Transfer table

A transfer table is a piece of railway equipment. It is similar in function to a turntable, though it cannot be used to turn equipment around.

Overview

It is also called as traverser. It consists of a single length of track that can be moved from side to side, in a direction perpendicular to the track. There are often multiple tracks on one side of the table and a single or multiple track(s) on the other.

Applications

Disused traverser outside the former Eveleigh Carriage Workshops in Australia
A traverser inside Golden Rock Railway Workshop in India.

Yards

They are often found in yards with locomotive maintenance facilities. The table allows a shed with multiple stalls for locomotives or carriages to be served by a single track, without the need for points that could take up a much larger area. Traversers were used at metropolitan termini where space is at a premium, such as Kew and St Kilda in suburban Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, which worked only two tracks.

Terminal stations

In Europe there were traversers at the terminal platforms at Birmingham Moor Street Station and at the former Gare de la Bastille terminus in Paris. These were installed to release locomotives from arriving passenger trains to the adjoining track. They had three parallel tracks on the table so that whichever positions the traverser was in an incoming passenger train would not be faced with a void.

In 2013 the Port of Felixstowe installed a traverser across nine tracks at its new North Terminal as ordinary points could not be fitted while allowing 35-wagon trains of shipping containers.[1]

Rack railways

A two track transfer table used as a switch at Mount Washington Cog Railway

Systems like the Locher rack system do not allow normal switches and transfer tables are used instead, as on the Pilatus Railway.

Roller coasters

Smaller traverses are frequently used on roller coasters to switch out trains.

Monorails and maglevs

Traverses are used on monorails and maglevs.

The Sydney Monorail had a traverser connected to about 6 storage roads. When the track in the main line moved to a stabling road, another track moved into the main line position.

Stadiums

Maintaining grass in stadiums can be a problem if the stadium keeps the grass in the shade. A solution is to mount the playing field on a single huge traverser, which can be rolled out under one of the grandstands onto the sunny side of that grandstand.

Combined turntable and traverser

Collinwood yards usage of a turntable leading into a transfer table

In rare instances, the turning features of a turntable have been combined with the lateral motion of a transfer table. Examples of such installations are in Asia.

An example of both pieces of equipment was in use up until the 1970s at the Collinwood Yards in Cleveland, Ohio. It allowed a single turntable to serve a linear train shed.

Preserved examples

Didcot Railway Centre, UK, has a traverser for transferring coaching stock between the roads of the carriage maintenance sheds.[2]

The National Tramway Museum at Crich, in Derbyshire, England has a traverser between the depot roads.[3]

Pilatus Railway has a lot of traversers, as its rack railway system does not allow switches.

Traversers are common on ridable miniature railways to access the shed and maintenance facilities. There may be a desire to reduce the number of points required, or — in the case of raised track with overhanging carriages — to allow switching with the same restrictions found on a saddle-beam monorail.

References

  1. ↑ Scotchman, Iain C (May 2013). "Felixstowe doubles rail capacity". Modern Railways (Key Publishing) 70 (776): 76.
  2. ↑ Mark, Baldry. "Traverser". Retrieved 2 February 2011.
  3. ↑ "All aboard!". Baldric.plus.com. Retrieved 18 June 2008.

External links