many containers as 250-280 trucks (for our math we will use 250).  The longest of these trains are 7000-8000 ft. long (for our math we will use 7500), and the average truck is about 75 ft. long, counting trailer and cab.  So if you consider that on one lane of good 70 mph highway, trucks will follow at least two truck lengths behind the one in front, then you get about 33 trucks per 7500 ft. of highway.  So in order for trucks to equal what trains do they would need between 7 and 8 highway lanes side by side.  So to answer your question, a rail line can do as much work as 7 or 8 road lanes.  And if you think about fuel efficiency, trains are 3-4 times more efficient than trucks, on a ton per mile basis.