Hi group
I was curious how close many of us are to the nearest tracks, and what kind of operation it is.
I live exactly 1 mile fro the NS Cleveland line. We see at least 50 trains a day normally. I also have a shortline that is 5 miles away with operation 2 times a week.
Charlie

Two blocks (800') from Canadian National and one block (520') from Wisconsin & Southern. CN is approximately 25 a day and WSOR is one each way six days a week.


CN2513WaukeshaWI6-25-12 by railohio, on Flickr

I live about one mile from the junction of the CP/CN and the Minnesota Commercial.

[attachment=12000]I live a couple of miles from the Metrolink former SP line through Glendale, which has gradually become mostly passenger, with Metrolink commuter trains, Amtrak Surfliners, and the Amtrak Coast Starlight. Most freight now goes through the San Joaquin Valley via West Colton, the exceptions being a pig train from Portland, OR to LA, an oil tank train several times a week from up the coast, some empty auto racks, and some local freights and haulers.

Best I can figure is about 3/4 mile to a CN spur that used to service the AMC plant., and a bit under 2 miles to the CN main line. Then almost 3 miles to the ex-CPR line that's now Brampton and Orangeville.
The OB line gets a few trains a week. The spur may get service daily. The CN line gets practically every CN east-west freight through Toronto plus Go trains, VIA trains and Goderich and Exeter. There is talk that the line may go up to 60 to 100 trains a day.

I live on the southside of Lufkin, TX, about a mile from the UP (former SP) Houston - Shreveport line. Close enough to hear them when we have our windows open. Maybe a dozen or so trains a day, plus a couple of locals. Mostly westbound (southbound by the compass). Eastbound goes around through Beaumont.

I live about 2000 feet away from the junction between the standard gauge Kongsvinger Line and the narrow gauge steam museum railroad Urskog Hølands Banen.

The museum railroad runs on Sundays (except for charter trips and photo specials), and runs small tank steam engines pulling 3-4 passenger cars, or 7-8 two axle freight cars for photo specials.

On the Kongsvinger Line it is mostly passenger traffic:

Norwegian State Railroads (NSB) running suburban commuter operations from Oslo to Årnes or from Oslo to Kongsvinger on the Swedish border, under contract with the provinces of Akershus and Hedmark. Runs NSB type 69 and NSB type 72 two to four car electric motor units. We might soon see some of the newer and faster NSB type 75 (Stadler FLIRT) EMUs on the longer runs between Oslo and Kongsvinger.

Regional/international traffic operated by the Swedish train company Värmlandstrafik, running every 4 hours or so between the city of Karlstad in Sweden and Oslo, tying the Swedish border region closer into the booming Oslo economy. Runs Swedish X.52 EMUs - known as "Regina" (Queen) sets.

Swedish State Railroads (SJ) long distance international trains between the Norwegian capital city of Oslo and across Sweden to the Swedish capital city of Stockholm, on the Baltic Sea the east coast of Sweden.

Various freight trains operated by various operators, in particular lumber and sawdust trains from the Kongsvinger area (and the forest regions north of Kongsvinger along the Solør RR line), headed down towards Oslo, and then either south to lumber processing plants on the Østfoldbanen RR line - way down along the eastern side of Oslo fjord), or west through Oslo to other processing plants to the west of Oslo or to the export port at Drammen

Intermodal trains with containers (including refrigerators/freezer containers) bound between Sweden or Norway, or bound for the long run up through Sweden to cross back into Norway for the arctic port of Narvik in Northern Norway. The "ore line" between the port of Narvik in Norway and massive iro ore mines at Kiruna in Northern Sweden is connected to the Swedish RR net, but not to the Norwegian.

Car transport trains from the import harbor at Drammen (west of Oslo) bound for Sweden or for Northern Norway (via Sweden)

Freight operators seen: CargoNet (NSB Freight), Arctic Rail Express (ARE), Green Cargo (SJ Freight) and HectorRail

You can see some photos from the Kongsvinger Line here, at trainspotter/photographer Roy Olsen's trip page:
http://trips.rool.no/kongsvingerbanen_190508
http://trips.rool.no/kongsvingerbanen_300407

About 50 trains a day on the Kongsvinger line, hoped to be trippled by 2040 if we get priority for double tracking the line from Lillestrøm to Kongsvinger - it currently have only seven places where trains can pass each other - in the RR plans starting around 2020. Before we get to that point there is a lot of other project that have priority - extra tracks between Oslo and Ski to the SE, another double track tunnel and maybe some extra RR stations in Oslo and so on and so forth.

Smile,
Stein

At my week day apartment when at work, I 'live' 1.5 miles away from the 'Leiden to Utrecht' passenger rail lines, with trains every 15 minutes or so, and 3 miles from Leiden central station, in the Netherlands. Weekends I am back in the UK, and live about 2 miles from the Great Western mainline near Newton Abbot, from London to the southwest via Plymouth) seeing various passenger trains and the occasional freight.
I live several thousand miles away from the nearest US based railroad where my real interest lies however, so the above proximities are of very little interest to me, and I hardly go and 'rail fan', although I do travel by rail from time to time.
I rely on info that I can find on the internet/books/dvd's etc.

Koos

CN's main line between Niagara Falls and Hamilton passes by the end of my street about two blocks north from here, and CP's former TH&B line between Hamilton and Welland, Ontario is 6 or 7 miles to the south of here. There's also a fair amount of track in the next room.

Wayne

About 500 yards, as a crow flies, from the Far North Line, Inverness to Wick/Thurso and about half a mile from the Cromarty Firth here in The land of the Northern Haggis.

About 2113 ft according to Google Earth from for former CN Murray Bay Subdivision, ex-QRL&PCo Montmorency Division (1889). Track is just down the hill I'm leaving. Add a few feets and it's the new Montmorency Falls passenger station for the tourist train (Le Massif).

http://embruns.net/images/train-charlevoix-01.jpg

Matt

About 450 feet in two directions from CSX tracks here in Anderson IN. They are ex-CR/PC/NYC tracks.

When I was growing up, I lived right next to the CPR line going north out of Orangeville. The line has now been taken up north of town. I used to see multiple trains per day, including the end of the caboose era.

I now live about 1 km from the line used primarily by VIA to get from Ottawa to Smiths Falls. there are 4-5 trains per day.

My current office is about 300 m from another section of that same VIA line.


Andrew

I grew up on Victoria Ave. in Hamilton Ontario.Two doors away the TH&B had a line that switched the local industries and just up the street the Canadian National's mailine ran through the middle of town---I guess you could say I grew up "on the wrong side of the tracks".Today I'm about a 15 minute drive to CP's Kinnear Yard and a half-hour drive to CN's Stuart St.yard---Bayview is another 15 minute drive.As a train lover,I definitly miss the good old days.

We live around 2.5 miles from the main BNSF line running between California and into Phoenix. We used to hear the train whistle almost every night until the people living next to the tracks complained enough for them to make it a "no signal" zone. Oh yeah, the line has been in the same place for at least 80 years, the housing development, only around 10 years. It's typical of things like this, move in next to an existing railroad track, an airport or major highway and then complain about the noise afterwards.

We are also a few miles away from a large automobile storage facility where there is usually a good 50 or more car carriers unloading cars and trucks.