Freight hopping

Freighthopping or train hopping is the act of surreptitiously boarding and riding a railroad freight car. In the United States, this became a common means of transportation following the American Civil War as the railroads began pushing westward, especially among migrant workers who became known as "hobos". It continued to be widely used by those unable to afford other transportation, especially during times of widespread economic dislocation such as the Great Depression. For a variety of reasons the practice is less common today, although a community of freight-train riders still exists.

Typically, riders will go to a rail yard where the trains "crew change" (switch out crew). They will either know from other riders of a spot to hide and wait, or they will find one themselves. Depending on the size and layout of the yard, riders may have to get on the train while it is moving; doing this is known as "catching on the fly". Furthermore, riders must figure out which way trains are going, either by calling the company's internal tracking number or by knowing which tracks go where. Riders will occasionally wait at "side outs", places where there are two parallel tracks and trains pull aside for others to pass.

Cars and trains are divided several ways with regards to riding. There are "IMs" (intermodal containers, also called "hotshots" or "double stack"), "junk" (mixed cars) and coal. Within these three groups some cars are "rideable" and some not: boxcars, grainers and gondolas are some of the rideable "junk" cars. On IMs, riders usually stay in the metal beds in front of or behind the shipping containers, "48/53 wells" or under tractor trailers "pig in a bucket" (when trailer is on a metal platform with large holes cut in the bottom. On coal, riders often get into "DPUs" or "rear units", which are the engines put on the back or middle of the train on long coal loads. Riding in the empty or full coal containers is also possible. Riding cars on the small exposed porch of a tanker, on a truss-bottom well car or any other position which exposes the rider to a great risk of falling off or getting caught is called "riding suicide".

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Wikipedia