When and Why did Roadrailers End

[wheelnrail]

Over here across the Atlantic, Norfolk Southern is beginning to end Its dedicated Triple Crown Roadrailer service from all but one of its routes due to "restructuring". Anyway I was looking through some images and found that Roadrailers ran on the British Network for a time. When did they end and why? Thanks!

 

[coppercapped]

Over here across the Atlantic, Norfolk Southern is beginning to end Its dedicated Triple Crown Roadrailer service from all but one of its routes due to "restructuring". Anyway I was looking through some images and found that Roadrailers ran on the British Network for a time. When did they end and why? Thanks!

Trials were run with then in the late 1950s, early 1960s. There were some issues at the time. Firstly the rail axle set was heavy and took away some of the payload which could have been carried with the same all-up weight. Another was that the structure was a lot heavier as it also had to take the buffing loads of all the train behind it which a road semi-trailer didn't.

So it was quite heavier than a road semi-trailer and more expensive. In the days of more limited maximum road vehicle weight this was an important consideration as the payload suffered.

Equally it would only run one way round so for the return journey either all the trailers would have to be uncoupled and reversed or a balloon loop would be necessary. At any intermediate stop, if the required road railer was in the middle, it was quite a faff to separate the train, remove the trailer and couple the train up again. Probably for long trans-USA journeys these issues were not so much a problem.

In view of the rapid development of the container, the 'Beeching Report' recommended the development of the container carrying 'Liner Train', which didn't need to be rotated and any container could be removed or replaced without disturbing the others, so the RoadRailer was abandoned about 1963 or 64.

 

[philabos]

The above is correct.
I would add one of the advantages of roadrailer is to operate without a heavily equipped intermodal terminal. Simply hook up and drive off on a flat paved terminal.
With all of the US railroads heavily invested in double stacked container equipment and facilities, NS decided it was not prudent to reinvest in a one off product. The equipment is getting old so it is the right time to exit.

 

[Dr Hoo]

The original roadrailer trials were before my time in terms of working but they attracted quite a lot of interest at the time. Apparently Ernest Marples MP, Minister of Transport, showed great personal interest when a prototype was displayed at the 1960 Commercial Vehicle Show in Britain.

One of the few places that I have seen the concept described at any length is in a book entitled Railways Tomorrow by Rolt Hammond, published in 1963, but unfortunately this does not extend to describing what happened.

There are some very brief clips available on YouTube, forming part of contemporary newsreel reports on railway modernisation but they don't reallly show very much.

There was a brief attempt to re-activate the idea in Britain around 1996, called Trailer Train, I think. I remember going to Northampton to see a demonstration with a trailer that had come down from Aberdeen IIRC loaded with paper products and was being sent on by road to Kent.

Road railers have run in Australia on the standard gauge, I understand, and even in New Zealand on 3 foot 6 inch gauge but without long term commercial success.

 

[John Luxton]

The model railway suppliers PECO sold kits of the Roadrailers well into the late 1970s there were kits available for the trailer and the adaptor wagon. I recall building one.

I am sure Triang also had a ready to run model designed to run on their Minic 00 scale model roadway system complete with slot car road way with interlaced rail track.

I have seen photos not sure if the model made it into production though.

jOhn

 

[snakeeyes]

https://youtu.be/CPbTgv_wv6g

 

[John Webb]

The model railway suppliers PECO sold kits of the Roadrailers well into the late 1970s there were kits available for the trailer and the adaptor wagon. I recall building one.

I am sure Triang also had a ready to run model designed to run on their Minic 00 scale model roadway system complete with slot car road way with interlaced rail track.

I have seen photos not sure if the model made it into production though.

jOhn

According to Pat Hammond's "Triang Railways, the Story of Rovex Volume 1 1950-1965" the road/railer system was produced in model form and was available from 1964 onwards. But like the full-size version it was not available for long, being removed from the catalogue in the late 1960s.