Since the mid 1990s trains were fitted with toilet tanks which has gone a long way to reduce environmental health hazard all together. As years goes by the rail industry are gradually phasing out trains that don’t have fitted storage tanks.
All most all new trains in use today now have sewage tanks in them which help them store the sewage until they get disposed.
This means that modern train are built with a holding tanks and all toilet waste goes directly into this tanks.
Although years back most trains were not equipped with storage tanks which simply means that they have no efficient plumbing system, they make use of the old system ;
this means they literally dispose their sewage on the rail track but right now the rail industry are investing millions of dollars replacing old trains that lack this facilities to newer ones that will help reduce health hazard and better handle human waste.
Note: we should understand that disposing human waste from the train on the train track poses great health issues. Take for instance someone that is sick and suffering from a certain illness and possibly excreting bacteria i.e E. coli which get into the environment, this bacteria have the ability to remain active or very much alive for weeks and are capable of causing health hazard.
The UK Department for Transport and Network Rail are working very hard to get this old system train replaced and this will go a long way to see an end of indiscriminately dumpling of raw sewage on tracks
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Where does the flush go on a train?
Most people ask this question Where does poop go when you flush it on a train? Well this depends on the type of train and if the train is equipped with a plumbing system or not.
For trains that are equipped with a plumbing system and a storage tank, the poop or sewage will go directly into the sewage tanks where it is held pending when it is evacuated.
Most modern train are equipped or fitted with sewage tanks where all flush goes into.
But trains that lack this features will have their flush dump on the train track because their bathrooms only have toilet that dumps poo or sewage directly on the train track
Note that this kind of train are being replaced with the modern ones.
Disposing sewage on a train track is something that should not be encouraged because it is not only filthy but a disgusting practice that should have no place in the modern world. To curb this ugly practices the Government must ensure that ageing rolling stock be replaced with modern train that have the capability to retain sewage.
Again indiscriminate dumping of sewage on the track can lead to corrosion of the rail track and this could cause mishaps.
What happens when you use the toilet on a train? :
When you make use of the toilet in the Train , everything get stored in the storage tanks pending when the Train gets to the station where everything (the sewage) is emptied out or disposed.
When were toilets introduced on Trains
Most modern trains that are equipped with self-contained toilets were introduced in the mid 1990s but despite this it is estimated that over 25% of operators in UK alone still have trains that empty their waste on the train track as at 2019.
Some earlier version of train were built to only hold sewage for certain period of time i.e they discharge their sewage once the train reaches some certain speed but when the train moves slowly sewage remains trapped pending when a certain speed limit is attained. This method we explain above has been replaced or rather upgraded with straight retention system.
Why do some trains not have toilets?
Only Fewer trains still exist today that don’t have plumbing toilets because they where not built with the facility that supports such system rather they adopt the conventional toilets system which are of open discharge type, this system only discharge on the tracks en route. This kind of train are trains that where built years back but still in service.
Sources
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn03146/
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/oct/10/train-toilets-to-no-longer-empty-on-to-tracks
https://www.heatandplumb.com/blog/what-happens-to-toilet-waste-on-transport