Each player draws cards from the Rolling Stock Deck and uses them to construct a passenger or freight train. Players then draw cards from the Operations Deck. Operations cards will be passenger cards, freight cards, special cards, or destination cards. Passenger cards may only be loaded on cars for passengers. Freight cards may only be loaded on freight cars. The destination cards govern the movement of the trains from place to place. Special cards are either disasters or opportunities.
(Note that this game is unrelated to Metro, which was coincidentally originally released with the title Iron Horse.)