Rail-Track Laying and Maintenance Equipment Operators
Lay, repair, and maintain track for standard or narrow-gauge railroad equipment used in regular railroad service or in plant yards, quarries, sand and gravel pits, and mines. Includes ballast cleaning machine operators and railroad bed tamping machine operators.
19,580 people do this job in the US. $70,070 a year.
of the working time. Estimate.
- 0%
- 0%
- 100%
Measured, from Anthropic's usage data (2025). Counts help on part of a task.
On the chosen pace and reliability. Estimate.
Share of the working time within reach, now to 2030
What each choice means: , , , , . Every pace starts from .
At this date and pace, models finish tasks up to 4.4 h long four times in five.
How far this has come
With GPT-4, measured in March 2023, 0% of this job's working time was within reach at . With Claude 3.7 Sonnet, measured in February 2025, 0%. With Claude Mythos Preview (early), measured in April 2026, 0%. Today's estimate: 0%.
A backcast: today's task data with the best model METR had measured by each date. It shows how fast the models have moved, not what anyone forecast at the time.
The tasks
Sorted by . 26 tasks from .
| Task | Kind | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drive vehicles that automatically move and lay tracks or rails over sections of track to be constructed, repaired, or maintained.Done daily by most who do it. | 16% | 1.7 h50 min to 5 h | Stays with people | |
| Patrol assigned track sections so that damaged or broken track can be located and reported.Done more than monthly by most who do it. | 9% | 1.7 h50 min to 3.3 h | Stays with people | |
| Dress and reshape worn or damaged railroad switch points or frogs, using portable power grinders.Done more than monthly by most who do it. | 9% | 1.3 h25 min to 2.5 h | Stays with people | |
| Clean, grade, or level ballast on railroad tracks.Done more than yearly by most who do it. | 7% | 1.7 h25 min to 3.3 h | Stays with people | |
| Operate track wrenches to tighten or loosen bolts at joints that hold ends of rails together.Done daily by most who do it. | 7% | 25 min8 min to 1.3 h | Stays with people | |
| Operate single- or multiple-head spike driving machines to drive spikes into ties and secure rails.Done more than monthly by most who do it. | 6% | 38 min17 min to 1.7 h | Stays with people | |
| Repair or adjust track switches, using wrenches and replacement parts.Done more than monthly by most who do it. | 5% | 1.3 h25 min to 2.5 h | Stays with people | |
| Weld sections of track together, such as switch points and frogs.Done more than yearly by most who do it. | 4% | 2.5 h50 min to 5 h | Stays with people | |
| Engage mechanisms that lay tracks or rails to specified gauges.Done more than weekly by most who do it. | 4% | 25 min13 min to 1.3 h | Stays with people | |
| Operate single- or multiple-head spike pullers to pull old spikes from ties.Done more than yearly by most who do it. | 4% | 38 min17 min to 1.7 h | Stays with people | |
| Drill holes through rails, tie plates, or fishplates for insertion of bolts or spikes, using power drills.Done more than weekly by most who do it. | 3% | 38 min13 min to 1.3 h | Stays with people | |
| Clean tracks or clear ice or snow from tracks or switch boxes.Done more than monthly by most who do it. | 3% | 50 min17 min to 2.5 h | Stays with people |
Within reach, per task: the share of the task's time whose instances are short enough for a model to finish at the chosen date, pace and reliability. Half by: the date half of that time comes within reach.
Jobs that share skills with this one
From O*NET's related occupations. Within reach now and by the end of 2028, long-run pace, four in five.
- Paving, Surfacing, and Tamping Equipment Operators0% now, 0% by 2028
- Operating Engineers and Other Construction Equipment Operators9% now, 9% by 2028
- Millwrights0% now, 0% by 2028
- Pile Driver Operators0% now, 0% by 2028
- Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining10% now, 10% by 2028
- Rail Car Repairers3% now, 3% by 2028
Where this job works
The industry groups that employ the most of it (BLS, May 2025).
Where the most of these jobs are
The metro areas with the most people in it (BLS, May 2025).