Passenger brake

[Anonymous]

Same question as for engines, is there a AAR rule for passengers train brake ratio?

Thank you,
JLC

[Overmod]

I believe the thing your UTU cites are referencing isn't an AAR rule, it's an FRA rule, and can be accessed here:

http://frwebgate5.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/waisgate.cgi?WAISdocID=087018420836+7+0+0&WAISaction=retrieve

Whenever you're looking for government regulations or rules, always look in the Federal Register (the online version of which is obtained through access.gpo.gov).

Be advised that the specific title of the thing indicates that it is for 'freight and other NON-PASSENGER application' (the original question being about passenger brakes, which can have (and normally do have) considerably higher permitted brake power. The Government search engine implementation is like a parody out of bad science fiction; you have to use special and nonintuitive PUNCTUATION to get the thing to recognize text queries rather than specific categories in its internal directory... but if you put any other punctuation in there, it chokes. I'm continuing to look at finding FRA regs on passenger braking; hopefully I'll turn something up in a few minutes.

[Overmod]

Oh, yes -- just to make things still more fun, there's a presumably revised or updated version of the 2001 final rule that is in the Federal Register on the SAME DATE in 2002 instead of 2001 (change the date in the URL if you want to get to it). This is how confusion can sink its evil teeth into what should be a simple review of national policy.

[Overmod]

Oh, yes -- just to make things still more fun, there's a presumably revised or updated version of the 2001 final rule that is in the Federal Register on the SAME DATE in 2002 instead of 2001 (change the date in the URL if you want to get to it). This is how confusion can sink its evil teeth into what should be a simple review of national policy.

Another 5 minutes of fishing around in the files produces this:

http://frwebgate4.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/waisgate.cgi?WAISdocID=08814325840+0+0+0&WAISaction=retrieve

(if you paste this, there is no line break, of course). This is the latest Final Rule for passenger equipment I can find (May 1999). If you search the online Federal Register, there are three references (with different page number ranges) with this same general title; the above link is the one that best met my search criteria according to the way the Federal system tries to rate its answer relevance. You have the option to download PDF files of the rules (which will be MUCH easier to read on most systems) or a summary.

Somewhere in this there have to be quite a few ponies...

[Overmod]

You didn't say it was an AAR rule, he did...

The text of the rule is almost always adjacent to the commentary in the printed Federal Register. You can't tell from the index citations whether or not the piece of text you're accessing on the Web is the correct one... unless you already know the range of pages in the print version that have the rule printed in them... in which case you almost always wouldn't need to be reading the rule from the Web instead of the print...

Remember that in the past the printed Federal Register version of ANY of these rules IS the official version. Not the one that Congress provides, or the one given in any legal reference, or anything that FRA might generate or provide. That's why I can say with confidence that the text of your Power Brake Law, if it's a Federal 'final rule' (which is, of course, exactly what 'law' means when you're talking about FRA regulations), WILL be in the Federal Register, in full, on the date specified in its references.