Transport Tycoon Forums

I've recently come across the term "chord" (specifically the "Nuneaton North Chord") but cannot find any railway-related meaning to that term in any dictionary. I suspect it's just a fancy term for a flyover. Can somebody please educate me?

(Not a native speaker btw)

Is it possible short for Corridor?

I know there's a lot of local names and railway slang around.
One of our main stations has a small slow line which is nicknamed 'The Cupboard'. Goodness knows why

"a straight line joining the ends of an arc."

Similar to a chord across a circle, a chord in railway jargon is a supplemental alignment that cuts across between two other lines etc. Basically a spur that connects to something rather than being just a spur.

Additionally, in railway alignment "chords" are used for measuring transitional curves in Hallade method. In the UK it's customary to use 20 m (roughly 1 chain).

Guess the engineers just went "eh, we'll call the curved line a chord as well then !"

Two other UK chords that spring to mind are the "Holmes Chord" which links Rotherham Central to Meadowhall, and, the "Hazel Grove Chord", near Stockport which provides a link from the Hope Valley route to Stockport.
A "chord" tends to be a newer piece of railway linking two routes that historically did not have a connection at that point.

Ordsall Chord being the newest I guess !

Thanks, everybody!

Yes I think its definition in the Railway sense largely comes, much like the chord of a circle, from the fact chords appear to be a more direct route to something, which as Badger says necessitates them to be newer than what was there before.

You sometimes hear it used to refer to any line linking two others, but that’s rather erroneous. You also hear it referring to one side of a triangle sometimes. I suppose Ordsall is an extreme example as it’s quite a big triangle. There’s a single track chord linking the North London Line with the GEML to the south at Stratford.

I know there's a lot of local names and railway slang around.
One of our main stations has a small slow line which is nicknamed 'The Cupboard'. Goodness knows why

Probably because you’re left there to be forgotten about where’s that anyway!?

Often depot men would regularly talk of engines being at the “back of the lake” (a small puddle), or “through the puzzles” (the points).

Plenty more exist, often less polite and subject to intense localisation.

Dave wrote:

I know there's a lot of local names and railway slang around.
One of our main stations has a small slow line which is nicknamed 'The Cupboard'. Goodness knows why

Probably because you’re left there to be forgotten about where’s that anyway!?

In honest, that isn't probably isn't untrue I've been forgotten about a few times or best one yet "Sorry to ask driver, but where on earth are you going?". What a day that was!

'The Cupboard' is the slow approaching Cambridge

My favourite named chord is 'Bacon Factory Chord'.

https://www.google.com/search?q=bacon+f ... =703&dpr=2

YNM wrote:Ordsall Chord being the newest I guess !

That's known as the Ordsall Curve.

Badger wrote:

YNM wrote:Ordsall Chord being the newest I guess !

That's known as the Ordsall Curve.

Not according to Network Rail it isn't, referred to as the Ordsall Chord in the Sectional Appendix.

I can't say I've ever heard of it called the Ordsall Curve until now to be fair.

Pilot wrote:

Badger wrote:

YNM wrote:Ordsall Chord being the newest I guess !

That's known as the Ordsall Curve.

Not according to Network Rail it isn't, referred to as the Ordsall Chord in the Sectional Appendix.

For sure you wouldn't call the sharp curve on ECML at Morpeth a "chord".

So I guess, a chord is :

• A curvy-line of track
• Fairly short
• Connects two other things
• Wasn't the first to exist