A shunting yard or shunting yard is a special railway station for the organization (decomposition and composition) of freight trains made up of isolated wagons, as opposed to block wagons. These stations are found at large railway junctions and large industrial cities or cities with large ports.

This station is generally formed by the following bundles of tracks and parts in a row that are traversed by the wagons maneuvered in succession for classification operation:.

The vast majority of marshalling yards are of the transit type with one or, in some very large classifications, also two classification systems (one for each main direction of the station), but there are also some of the terminal type, especially in Italy.

Currently the largest switching yards in the Spanish-speaking world are Terminal Valle de México (in the north of Mexico City, with 48 lanes in the classification beam) and Vicálvaro-Clasificación (in the east of Madrid, with 30 lanes in the classification beam). The largest switching yard in the entire world is Bailey Yard (csf.) near North Platte (Nebraska) "North Platte (Nebraska)"), United States of America, with two systems (64 and 50 tracks in the two classification beams). The largest in Europe is Maschen Rbf (csf.) south of Hamburg, Germany, with two systems (64 and 48 tracks in the two classification beams).

Due to the decline in the transport of goods by rail (especially that carried out by means of isolated wagons) in favor of the transport of goods by road, today many classifications are abandoned or resized with closure of the donkey's back.

Thus, all maneuvering yards have been closed in the United Kingdom, Norway, Denmark, Japan and Australia.

OLIVEROS RIVES, Fernando et al.: Railway Treaty. Volume 2: Civil engineering and facilities. Editor: Rueda Editorial, S.L. 1980, ISBN 84-7207-015-8.