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Draisine
A draisine (English: /dreɪˈziːn/) is a light auxiliary rail vehicle, driven by service personnel, equipped to transport crew and material necessary for the maintenance of railway infrastructure.
The term is derived from the German inventor of a two-wheeled, foot-propelled conveyance Baron Karl Drais, who invented his Laufmaschine (German for "running machine") in 1817, which was called Draisine in German (vélocipède or draisienne in French) by the press.
A dandy horse, it is the first reliable claim for a practically used precursor to the bicycle, basically the first commercially successful two-wheeled, steerable, human-propelled machine, also called a hobby-horse.
Later, the name draisine came to be applied only to the invention used on rails and was extended to similar vehicles, even when not human-powered. Because of their low weight and small size, they can be put on and taken off the rails at any place, allowing trains to pass.
In the United States, motor-powered draisines are known as speeders while human-powered ones are referred as handcars. Vehicles that can be driven on both the highway and the rail line are called road–rail vehicles, or (after a trademark) Hy-Rails.
There are many forms of self-propelled "draisine”, including the familiar pump-action railroad handcar.
A specific form of pedal-powered rail-cycle used by railroad maintenance workers in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Finland until about 1950, are called dressin in Swedish, dresin in Norwegian, dræsine in Danish, and resiina in Finnish.
Self-propelled draisines nowadays are used for recreation on several otherwise unused railway lines in Germany, France, Belgium, Austria, Costa Rica, Sweden, Norway, Poland, North America and South Korea. In the United States, railbike tours have operated in several states: California, Maine, Oregon, the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York, and Delaware.
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Draisine
A draisine (English: /dreɪˈziːn/) is a light auxiliary rail vehicle, driven by service personnel, equipped to transport crew and material necessary for the maintenance of railway infrastructure.
The term is derived from the German inventor of a two-wheeled, foot-propelled conveyance Baron Karl Drais, who invented his Laufmaschine (German for "running machine") in 1817, which was called Draisine in German (vélocipède or draisienne in French) by the press.
A dandy horse, it is the first reliable claim for a practically used precursor to the bicycle, basically the first commercially successful two-wheeled, steerable, human-propelled machine, also called a hobby-horse.
Later, the name draisine came to be applied only to the invention used on rails and was extended to similar vehicles, even when not human-powered. Because of their low weight and small size, they can be put on and taken off the rails at any place, allowing trains to pass.
In the United States, motor-powered draisines are known as speeders while human-powered ones are referred as handcars. Vehicles that can be driven on both the highway and the rail line are called road–rail vehicles, or (after a trademark) Hy-Rails.
There are many forms of self-propelled "draisine”, including the familiar pump-action railroad handcar.
A specific form of pedal-powered rail-cycle used by railroad maintenance workers in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Finland until about 1950, are called dressin in Swedish, dresin in Norwegian, dræsine in Danish, and resiina in Finnish.
Self-propelled draisines nowadays are used for recreation on several otherwise unused railway lines in Germany, France, Belgium, Austria, Costa Rica, Sweden, Norway, Poland, North America and South Korea. In the United States, railbike tours have operated in several states: California, Maine, Oregon, the Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York, and Delaware.