Customer Reviews

The Railroad: What It Is, What It Does

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I'm the kind of person who wants to know why things are made the way they are. This book kept me busy for hours. It is incredibly comprehensive, and is a good read. It explains technology choices (locomotives, cars, track). It explains how operations & dispatch works, and it explains how different signaling systems work. It even delves into business and ownership issues. If you want a core dump of the rail transportation business, get a copy of this book.

John Armstrong is both a railroader and a railroad modeler. He wrote "Railroad: What it Is, What it Does" to help modelers create realistic layouts by understanding how a real railroad operates. But it doesn't matter if you're a modeler: whatever your reason, if you want to know how railroads operate, then this book is for you!

Armstrong covers every aspect of railroading. Starting with history as far back as the Roman Empire, he surveys the evolution of rail transport from mining cars on wooden tracks through the "big steel rail". He covers the pros and cons of flat wheels on flanged track versus flanged wheels on flat track, stone ties versus timber ties, steel rails versus iron rails, and all of the engineering issues that go into building a stable, long-lasting track--and that's just in the first few chapters.

From there he explains the economic issues that go into deciding where to run the track, how to route the trains, and everything that goes into establishing a railroad operation.

Finally he covers all the details: how a consist is put together; the various cars and their construction; the railroad workers and their various jobs.

This is one of the few books that leaves me feeling like I know all about the subject. It's incredible how he packs so much knowledge into these few pages! He obviously knows, and loves, his subject. And he writes with a storyteller's flair, so it's more like a novel than a text--I was sorry when it was finished!

Do yourself a favor. If you have any interest in trains whatsoever, get this book. You'll read it more than once.

I purchaced the book used and found it to be an asset to my RR Library. It covers all aspects of the RR especially freight service. My only complaint was the maps in my book are hand drawn and needed to blow them up on copy machine to get a good understanding of what they were talking about. They reference the maps quite a bit and turning back and forth got to be a little tough, so made the copys. Great book... buy it NOW !

The cover of this book makes it look cheap but inside there is literally a treasure trove awaiting the person who wants to know how and why a railroad works. Worth the price. This book was read from cover to cover and will now joint my reference material.

Excellent way to bring yourself up on the complexities of the railroad industry. We used the book to bring management consultants up to speed with the information about railroads that they needed to use on an assignment that put them in front of railroad veterans. The average layman can get alot out of this book if he has an interest in railroads. It gets into all aspects from car types, engine sizes, intermodal, and examples of why routes are developed in what seems to the average person as incorrect routes. The cover is a little "cheesy" but don't be fooled this is a good buy.

Armstrong's book is intelligent, comprehensive and not alienating, and gives a wonderful introduction to all aspects of the railroading business. I bought a copy as reference for work, but intend to sell that copy to the company and buy my own--a first rate job!

John Armstrong knows trains both big and small. This excellent work is the bible of railroading, taking you from a standing start to a comprehensive background in everything having to do with the design and operation of railroads. Armstrong writes with a spare, clean style tinged with dry humor that gets you where you need to go with no unnecessary overhead. If you have a need or desire to find out what trains are all about, look no further than this excellent work.

(By the way, in his other life, John Armstrong is the world's greatest living designer of model railroad layouts!)

If you want to know everything about railroading, this is THE book to get. I'm in model railroading since 20 years. This book is so comprehensive and full of informations, after the third chapter, I was feeling as if I was a perfect ignorant before!!
It's an hard-to-find book, so if you can get a copy, do it!

The fifth edition of this fine book has now been published however it is still not yet available from Amazon.com

Most of our knowledge of railroads comes from either seeing them as they pass in their multi-hued glory, or in memories generated from films of steam belching locomotives huffing and chugging their way across the countryside. Unless we care enough to learn more, we really do not understand how they work, why they are organized the way they are, or what all the equipment that we pass by is really for. If we do care to learn more, there is a dearth of information about the railroad. That lack of information is what is addressed by this book. This book could be used as a semester-length entry-level university class textbook - it is that thorough yet high-level. In 22 chapters it addresses all the fundamentals of the railroad especially as railroading is practiced in North America.

Through many examples derived from a fictional railroad that operates in the Northeast U.S., the author leads us through what and how a railroad "ticks". He explains why the rails are ballasted the way they are; what historical accident led to the gauge being determined as 4 ft 8.75 inches; how locomotives are measured and what are the important measurements that the operating departments use; How signals work on the railroad; what kinds of railroad cars are there and what they are used for; the way in which a car goes from point A to point B and how the revenue is shared amongst the many hands that touch that load; and how the railroad itself is organized to bring its benefits to the shipping public.

This is a pretty thorough introduction to the art of railroading and is about as much information as any curious observer may wish to have. Besides people who are interested in railroading (maybe as a career?), I can see this book also being useful to model railroaders who want to model realistic operations; shippers who want to understand what happens when they let go of a cargo, or when they receive it; investors and financiers in railroads; and others.

Being somewhat of a textbook, the reader has to understand that getting through this book will take some work - this is not an easy read at the beach intended to help pass the time! But, attention to the words and the concepts they illuminate will help the reader understand the complex world of railroading.