TBH considering their mountainous terrain, already the lower speeds they achieve are quite a feat of engineering. Meanwhile a small storm upends most of Germany's rail network for a long time because they let trees grow close to the rails...
I am now imagining some description of brush extensions on the front of cow catchers that just take a wire brush and scrub the fire out of the track in front of the train to get leaves off the track and scrub of some of the crushed wet leaves off of it as the train goes along.
