How you make money

Your railroad earns money when a train delivers freight to a town that wants it. Freight is anything a train carries: coal, grain, mail, and passengers too. That is the whole idea. Loading freight does not pay. Driving does not pay. Delivering pays.

Do this first

Select a town on the map. Find its Traffic section. Produces is what the town makes. Demands is what the town wants.
Look for a second town that wants what the first one makes. A pair that want each other's freight is better still. Then the train has something to carry both ways.
Build a station in each town and lay the track between them. The first line page shows how.
Order a train with both towns as its stops.
Wait for it to arrive. The money lands when the freight does. Your railroad's money, in the bar at the top, goes up.

You already have a railroad? Do step 1 on any town you could build in next. Then ask two things. Does this town want something your trains already carry? Does this town make something a town on your line wants? A yes to either one is good.

Starting from nothing and want some help choosing? Before you build anything, select a town. The panel shows the Surveyor's report. A surveyor is a person who measures the land for a railroad. The report is a short list of lines you could build from that town. Each one names two towns. Under the names are two rows of numbers. Here is an example:

est $44/day · $24,791 · 77 km · 0.6% grade
+ est $0/day connecting · $44/day together

Only two of those numbers matter for now. Both are in the first row.

The first number (est $44/day) is what the line should earn each day, after its daily costs. "est" means it is a best guess. It can be a minus, like est $-31/day. A minus means the line would lose money every day.
The second number ($24,791) is what it costs to build the two stations and the track. It has no label. The train costs extra.

Look for a line whose first number is above zero, and as big as you can find. If every line in a town's report shows a minus, select a different town and look again. You can ignore the other numbers for now: the kilometres, the grade, and the whole second row. The report goes away once you have built your first station.

Why it works

A town makes freight, and the freight waits at the station there. Your train picks it up and takes it to a town that wants that kind of freight. When it arrives, you are paid.

The game picks where each load goes. It looks for a town that wants that freight and that trains can reach, your own or another railroad's. When the trip takes more than one train, the freight waits at a junction for the next one. The game sends freight only toward towns some train reaches, but it does not check that the next train will have room for it, takes that kind of freight or comes soon enough. Freight that waits too long spoils, and nobody is paid for the part of the trip it already made. So a junction needs a train that takes the freight and runs the way it is going. You choose the stops and the trains. The game chooses the loads.

What makes a delivery pay more

How far apart the two towns are. Think of a ruler laid on the map, from the town where the freight started to the town where it ended up. The farther apart they are, the more you are paid. A winding route adds nothing. Towns far apart also need more track, and the trip takes longer.
How many carloads you deliver. A carload is one car full of freight. The game's screens count freight in cars and passengers in coaches. One coach is one carload. More carloads, more pay.
What the freight is. Each kind has its own price for every carload for every kilometre. A board is the map a game is played on. On the America board, mail pays the most, then passengers. Coal is among the lowest.
How much the town wants it. A town that has run low pays a little more. As it fills up, the price drops back to normal. Carloads the town did not want still get paid, but at a much lower price. Sending lots of the same freight to one town fills it up for a while. Some passengers are going to one town and no other. They pay the full price whatever that town wants.
How fast it gets there, for mail, passengers and food. These lose value if the trip takes much longer than a fast train would need. Waiting at a stop counts. A fast trip is paid in full.

Why a train might earn nothing

It has not arrived yet. Pay comes when the freight is delivered, never when it is loaded. A full train that is still on its way has earned nothing so far. Watch your railroad's money in the bar at the top when it gets there. Then select the train and find Earnings. Lifetime is everything the train has been paid. Recent deliveries lists its latest ones.
There is nothing to load. A train only takes freight that has a town to go to. If no town on your lines wants what your stations make, the freight just waits at the station. Look at the two towns' Produces and Demands again.
The load has nowhere to be put down. A train only loads freight it can take somewhere useful. Check its stops on the order sheet.
1. Is the town that wants the freight one of the stops? Then it is fine.
2. If not, is one of the stops a town where another train can pick the freight up and carry it on?
3. If the answer to both is no, add a stop.
It costs more than it earns. A train costs money to own every day, and more for every kilometre it runs. Stations cost money every day too. A short trip with a small load can pay less than that. A train's Net is the money it was paid, take away what the train cost you. The train costs some money every day. It costs more for every kilometre it runs. Station costs are not counted in a train's Net.

Where to see what you earned

Your railroad's money is the dollar figure in the bar at the top.
Open the Trains tab at the bottom. On a wide screen each train shows Revenue (what it was paid) and Net, both for the last 30 game days. It also shows Earned, the train's total so far.
On a phone the Trains tab is shorter. It shows each train's name, route, load and cargo, with one money figure next to its name. That figure is Net for the last 30 game days. For the train's total, select the train.
A train's own panel, on any screen, has an Earnings section. Lifetime is everything the train has earned so far. Recent deliveries lists its latest deliveries, one line each.
The Railroad tab has a month-by-month table of money in and money out, called the Income statement. Under it is a list of every delivery and every cost.
The Stations tab shows what each town has waiting to be picked up.

All of this is the railroad's money. For what the game costs to play in real money, see what costs money.

Money from other railroads

Other railroads pay you when they use what you built. You set each price.

Your trains. Your tariff is your price for carrying another railroad's freight. You are paid it for each carload, for each kilometre.
Your track. Their train on your track pays for the weight it carries, for each kilometre.
Your stations. Their train at your station pays for the weight it loads or unloads.