Railroad directions are used to describe train directions on railroad systems.
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British
In British practice, railway directions are usually described as up and down, with up being towards a major location. This convention extends to not only the trains and the tracks, but also to lineside equipment, and areas near the track. Since British trains run on the left, the up side of a line is on the left when proceeding in the up direction. The names originate from the early railways, where trains would run up the hills to the mines, and down to the ports.
On the majority of the network, up is the direction towards London. London ( ˈlʌndən is the capital and largest urban area in the United Kingdom. In most of Scotland, with the exception of the West and East Coast Main Lines, up is towards Edinburgh. The West Coast Main Line (WCML is a busy mixed-traffic railway route in the United Kingdom. The East Coast Main Line ( ECML) is the electrified high-speed railway link between London and Edinburgh connecting Yorkshire, North East Edinburgh ( ˈɛdɪnb(ərə Dùn Èideann) is the Capital of Scotland and is its second largest city after Glasgow. The Valley Lines network around Cardiff has its own peculiar usage, relating to the original meaning of traveling up and down the valley. Valley Lines (also Valleys & Cardiff Local Routes) is the commonly-known name for the Cardiff and Valleys network of Suburban railway services within Cardiff Cardiff ( 'kɑːdɪf) is the Capital and the largest city and county in Wales. On the former Midland Railway up was towards Derby. The Midland Railway (MR was a Railway company in the United Kingdom, which existed from 1844 to 1922 when it became part of the London Midland and Scottish Derby (pronounced "dar-bee" /dˈɑːbɪ/ is a city in the East Midlands of England. Mileposts normally increase in the down direction
On the London Underground, geographic direction naming generally prevails (eg Eastbound, Westbound), except on the Circle Line, where the terms are Inner Rail (anticlockwise), and Outer Rail (clockwise). The Circle line, coloured yellow on the tube map is the eighth busiest line on the London Underground.
Individual tracks will have their own names, such as Up Main or Down Loop. Trains running towards London are normally referred to as Up trains, and those away from London as Down. Hence the Down Night Riviera runs to Penzance and the Up Flying Scotsman to Kings Cross. Penzance (Pensans also Penzans, IPA: /pɛnˈzæns/ is a town Civil parish, and Port in the Penwith district of Cornwall This article is about the railway passenger service known as the "Flying Scotsman" King's Cross station is a major railway terminus opened in 1852
Other directions commonly used are London and Country. The London end of a station is the end where trains to London depart. The country end is the opposite end, where trains to the country depart. This usage has issues where more than one route to London exists (eg at Exeter St Davids). Exeter St Davids station is the most important of seven National Rail stations in the city of Exeter in southwest England. London termini only have a country end.
China
In China, railway directions are described as "up" (上行) and "down" (下行), with up towards Beijing; trains leaving Beijing are "down", while those going toward Beijing are "up". Beijing Railway Station ( is one of Beijing 's Railway stations opened in the 1950s as can be seen from its architecture (which merges traditional architecture with For railways not connected with Beijing, north and west are used as "up" and east and south as "down". Odd numbered train codes are used for "up" trains, while even numbers are used for "down"; for example, train T27 from Beijing west to Lhasa is "down" (going away from Beijing) since 27 is odd. Beijing 's West Railway Station or just abbreviated as Beijing West ( Hanyu Pinyin: Běijīng Xīkèzhàn Simplified and Traditional Lhasa railway station ( is a railway station in Lhasa, Tibet Autonomous Region, China. As another example, the train from Harbin to Shanghai uses two codes, since in the Harbin-Tianjin sect, the train runs toward Beijing, but not in Tianjin-Shanghai sect. [1]
United States
Most railroads in the U.S. use cardinal directions to describe the directions that lines on their systems run, although these directions often differ from actual compass directions. The United States of America —commonly referred to as the A compass, magnetic compass or mariner's compass is a navigational instrument for determining direction relative to the earth's Magnetic poles It consists
Typically an entire railroad system (the lines of a railroad or a related group of railroads) will describe all of its lines by only two directions, either west and east or north and south. This greatly reduces the possibility of misunderstanding the direction in which a train is travelling as it traverses lines they may twist and turn or even reverse direction for a distance. These directions also have meaning in conflicts between trains running in opposite directions. For example, many railroads specify that trains of equal class running east are superior to those running west. This means that, if two trains are approaching a passing siding on a single-track line, the inferior westbound train must "take the siding" and wait there for the superior eastbound train to pass.
These directions are often referred to as "railroad" north, south, east or west to remove ambiguity with the same compass directions.
References
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