In Alaska you can flag down a train

I've had my car at a local repair shop for the last few days (see my RAV4 recall article) to see if they can find out what's wrong with it. It has an intermittent "power lag" problem, but with it being intermittent, and only being worse on cold and wet days, they haven't been able to find it. (Amazingly it has been sunny and warm for the last two days, but much cooler today.)

When I told the mechanic that I really didn't want to get stranded on the side of the road between here and Fairbanks, he mentioned something I'd never heard before: He said that in Alaska you can flag down a train! He said the commercial trains won't stop for you, but the passenger trains either (a) will stop for you or (b) have to stop for you by law. (Sorry, I don't remember the exact quote.)

That's good to know for future information, but I sure hope it doesn't come to that.