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What is the translation for the German word "Überholbahnhof"?

I have seen "overtaking station" in print, but I believe proper railway English doesn't distinguish and calls this a "passing loop", too. Since you showed a Spanish example, I note that Spanish-language rail literature uses the acronym "PAET" to denote it almost universally, and it took me some time to find that it is short for Puesto de Adelantamiento y Estacionamiento de Trenes (place for the overtaking and stabling of trains).

I didn't want to overload the diary by talking about the use of sidings for overtakings, too, but Nock's book described a North American operation even more special than a mallard:

  1. At a long siding, an even longer freight train stops with its end still on the siding.
  2. An AMTRAK passenger train arrives on the main track and passes the lower end of the siding.
  3. As the AMTRAK train progresses, the freight train pulls back until its front is on the siding.
  4. The AMTRAK train progresses non-stop past the upper end of the siding.
  5. The freight train moves forward again and leaves the siding.

Now the biggest switches are on the lines Madrid-Barcelona (180m long, 220km/h regular speed) and LGV Est.

A record set to fall:

Switches ordered for TGV Bretagne-Pays de la Loire | International Railway Journal

The longest turnout will have a tangent of 1/65 and will be more than 230m long.


*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.
by DoDo on Thu Jun 5th, 2014 at 03:05:18 PM EST
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