handcar

American  

[hand-kahr] / ˈhændˌkɑr /

noun

1. a small railroad car or platform on four wheels propelled by a mechanism worked by hand, used on some railroads for inspecting tracks and transporting workers.

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Etymology

Origin of handcar

An Americanism dating back to 1840–50; hand + car ¹

Example Sentences

Bike-adjacent inventions that roll atop train tracks have been known by many different names — handcar, draisine, kalamazoo and velocipede are just a few — since they first cropped up around the 1860s.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 10, 2023

And between two wooden luggage carts from the late 1800s sits a railway velocipede, a three-wheeled handcar that was operated by pedals.

From Washington Times • Nov. 15, 2020

In 1962, he published the marvellous “Willowdale Handcar,” in which three young people take off one day on a railroad handcar.

From The New Yorker • Dec. 3, 2018

The train’s conductor, William A. Fuller, pursued the first on a handcar and then by commandeering another locomotive.

From Time • Jul. 3, 2013

A small handcar rested on the tracks, its iron pump waiting for a human touch to animate it.

From "The Underground Railroad: A Novel" by Colson Whitehead