[1][2] Members of the FTRA claim to be a loosely knit club of people who share a similar lifestyle, and organise for mutual support.
[3] FTRA members are most frequently encountered along the BNSF Railway's Hi-Line, which stretches from Chicago to Seattle, often sleeping in switching yards, bridge underpasses, and boxcars along the route.
[4] In 2011, Gus Melonas, a spokesman for the BNSF, said the "FTRA and associated act[s] of riding and living on the rails have gone largely extinct.
He claims members of the group are linked to food stamp and benefit fraud, illegal drug trafficking, and thefts, as well as brutal assaults and murders committed against other transients, vagrants, and the public.
Author Richard Grant writes that various FTRA members, including American founder D. Boone, insist the group was founded on the basis of camaraderie between people sharing a similar lifestyle of adventure and not as a criminal organisation.