Listed below are standard frequencies used by railroads in the United States. Most of the same frequencies are be used for cross-border operations with Canada. The American Association of Railroads (AAR) has assigned channel numbers to each standard voice radio frequency.
These channel numbers are used with railroad radios and are commonly referred to by field personnel. Locomotive radios are able to select individual transmit and receive frequencies as needed. Sometimes this can be heard as "Go to 20-90". Standard practice is simplex operations, with the same channel number (i.e., 3636). A common channel for Union Pacific is channel 020, and may be heard on the radio as "go to Channel 20." Railroads on the radio still use the old channel number as opposed to the new numbers, where appropriate (i.e., "20" vs saying "020").
Regional or smaller/tourist railroads have been known to use channels or trunked radio systems outside of the AAR plan. In addition, some small operations even use DMR or other modes or systems for internal communications. If interchanging with another railroad, the AAR standard is used.
Amtrak/passenger trains outside of their own rail lines can be found on the host railroad's radio channels. Station operations may or may not be on a separate channel. Trains from one railroad company operating on another railroad will be found on the host railroad's channels (i.e., a Norfolk Southern train operating on CSX rails).
Location-specific railroad radio operations are found in the railroad section for each state.
With the introduction of the FCC narrowbanding requirements in 2013, the American Association of Railroads AAR) officially adopted the NXDN digital standard. The NXDN mode has two bandwidth options: "NXDN-N" or "Narrow" uses a 12.5 kHz channel spacing and is also referred to as "NXDN 9600" as this is the data bandwidth the channel can support. "NXDN-VN" or "Very Narrow" uses 6.25 kHz channel spacing, and is also referred to as "NXDN 4800". The AAR officially designated the "NXDN-VN" or "Very Narrow" mode for railroad operations.
While there is no timeline and railroads seem to be in no hurry to make the switch, in the coming years many railroads may begin the migration to this mode. Some are already using NXDN for yard and secondary operations.
CAPABLE SCANNERS - With these future plans in mind there are only a few receivers currently available on the market which can properly receive and decode the NXDN digital mode. These include the ICOM IC-R30 and IC-R8600, the Whistler TRX-1 and TRX-2, Uniden BCD160DN, BCD260DN, SDS100, SDS150, SDS200, BCD436HP and BCD536HP, AOR DV-1 and DV-10. With the exception of the BCD160DN and BCD260DN, the Uniden models all require the optional NXDN upgrade.
Frequencies
Railroad Operations
AAR 001-097
These channels are part of the original AAR band plan, and are widely used in the United States. After the narrowband mandate, AAR relabeled the channels with a 0 (zero) to indicate that the channel is now narrowband. Channel 24 (25KHz. wide) became 024 (12.5 KHz. wide) and the frequency remained the same. Channels 001-006 are used in Canada and in the US by some railroad trucking operations
AAR 107-196
AAR 307-487
Advanced Train Control System (ATCS)
A combination of wayside signal reporting, on board work reporting and message delievery along the railroad. Most commonly it is found along signaled/CTC rail lines and aids in the approximate location of trains, switch positions, route requests and other railroad specific data. A good source on monitoring ATCS data can be found on the ATCS Monitor website. ATCS data is not available on all railroads or lines. There is no standard channel plan or frequency band for ATCS. Listed are known channels in use, and will vary by railroad and/or location
Positive Train Control
Positive Train Control or PTC is a new GPS and data system to enforce various railroad and federal rules pertaining to train movement. Most railroads will be required to use a form of PTC currently offered by two vendors. This system is designed to be interoperable with other railroads to allow standardizing of data and equipment. Some isolated or passenger railroads may use their own form of PTC such as Amtrak's ACSES on the Northeast Corridor. PTC is independent of other forms of signaling such as ATC/CCS/ATC, but may be overlaid with signal systems. Although there is no dedicated service for PTC by the FCC, railroads have selected the 220MHz spectrum for PTC operations. These frequencies are licensed nationwide.
ITC
This is the Interoperable Train Control (ITC) system used on the North East Corridor (NEC), one of two Positive Train Control (PTC) systems there. Some of the frequencies are the same or overlapping with other PTC systems and steps are taken to minimize interference between the two systems. ITC uses a wider bandwidth (25 KHz.) signal than other systems. ITC is used by freight operators on the NEC and elsewhere.
Amtrak ACSES
Amtrak's Advanced Civil Speed Enforcement System (ACSES) system is used by Amtrak and commuter passenger trains on the North East Corridor (NEC). Freight trains on these tracks use ITC listed elsewhere. Many of these frequencies duplicate or overlap with ITC and other PTC 220 range frequencies so steps are taken to avoid interference.
Train Telemetry
Frequencies listed here are used for train status within the train. EOTD's (End Of Train Device), also known as FRED's (Flashing Rear End Device) are fixed at the rear of most freight trains. This device is linked to the HOTD (Head Of Train Device) also known as a MARY (as opposed to "FRED"). The devices report that the train is moving, air pressure and emergency status of the air valve along with its specific radio ID. This data burst is commonly used by the railfan community that a train is in the listener vicinity. Trains using DP or Distributive Power (remotely controlled locomotives) also use 450MHz frequencies to control such locomotives and transmit information such as power or brake setting, unit ID and other status information. Remote Controlled Locomotives (RCL) are typically found in yards/terminals on yard jobs. Some may be found on mainlines on local jobs but are not used for through trains and are not the same as DP locomotives.