Comment Well there are lots of ways to stop trains (Score 4, Insightful) 60
In railway safety is usually very important, and a stopped train usually is in its safest state. So everything typically fails towards stopping a train.
You can stop many stations by placing a copper wire on the tracks at a strategic position, making all of the systems believe that there is a train. You can puncture a brake line and the train will stop. You can cut wires used for signaling and the signals will fall back to stop... on AFAIK any signaling system.