Brutal unpredictability of work schedule. Essentially, when I as marked up, I lived in a state of sleep deprivation for 30 years. You get an idea of when you might get called, then try to adjust life and rest accordingly, (usually a 2 hr call), but that can change in an hour (people lay off ahead of you, phantom trains pop up, etc.). then you have to decide whether to lay off sick, costing you two days pay, or to throw water in your face and live on coffee for 12 hours with no or little sleep. THIS IS NOT A JOB FOR SOMEONE WHO HAS TO GET 6-8 HOURS OF REGULAR SLEEP A NIGHT. No shifts, you'll be called when your turn comes up; could be any hours day or night.
Outside conditions can be tough, although most engines now have AC and sufficient heat (not so 30 years ago.)
Very responsible position, so many rules and regulations to keep up with. This continues to get worse as the company constantly tries to insulate themselves from liability by writing new rules almost weekly to cover every situation, often redundantly.
Can be dangerous. If you don't pay attention, the chance of injury is always lurking.
When the work force is poorly allocated, you are under pressure to work too much. Pay is good, but its hard on the body and home life. And again, the unpredictability of on-duty times can break a person down. It's tough for a person with a good work ethic because you don't want to lie or disappoint, yet one has to be ready to lay off sick in order to preserve your health and sanity.
Management harassment and incompetence. This varies by railroad and location. Some terminals are managed by railroaders with experience who know to let the men do the work with as little interference as possible. Others are people who were hired out of college with little work experience, (I'm not anti-college, I have a degree.) and then are drilled to constantly be doing road tests for finding violations and subsequent discipline. Most RR's require their managers to perform so many tests per month. The poorly managed ones even require so many FAILURES per month. (how's that for pessimism.) Again, this varied greatly over the years, and I'm sure it still does - highly dependent on the tone set by the local superintendent or district manager. Over my 30 years it was about 50/50. (half the time working for good managers, half the time jerks or incompetent or both.)
