I just moved and I live literally window to a freight train line, unfortunately it scares the crap out of my cats and so I'm trying to find out what the schedule is so that I can close the windows for them, and maybe put a little raspberry pi display screen saying something like "next train arriving in...." Next to my window
There are groups out there that monitor train routes. And some publish to the Web.
In theory you could hook up an software defined radio and listen to train transponders yourself and give yourself a warning if one is nearby.