Train driver

A train driver is a person who operates a train, railcar, or other rail transport vehicle. The driver is in charge of and is responsible for the mechanical operation of the train, train speed, and all of the train handling (also known as brake handling). Train drivers must follow certain guidelines for driving a train safely.

British English terms for a train driver include engine driver, engineman, and locomotive driver. The term in North American English is railroad engineer, but the simpler term engineer is more commonly used. Terms for a train driver in other English dialects include locomotive handler, locomotive engineer, locomotive operator, train operator, and motorman. In American English, a hostler (also known as a switcher) moves engines around rail yards, but does not take them out on the main line tracks; the British English equivalent is a shunter.

For many American railroads, the following career progression is typical: assistant conductor (brakeman), train conductor, and finally the engineer. For many years the fireman was next in line to be an engineer, but that classification has been eliminated. In the US, engineers are required to be certified and must then be re-certified every two to three years.

The traditional career progression in the United Kingdom (for steam locomotives) was engine cleaner, passed engine cleaner (i.e. the employee has passed the assessment for fireman), fireman, passed fireman (i.e. passed assessment for driver), and driver. Michael Reynolds, locomotive inspector of the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway proposed a system of locomotive driving certificates, as a stimulus of improvement of service and competency. However, no such system was ever universally adopted by the railways of the UK.

In India, a driver starts as a diesel assistant (or electrical assistant for electric locomotives). They then get promoted on a scale: goods, passenger, mail express, and the Rajdhani, Shatabdi, and Duronto express services.

The British transport historian Christian Wolmar wrote in October 2013 that train operators employed by the Rio Tinto Group to transport iron ore across the Australian outback were likely to be the highest-paid members of the occupation in the world at that time.

• Ben Chifley, former Prime Minister of Australia
• Christine Gonzalez, first female driver for a Class 1 railroad.
• Casey Jones, American engineer whose wreck on the Illinois Central Railroad on April 30, 1900, was immortalized in verse and music.

• Conductor
• Fireman
• Motorman
• Secondman

• Huibregtse, Jon R. (2010). American Railroad Labor and the Genesis of the New Deal, 1919–1935. University Press of Florida.
• Licht, Walter (1983). Working for the Railroad: The Organization of Work in the Nineteenth Century. Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691047003.
• Orr, John W. (2001). Set Up Running: The Life of a Pennsylvania Railroad Engineman, 1904–1949.
• Tuck, Joseph Hugh (1977). Canadian Railways and the International Brotherhoods: Labour Organizations in the Railway Running Trades in Canada, 1865–1914 (Thesis). Vol. 37. Dissertation Abstracts International. p. 6681.

The following examine the role of the railroad engineer from 1890 to 1919, discussing qualifications for becoming an engineer and typical experiences on the job:

• White, John H. Jr. (Fall–Winter 2003). "Oh, To Be a Locomotive Engineer, Part 1: Once It Was Every Boy's Ambition". Railroad History. 189 (189): 12–33. JSTOR 43504848.
• White, John H. Jr. (Spring–Summer 2004). "Oh, To Be a Locomotive Engineer, Part 2: More About the Lives of Eagle-Eyes Famous, Infamous, and Forgotten". Railroad History. 190: 56–77. JSTOR 43524273.

Wilson David C Forward! The Revolution in the Lives of the Footplatemen 1962–1996 Published by Suttons ISBN 0-7509-1144-1

• TrainDriver.org – A detailed explanation of what train driving involves, and becoming a train driver in the UK