cx500 Euclid: What you are suggesting still requires the law to be amended. The courts and FRA can only base enforcement on the law as it is written. It is only words on paper, but those words are absolute. Events have proved that the original deadline, a number picked out of the air, was completely unfeasible for a variety of reasons beyond the best efforts of the railroads. Furthermore, you haven't thought through your suggestion. If they pay a fine for "not having PTC installed" does that leave them free to operate without PTC forever after? Or do they get fined daily, weekly, monthly or annually? Even so, it still needs the existing law to be amended. The simplest, fairest and most logical approach is to extend the deadline just enough so that the majority of railroads will have a reasonable chance of being in compliance. The present suggested date extends it only just enough to make sure the pressure stays in place to ensure the present frantic pace of development continues. It won't be the railroads in a real pickle after a December 31 2015 shutdown. Perhaps little income but vastly reduced operating costs to compensate. Their situation will be relatively comfortable compared with the rest of the country and economy. John
Euclid: What you are suggesting still requires the law to be amended. The courts and FRA can only base enforcement on the law as it is written. It is only words on paper, but those words are absolute. Events have proved that the original deadline, a number picked out of the air, was completely unfeasible for a variety of reasons beyond the best efforts of the railroads.
Furthermore, you haven't thought through your suggestion. If they pay a fine for "not having PTC installed" does that leave them free to operate without PTC forever after? Or do they get fined daily, weekly, monthly or annually? Even so, it still needs the existing law to be amended.
The simplest, fairest and most logical approach is to extend the deadline just enough so that the majority of railroads will have a reasonable chance of being in compliance. The present suggested date extends it only just enough to make sure the pressure stays in place to ensure the present frantic pace of development continues.
It won't be the railroads in a real pickle after a December 31 2015 shutdown. Perhaps little income but vastly reduced operating costs to compensate. Their situation will be relatively comfortable compared with the rest of the country and economy.
John
BaltACD Euclid MidlandMike A fine is a penalty for breaking a law. The railoads are not goint to pay a fine unless there is a judgement against them for breaking a law. If you read what I was suggesting, you can see that the fine I am proposing would be for breaking the law. But the law would only require the installation of PTC. It would not prohibit operating without PTC. The fact that one would be knowingly breaking the law blows up any liability defense if a carrier continued to operate without PTC where it is required. Breaking the law is breaking the law - no matter what forms any penalty may take. No law prohibits anyone from breaking it, IF THEY SO DESIRE. The carriers do not desire to knowingly break the PTC law.
Euclid MidlandMike A fine is a penalty for breaking a law. The railoads are not goint to pay a fine unless there is a judgement against them for breaking a law. If you read what I was suggesting, you can see that the fine I am proposing would be for breaking the law. But the law would only require the installation of PTC. It would not prohibit operating without PTC.
MidlandMike A fine is a penalty for breaking a law. The railoads are not goint to pay a fine unless there is a judgement against them for breaking a law.
A fine is a penalty for breaking a law. The railoads are not goint to pay a fine unless there is a judgement against them for breaking a law.
If you read what I was suggesting, you can see that the fine I am proposing would be for breaking the law. But the law would only require the installation of PTC. It would not prohibit operating without PTC.
The fact that one would be knowingly breaking the law blows up any liability defense if a carrier continued to operate without PTC where it is required. Breaking the law is breaking the law - no matter what forms any penalty may take. No law prohibits anyone from breaking it, IF THEY SO DESIRE. The carriers do not desire to knowingly break the PTC law.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
oltmannd Euclid oltmannd You can't require a locomotive engineer to take a train in cab signal territory if the cab signal signal system on the locomotive isn't funcitoning. He's criminally liable if for all the bad things that may occur (remember Chase MD?). How are you going to force a locomotive engineer to take a non-compliant PTC train? If that problem actually exists with the PTC law, the solution is to change the law so the engineer is not running a non-compliant train. There is an obvious solution to this problem which will allow the railroads to keep operating, but retain the teeth to push the process of PTC along. That's pretty much what the extension does. No matter what, a bill needs to be passed and signed.
Euclid oltmannd You can't require a locomotive engineer to take a train in cab signal territory if the cab signal signal system on the locomotive isn't funcitoning. He's criminally liable if for all the bad things that may occur (remember Chase MD?). How are you going to force a locomotive engineer to take a non-compliant PTC train? If that problem actually exists with the PTC law, the solution is to change the law so the engineer is not running a non-compliant train. There is an obvious solution to this problem which will allow the railroads to keep operating, but retain the teeth to push the process of PTC along.
That's pretty much what the extension does.
No matter what, a bill needs to be passed and signed.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
Euclid, Yes I noticed that there was no indication that a deadline extension came up in the conversation you had with Sen. Bluemthal's office. But the inference that I get from the fact that the Senate has passed a Transportation bill with a PTC extension, is that they got over whatever problems they had with the railroad's progress, enough to move on to delay enforcement for a more achievable PTC implementation timeframe.
schlimm wanswheel It makes no sense Obama wants to keep the current deadline with all its disruptive potential intact. Anything his press officers say about PTC is said to keep the pressure up. The Obama statement is just a strategy to get a do-nothing Congress (by design) to hurry up and pass the extension. Hopefully it will work. But with the GOP House leadership in total disarray, that may be in doubt.
wanswheel It makes no sense Obama wants to keep the current deadline with all its disruptive potential intact. Anything his press officers say about PTC is said to keep the pressure up.
It makes no sense Obama wants to keep the current deadline with all its disruptive potential intact. Anything his press officers say about PTC is said to keep the pressure up.
The Obama statement is just a strategy to get a do-nothing Congress (by design) to hurry up and pass the extension. Hopefully it will work. But with the GOP House leadership in total disarray, that may be in doubt.
I agree that this is the White House's version of jumping on the worst-case-scenario bandwagon. Sen. Thune introduced the extension bill last March, at the White House's request to give the FRA the flexibility to handle deadline extensions on a case-by-case basis.
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
NorthWest Not that this thread needs another bombshell tossed in, but this appears that it could be a big part of the story... http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-07/obama-won-t-support-extending-deadline-for-rail-safety-equipment
Not that this thread needs another bombshell tossed in, but this appears that it could be a big part of the story...
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-07/obama-won-t-support-extending-deadline-for-rail-safety-equipment
President Barack Obama plans to enforce a deadline for rail operators to install safety technology by the end of the year, despite warnings from railroads including Union Pacific Corp. and Amtrak that they can’t meet the mandate and would have to suspend some service without an extension.
“Congress enacted this law, including the December 31, 2015, deadline, and we believe it is important that the Department of Transportation enforce the law that Congress passed,” Frank Benenati, a White House spokesman, said Wednesday, the day after lawmakers released a letter from Amtrak saying it might suspend some passenger service if the delay isn’t enacted.
House transportation leaders last week introduced legislation to extend the deadline for three years. House and Senate negotiators have been discussing ways to get the measure through both chambers. Benenati declined to comment on whether Obama would sign legislation extending the deadline because nothing has advanced in Congress.
The thing that bugs me about some of this thread is that there's this insinuation that the RRs are:
a) arrogant and ignorant of supposed "off the shelf" technology
b) didn't really try to meet the deadline
From a somewhat inside view, I'd say a & b are pretty wholey false.
The RRs have taken this seriously and one of the reasons they chose a single, closed, proprietary system was because it greatly simplified system integration, particularly interoperability testing.
The RRs have geared up at a great rate trying to get suppliers to deliver equipment and find qualified employees and contractors to get stuff installed.
Yes, seven years is a long time, and the RRs would have been better off it they had taken a greater interest in ATC in past decades, but generally, the RRs have acted in good faith and have pedalled as fast as they can go to meet the deadline.
In comparison, it took NS nearly 20 years to roll out a new train dispatching system (UTCS).
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
BaltACD oltmannd You can't require a locomotive engineer to take a train in cab signal territory if the cab signal signal system on the locomotive isn't funcitoning. He's criminally liable if for all the bad things that may occur (remember Chase MD?). How are you going to force a locomotive engineer to take a non-compliant PTC train? With my company's rules, Train Control must be tested and working at the Origin of the train (that is Origin of the train, not crew change location), there is a form on which the performance of the TC test is recorded for successive Enginemen to note if the engine was tested. If the Train Control stops working while the train is in route to it's destination, the Train Control may be cut out and the train can continue to operate on wayside signals. It must stop at Restricted Proceed signals and must get the Train Dispatchers permisson to enter that signal block. While I have no idea how failure of PTC will be handled when PTC is implemented, there will have to be rules that will permit trains to continue to operate when having experienced PTC failure.
oltmannd You can't require a locomotive engineer to take a train in cab signal territory if the cab signal signal system on the locomotive isn't funcitoning. He's criminally liable if for all the bad things that may occur (remember Chase MD?). How are you going to force a locomotive engineer to take a non-compliant PTC train?
You can't require a locomotive engineer to take a train in cab signal territory if the cab signal signal system on the locomotive isn't funcitoning. He's criminally liable if for all the bad things that may occur (remember Chase MD?).
How are you going to force a locomotive engineer to take a non-compliant PTC train?
With my company's rules, Train Control must be tested and working at the Origin of the train (that is Origin of the train, not crew change location), there is a form on which the performance of the TC test is recorded for successive Enginemen to note if the engine was tested. If the Train Control stops working while the train is in route to it's destination, the Train Control may be cut out and the train can continue to operate on wayside signals. It must stop at Restricted Proceed signals and must get the Train Dispatchers permisson to enter that signal block.
While I have no idea how failure of PTC will be handled when PTC is implemented, there will have to be rules that will permit trains to continue to operate when having experienced PTC failure.
It will have to be similar. There is a provision non-equipped trains in certain circumstances - low speed transfer jobs, for example. I would expect a failed en route would be similarly limited.
The key is that you can't start out without everything working.
Chosing ERTMS instead of Wabtec I-ETMS wouldn't have changed a thing. The problem isn't getting the components designed, it's getting them all installed and getting the system integration done.
PTC exists and has worked in revenue service in a test environment. The problems have been getting the software aligned with the rulebook and integration with back office systems, such as the dispatiching system (for movement authority creation and completion) and car reporting system (for data to feed braking algorithm)
All of this work would have to be done regardless of the system chosen.
There is also the problem of building and installing all the hardware.
The FRA rules are pretty specific about what testing has to be done and they have to review each step along the way.
Failure to meet the deadline isn't because of the choice of the system as much as it is the scope of the project.
Euclidoltmannd You can't require a locomotive engineer to take a train in cab signal territory if the cab signal signal system on the locomotive isn't funcitoning. He's criminally liable if for all the bad things that may occur (remember Chase MD?). How are you going to force a locomotive engineer to take a non-compliant PTC train? If that problem actually exists with the PTC law, the solution is to change the law so the engineer is not running a non-compliant train. There is an obvious solution to this problem which will allow the railroads to keep operating, but retain the teeth to push the process of PTC along.
Buslist schlimm BaltACD schlimm tree68 schlimm It's less a matter of the technology than the tools therein. Getting locations for towers and necessary frequencies and bandwidth has been a major hurdle. There is also the need to build a system that will be seamless nationwide (and potentially internationally). Simply getting all vendors to speak the same language can be problematic. It can take two years to get a single frequency here north of the "A Line." The rails should take some responsibility for their choices for PTC. Nobody mandated they use the new untested products they chose. So what 'tested technology' existed the fulfilled the demands of PTC and was compatable with US operations. You are the railroader. Do the research for yourself. Can't support your claims? And there isn't any and don't ever fool yourself into thinking that ERTMS is it. Note how little deployment of that technology exists. A friend is NR's lead guy for ERTMS and all he can do is shake his head, nothing truly operable in the UK and little operable anywhere in 2008 when the US railroads had to choose a direction. ERTMS's wayside transponders are a nonstarter in the wide open spaces of rural America.
schlimm BaltACD schlimm tree68 schlimm It's less a matter of the technology than the tools therein. Getting locations for towers and necessary frequencies and bandwidth has been a major hurdle. There is also the need to build a system that will be seamless nationwide (and potentially internationally). Simply getting all vendors to speak the same language can be problematic. It can take two years to get a single frequency here north of the "A Line." The rails should take some responsibility for their choices for PTC. Nobody mandated they use the new untested products they chose. So what 'tested technology' existed the fulfilled the demands of PTC and was compatable with US operations. You are the railroader. Do the research for yourself.
BaltACD schlimm tree68 schlimm It's less a matter of the technology than the tools therein. Getting locations for towers and necessary frequencies and bandwidth has been a major hurdle. There is also the need to build a system that will be seamless nationwide (and potentially internationally). Simply getting all vendors to speak the same language can be problematic. It can take two years to get a single frequency here north of the "A Line." The rails should take some responsibility for their choices for PTC. Nobody mandated they use the new untested products they chose. So what 'tested technology' existed the fulfilled the demands of PTC and was compatable with US operations.
schlimm tree68 schlimm It's less a matter of the technology than the tools therein. Getting locations for towers and necessary frequencies and bandwidth has been a major hurdle. There is also the need to build a system that will be seamless nationwide (and potentially internationally). Simply getting all vendors to speak the same language can be problematic. It can take two years to get a single frequency here north of the "A Line." The rails should take some responsibility for their choices for PTC. Nobody mandated they use the new untested products they chose.
tree68 schlimm It's less a matter of the technology than the tools therein. Getting locations for towers and necessary frequencies and bandwidth has been a major hurdle. There is also the need to build a system that will be seamless nationwide (and potentially internationally). Simply getting all vendors to speak the same language can be problematic. It can take two years to get a single frequency here north of the "A Line."
schlimm
It's less a matter of the technology than the tools therein. Getting locations for towers and necessary frequencies and bandwidth has been a major hurdle. There is also the need to build a system that will be seamless nationwide (and potentially internationally). Simply getting all vendors to speak the same language can be problematic.
It can take two years to get a single frequency here north of the "A Line."
The rails should take some responsibility for their choices for PTC. Nobody mandated they use the new untested products they chose.
So what 'tested technology' existed the fulfilled the demands of PTC and was compatable with US operations.
You are the railroader. Do the research for yourself.
Can't support your claims?
And there isn't any and don't ever fool yourself into thinking that ERTMS is it. Note how little deployment of that technology exists. A friend is NR's lead guy for ERTMS and all he can do is shake his head, nothing truly operable in the UK and little operable anywhere in 2008 when the US railroads had to choose a direction. ERTMS's wayside transponders are a nonstarter in the wide open spaces of rural America.
Interesting, but ERTMS has become the world standard because it works.
schlimm 2. 7 years is a long time, considering the working technology existed in part here and completely in Europe. The moon landing was proposed in 1961 and fulfilled in 1969. The Manhattan Project managed to build operable nuclear weapons in 3 years.
2. 7 years is a long time, considering the working technology existed in part here and completely in Europe. The moon landing was proposed in 1961 and fulfilled in 1969. The Manhattan Project managed to build operable nuclear weapons in 3 years.
The moon landing had relied on a lot of that was done prior to 1961, work on the F-1 engine used on the Saturn 5 launch vehicles was started in 1958 by people who were fresh off designing the engines for the Atlas missile. There was also a lot of ogoing research into guidance and control systems.
The Manhattan Project benefitted from a lot of research that was being done in the 1939-1941 time frame, Lawrence was getting ready to demostrate electromagnetic enrichment of 235U on the eve of Pearl Harbor. The project also benefitted from a lot of people being forced from their land - the equivalent with PTC implementation would be yanking the licenses of entities using frequency space needed by PTC, telling the FCC to go pound sand about licensing the towers needed for the radio equipment, etc.
For something a bit closer to present time - how long has it taken the FAA to update the 1960's era Air Traffic Control system - which likely was based on the experience implementing SAGE.
- Erik
I think a lot of people think of ARES that BN tested back in the late 1980s. That's why they think there was a system that could be implemented immediately.
http://www.designnews.com/document.asp?doc_id=228051&dfpPParams=ind_182,aid_228051&dfpLayout=article (it may not link direct, but ask to open in a new window)
Since it's been over 20 years since they discontinued it, would any of the technology be usable today? We did go to the moon almost 50 years ago, but I don't think we could do it anytime soon now.
Jeff
schlimm Buslist Two of the best aerospace electronics firms, GE Harris and Lockheed Martin couldn't produce a working system guess they just missed the tested technology part. And that was the problem. Should have used one of the companies experienced with rail control, not an aerospace outfit.
Buslist Two of the best aerospace electronics firms, GE Harris and Lockheed Martin couldn't produce a working system guess they just missed the tested technology part.
And that was the problem. Should have used one of the companies experienced with rail control, not an aerospace outfit.
Companies experienced with rail control had no clue how to deal with the security protocols required to operate trains at 99.99999% reliability (FRA requirement) via radio signals.
BuslistTwo of the best aerospace electronics firms, GE Harris and Lockheed Martin couldn't produce a working system guess they just missed the tested technology part.
Just imagine a plaintif's lawyer suing the railroad and asking why they had not installed PTC as congress had mandated. If they had done as congress ordered, then the accident would not have happemed. Therefore they were negligent! I ask for a directed guilty vertict.
tree68 schlimm 2. 7 years is a long time, considering the working technology existed in part here and completely in Europe. It's less a matter of the technology than the tools therein. Getting locations for towers and necessary frequencies and bandwidth has been a major hurdle. There is also the need to build a system that will be seamless nationwide (and potentially internationally). Simply getting all vendors to speak the same language can be problematic. It can take two years to get a single frequency here north of the "A Line."
schlimm 2. 7 years is a long time, considering the working technology existed in part here and completely in Europe.
Johnny
schlimmThe rails should take some responsibility for their choices for PTC. Nobody mandated they use the new untested products they chose.
The railroads could have chosen an "existing technology." But the problem of securing frequencies and tower locations (and issues of the like) would have still existed. We're trying to put in a new public safety radio system here, and will end up buying frequencies from existing license holders. That takes time, in addition to costing very real cash.
So, too, the simple logistics issue of getting tens of thousands of copies of the locomotive equipment necessary, as well as all of the lineside equipment, and getting it installed is a very real issue. And getting the locomotive equipment installed in rolling stock that is in use on a daily basis.
Even the GAO, generally regarded as an impartial body, has said the current deadline is unworkable.
While some footdragging is possible, and maybe even likely, by all indications the railroads have been working toward the goal.
Euclid, as readers of Fred Frailey's blogs know, Sen. Blumenthal and a few others were not happy that the railroads would not meet the deadline, so everyone knew there was another side. The problem is that you and Sen. Blumenthal's office use the same rhetorical device, that you see "Congress" as like a monolithic entity. However, Bluemthal's people do not seem to speak for the whole Senate, which passed a transportation bill containing a deadline extension, with almost a 2/3 majority.
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