Many passenger trains around the world run fully automated.
the big issue is without someone on board there is nobody to see someone on the tracks and hit the emergency brake. My counter to that is it doesn’t matter as the train won’t stop until long after whoever was on the track is hit and dead.
Passenger trains generally don’t go that fast in areas where they’re likely to hit something or derail. Which is not what rail executives want.
Passenger trains have better maintained tracks and so are not likely to derail. They are also less likely to hit things because they are grade separated - fenced, elevated tracks, in tunnels. These are more cost, but they are things society wants (not the same as rail executives) Trams which run on the street are much slower and do have drivers.
They’re not there to hit the brakes, they’re there to report it.
