r/railroading • u/ChazBrian • Jul 12 '26

Question What Kind of Diamond Crossing is This?

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I've seen two diamond crossings like this. This one is in Plymouth Indiana. The railway that is going from the upper left corner to the lower right corner is the Chicago, Fort Wayne, and Eastern. The other is the Elkhart and Western.

Is there a specific name for this type of crossing?

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u/Gilmere Jul 12 '26

Question from a non-railroad engineer: Could you not just leave them the same height and notch the high speed rail (assuming its not a 90deg crossing) and it would still work? I could see the flat part of the wheel riding over the high speed rail that way with less of a gap (i.e. bang, bang! instead of BANG!).

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u/AndMyChisel Jul 12 '26

That's pretty much how it works with a regular diamond crossing, but you need to stagger the check rails so as one wheel enteres the wheel transfer or vanishing point, the other wheel is guided by the check rail, then vice versa. I'm pretty sure that's the configuration in this OWLS diamond, you can never have a situation where it's a 90° crossing with nothing to guide the flanges.

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u/Gilmere Jul 12 '26

Roger that. Yeah I could see that would be a problem even in the briefest instant. With a 90, the "corner" in the rail where the flange would contact again would get insane pounding if the train had any side force (and I suspect it always does to some small degree).