PS Technology has been delivering innovative simulation solutions to the rail industry for over three decades. Headquartered in Louisville, Colorado, the company develops advanced technologies that support the day-to-day operations of over 100,000 employees nationwide.

Train shoving is a common, yet potentially dangerous, move performed daily within railyards all around the world. Shoving is a railroad operation where a locomotive pushes a car or a “cut” of cars from behind, rather than pulling them. During a shove, railcars weighing hundreds of thousands of pounds are pushed along the track, with a conductor guiding the movement. Without proper training and experience, these movements can lead to serious injuries, equipment damage, and operation disruptions.

To better train rail conductors, our Shoving Moves VR Training program provides an immersive and realistic simulation enabling users to practice shoving movements in a safe and controlled environment. Utilizing the Meta Quest 3 headset, trainees enter a virtual railyard where they work through a series of scenarios that teach how to safely perform shoving movements. As the user completes these scenarios, the system actively monitors the user’s actions and progress, delivering real-time feedback.

Integrated on-device voice recognition and motion tracking is supported, using real communication protocols. Users have the option of practicing shoving movements from multiple positions, such as on the ground, or riding equipment. In addition to the VR experience, a separate non-VR input system enables desktop and web builds.

This program is developed in C# using the Unity game engine and is optimized for the Meta Quest 3 platform. On-device voice recognition is handled by VOSK, a small language model, for secure, offline voice processing.