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The operator's tasks

Operators in local stations - including traffic control centers like Zurich-Altstetten - directly control the reservation of the route for a particular train and the setting of turnouts and signals that this entails. In short, the operator controls the safety-related fixed plant.

Operators (Fahrdienstleiter) are supported by electro-mechanical and, increasingly, electronic interlocking systems that prevent clearing conflicting routes.

In the time before electronics, every station had one or more operators, who typically controlled only the tracks in the area of the station. In recent decades, electronics have allowed the grouping of operators in so-called "remote control" centers governing all safety-related fixed plant along a section of line. For example, the control center in Zurich-Altstetten station oversees traffic along a number of kilometers of the Killwangen-Altstetten line.

Role of the operator in managing train traffic

Theoretically, it would be possible for all train traffic to run automatically, using the automatic routing system, without any intervention from the operator. But because of the numerous extra trains, and the fact that some trains - particularly freight trains and special trains but also passenger trains - are almost always running off schedule, the dispatcher and operator must intervene to decide which train will go first in case of conflicts, and also on possible re-routing of trains onto other tracks.