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A well car, also known as a double-stack car (or also intermodal car/container car), is a type of
A well car, also known as a double-stack car (or also intermodal car/container car), is a type of railroad car
A railroad car, railcar ( American and Canadian English), railway wagon, railway carriage, railway truck, railwagon, railcarriage or railtruck (British English and UIC), also called a train car, train wagon, train carriage or train truck, is ...
specially designed to carry intermodal container
An intermodal container, often called a shipping container, is a large standardized shipping container, designed and built for intermodal freight transport, meaning these containers can be used across different modes of transport – from sh ...
s (shipping containers) used in intermodal freight transport
Intermodal freight transport involves the transportation of freight in an intermodal container or vehicle, using multiple modes of transportation (e.g., rail, ship, aircraft, and truck), without any handling of the freight itself when changing ...
. The "well" is a depressed section which sits close to the rails between the wheel trucks of the car, allowing a container to be carried lower than on a traditional flatcar
A flatcar (US) (also flat car, or flatbed) is a piece of rolling stock that consists of an open, flat deck mounted on a pair of trucks (US) or bogies (UK), one at each end containing four or six wheels. Occasionally, flat cars designed to carry ...
. This makes it possible to carry a stack of two containers per unit on railway lines (double-stack rail transport
Double-stack rail transport is a form of intermodal freight transport in which railroad cars carry two layers of intermodal containers. Invented in the United States in 1984, it is now being used for nearly seventy percent of United States inter ...
) wherever the structure gauge
A structure gauge, also called the minimum clearance outline, is a diagram or physical structure that sets limits to the extent that bridges, tunnels and other infrastructure can encroach on rail vehicles. It specifies the height and width of pl ...
assures sufficient clearance. The top container is secured to the bottom container either by a bulkhead built into the car (e.g., bottom and top containers are the same dimensions of 40 ft.), or through the use of