A combine car in North American parlance, most often referred to simply as a combine, is a type of railroad car

Railroad car

A railroad car or railway vehicle , also known as a bogie in Indian English, is a vehicle on a rail transport system that is used for the carrying of cargo or passengers. Cars can be coupled together into a train and hauled by one or more locomotives...

 which combines sections for both passenger

Passenger

A passenger is a term broadly used to describe any person who travels in a vehicle, but bears little or no responsibility for the tasks required for that vehicle to arrive at its destination....

s and freight.

Most often, it was used on short lines to carry passengers and their luggage

Luggage

Baggage is any number of bags, cases and containers which hold a traveller's articles during transit.Luggage is more or less the same concept as "baggage", but is normally used in relation to the personal luggage of a specific person or persons Baggage is any number of bags, cases and containers...

, as a full car would not have been cost effective. One half (or less) of the car is built like a baggage car

Baggage car

A baggage car or luggage van is a type of railway vehicle often forming part of the composition of passenger trains and used to carry passengers' checked baggage, as well as parcels . Being typically coupled at the front of the train behind the locomotive, this type of car is sometimes described...

 while the other half of the car is a regular passenger car. This type of combine is referred to as a coach-baggage. Another common type of combine in railroad use was the coach-RPO

Railway post office

In the United States a railway post office, commonly abbreviated as RPO, was a railroad car that was normally operated in passenger service as a means to sort mail en route, in order to speed delivery. The RPO was staffed by highly trained Railway Mail Service postal clerks, and was off-limits to...

. A portion of this type of car was configured as a railway post office

Railway post office

In the United States a railway post office, commonly abbreviated as RPO, was a railroad car that was normally operated in passenger service as a means to sort mail en route, in order to speed delivery. The RPO was staffed by highly trained Railway Mail Service postal clerks, and was off-limits to...

 while the rest of the car was configured as a coach.

When Amtrak took over in 1971, lightweight combines were used on most routes, particularly on trains which had used combines before Amtrak took over. As Amtrak started rehabbing their older cars to Heritage Fleet

Heritage Fleet

Heritage Fleet was a program started by Amtrak in 1977 to convert its older, mainly streamlined, cars from steam heating to head end power. Head end power conversions were performed at Amtrak's heavy repair center in Beech Grove, Indiana, outside of Indianapolis...

 standards, the only combines which survived were the Baggage-Dorm cars. As Amtrak received the Superliner

Superliner (railcar)

The Superliner is a double decker passenger car used by Amtrak on long haul trains that do not use the Northeast Corridor. The initial cars were built by Pullman-Standard in the late 1970s and a second order was built in the mid 1990s by Bombardier Transportation...

 cars in all forms, including dorm cars, the only routes which required rehabbed single-level dorm cars were the East Coast routes (Crescent

Crescent

In art and symbolism, a crescent is generally the shape produced when a circular disk has a segment of another circle removed from its edge, so that what remains is a shape enclosed by two circular arcs of different diameters which intersect at two points .In astronomy, a crescent...

, Lake Shore Limited

Lake Shore Limited

The Lake Shore Limited is a daily passenger train route operated by Amtrak in the Northeastern and Midwestern United States. The train runs between Chicago and Albany, NY, where it divides into two sections that provide thru-service to New York and Boston...

, Silver Star

Silver Star

The Silver Star is the third-highest combat military decoration that can be awarded to a member of any branch of the United States armed forces for valor in the face of the enemy....

, etc.) due to low tunnel clearance. Because Amtrak had a surplus of single-level coaches due to the recent delivery of Amfleet

Amfleet

Amfleet is a series of intercity railroad passenger cars built for the operator Amtrak by the manufacturer Budd Company in two series during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Today, Amfleet cars are used extensively throughout the Amtrak system outside the western United States...

 coaches, baggage-coaches were unnecessary. Thus, baggage-dorm cars were the only cars that should logically be rehabbed. Rehabbed baggage-dorm cars were used on Amtrak East Coast routes from the early 1980s until 1996.

When Amtrak received its new Viewliner

Viewliner

The Viewliner is a single-level car type used by Amtrak on eastern routes. With the exception of a prototype dining car named "Indianapolis" , all cars built so far are sleeping cars and are assigned names that include the word "View."- Early design :...

 and Superliner II sleeping cars in 1996, some of the Heritage 10-6 sleepers were turned into crew dorms, and the dorms became unnecessary. When Amtrak received the Superliner II coaches, some of the Heritage coaches which had been replaced were turned into baggage cars. Thus, baggage-dorms became unnecessary, and all were retired.

Although Amtrak

Amtrak

The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, doing business as Amtrak , is a government-owned corporation that was organized on May 1, 1971, to provide intercity passenger train service in the United States. "Amtrak" is a portmanteau of the words "America" and "track". It is headquartered at Union...

 operates many cars in its Superliner

Superliner (railcar)

The Superliner is a double decker passenger car used by Amtrak on long haul trains that do not use the Northeast Corridor. The initial cars were built by Pullman-Standard in the late 1970s and a second order was built in the mid 1990s by Bombardier Transportation...

 fleet that are labeled as coach-baggage, they are not often referred to as combines. Via Rail Canada still operates a few combines in the traditional sense, which carry passengers, baggage and supplies for villages en route. They are towed by freight trains in far northern Manitoba

Manitoba

Manitoba is a Canadian prairie province with an area of . The province has over 110,000 lakes and has a largely continental climate because of its flat topography. Agriculture, mostly concentrated in the fertile southern and western parts of the province, is vital to the province's economy; other...

.

External links

• Virginia & Truckee Railroad Combination Car No. 16 — photographs and short history of a Combination Car built in 1874.