Would you say driving a train is easier than driving a car? You don't have to be concerned about what is going on behind and to the side of you. All you have to be concerend with is the line ahead of you. Travelling at 125 mph with hundreds of passengers behind you though is not a responibility I'd want.
Obviously not all trains do that speed and a lot of metro style trains will be lucky if they do half that.
I think driving a train on a bright sunny day is easier than driving a car.
Driving a train is not really anything like driving a car. When driving a car, you react to what you see ahead of you; driving a train you have to be aware of what's ahead before you see it, which is why route knowledge is so important.
Some examples:
If a signal shows two yellows, you need to be thinking about where the red is, and where your braking point is in order to stop at that red (preferably without setting off the TPWS!), which may be a different point depending on the unit braking characteristics, loading, gradients and especially railhead conditions. (Try it in your car: when you pass a green traffic light, imagine you're on the railway and the next traffic light is two yellows, if such a thing existed on the road. Where's your red?)
When stopping at stations, again, you need to think about where to shut off power and where to brake - braking on sight of the station is likely to lead to you running straight out the other side; how you brake for the station depends again on unit, gradient, rail head conditions etc. And the braking technique used may depend on where on the platform the stop car mark is for the length of train you're driving (4 car train might stop midway down the platform; 8 car mark might be at the far end). Which of course leads to other considerations that the car driver need not worry about: stopping short, or failing to call, or making an unscheduled call, or opening doors on the wrong side, or leaving early if you're booked waiting time at a particular station.
Similarly for permanent/temporary speed restrictions: the driver needs to know from memory where to brake to avoid overspeeding and/or setting off TPWS overspeed grids - braking when you see the board marking the reduction in linespeed will very likely result in the train overspeeding. And where line speed increases, the driver needs to judge when his entire train is past the point where the speed changes, which might be different depending on the length of train. For example, where linespeed increases from, say, 30mph to 50mph, if a driver takes power too early such that the train is travelling at 35mph before the rear coach has fully passed the speed increase then he's speeding and could end up off track and being investigated.
A car driver doesn't need to know what he's passed, whereas the train driver needs to remember what the last signal aspect was so he knows what's coming up. Which sounds easy, and it is for the most part, except for where signal sections are very long, when the mind starts to wander, and the train approaches the next signal round a blind bend (with no banner repeater) with the driver trying to remember whether his last signal was one or two yellows....
And the same applies for stations where there is no starter signal, and the previous signal was single yellow. Which means that the next signal, perhaps hidden round the corner, is a red. But he's forgotten he came in on a single yellow because he's been distracted by concentrating on stopping at the right mark on the platform, carrying out station duties, opening and closing doors, checking his diagram, answering a passenger's questions etc. etc. etc. So he accelerates away from the station and ends up having a SOYSPAD. Hence the reason for using the DRA and professional driving techniques such as checking the AWS sunflower and taking reduced power.
And then there's a signalling problem so the signaller asks you to terminate short and carry out a shunt move that you've only done once before and that was 5 years ago when you first learnt the route. Which is ok, because the signaller is (usually) happy to talk you through the move, except for when they tut and say 'You do actually sign this route, don't you driver!?'. Assuming you can understand what he's saying because the reception on the CSR is so appalling.
All this, in the absolute pitch black and thick fog on some rural route (no streetlights!) and maybe you're tired because you're coming up to the end of your turn and you've been up since 2am, as you have been for the last 7 days, and you couldn't get to sleep last night. And then BEEPBEEPBEEPBEEPBEEP as the train decides to frighten the life out of you to tell you toilet's out of order because the toilet tank's full up - exactly the same alarm sound as if you've lost door interlock or something.
It's a great job, I love it. But it's nothing like driving a car.
hock:
Perhaps I'll stick to "Fullback" in future.