Vestibuled train

A vestibuled train is a passenger train on which passenger cars have enclosed vestibules at their ends, in contrast to the open platforms on early cars. Typically, a vestibule has doorways on either side to allow passenger entry and exit at stations, a door into the body of the car, and, at the end, a doorway allowing access to the next car, via a flexible gangway connection.

History

The first vestibuled train was introduced on June 15, 1887, on the inaugural run of the Pennsylvania Limited of the Pennsylvania Railroad, forerunner of the famous Broadway Limited.
As a concept, the railway car vestibule had been tried in various primitive forms during the latter part of the 19th century, but the first viable form was invented by H. H. Sessions and his staff at the Pullman Car Works in Chicago. Sessions' patent was challenged by others and reduced in litigation to the spring mechanism of his vestibule design. Further litigation by Pullman was successful in modifying the earlier rulings.
Prior to the development of vestibules, passage between cars when a train was underway was both unpleasant and dangerous, involving stepping over a shifting plate between swaying cars, exposed to the weather, with no safety barrier on either side except for chain guard-rails, and with soot, cinders and fly ash raining down from the exhaust of the steam locomotive.
Because passengers were generally confined to a single car during a journey, trains had regular meal stops built into their schedules, and sleeping cars were uncommon. The introduction of vestibule connections on trains in the late nineteenth century allowed the inclusion of dining cars, lounge cars, and other specialized vehicles.
Vestibuled cars allowed the development of luxury trains during the golden age of rail travel, involving trains such as the Union Pacific's Overland Limited, the Pennsylvania Railroad's Pennsylvania Limited, and the New York Central's 20th Century Limited. The Southern's Crescent was introduced in 1891 as the Washington and Southwestern Vestibuled Limited, and widely known as The Vestibule because it was the first all-year train south of Washington equipped with vestibule connections.