How fast is a freight train travelling?

What is the difference between a through freight train and a local freight train?

• What is the difference between a local freight train and a through freight train? Please let me know thank you.

• Answer:

  Hoghead got here before me. But I will add that I work a Local Road Switch most of the time. We stop at regular accounts in most every town up to 110 miles east of our home terminal. (Another Local does the same thing going west.) Our cars consist of center-beam-flats for a lumber mill, propane tanks for a distribution station, box cars for a bean warehouse, gondolas for a scrap iron yard, cars for interchange for another railroad, and hoppers for a couple of grain elevators. All these cars are strategically placed in the train where they will be easiest to set out at the various locations. By the time we have gone the 110 miles there are no cars left in the train. We spend the night and then return the next day picking up the loaded cars as we go, if the are ready. If not, then we get 'em on the next trip. And has Hoghead has stated it is a lot of switching and moving cars around at each stop. You don't know the problems you'll encounter until you get there and look it over. It's a whole different dimension in geometric problem solving that takes a long time to learn. With the added degree of safety and efficiency thrown in.