blue streak 1 Hve one more item that needs the federal legislation. Require all real estate transactions within 1000 feet of any rail line hauling Haz Mat to have a mandated separate disclosure that the property is within a possible Haz Mat derailment location. For all active and idle rail lines that may be reactivated. EDIT: If buyer closes anyway punative damages will not be awardable.
Hve one more item that needs the federal legislation. Require all real estate transactions within 1000 feet of any rail line hauling Haz Mat to have a mandated separate disclosure that the property is within a possible Haz Mat derailment location. For all active and idle rail lines that may be reactivated.
EDIT: If buyer closes anyway punative damages will not be awardable.
I think we will see this play out in some form regarding this East Palestine wreck. I would estimate that every property owner in that town has lost at least half of their property equity.
EuclidThis would amount to a broad seizure of property value from property owners and gifting it to the railroads. On what grounds would this be justified?
I would suspect it would be more like an easement than a taking. I interpret the intent as making sure that the purchaser understands that there is a railroad there. We've seen too many stories about people who buy near railroad crossings (airports are another favorite) and then complain about the noise.
If you have power lines running on or near your property, odds are there's an easement involved which allows the utility to access the pole line for whatever purposes may arise.
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...
tree68I would suspect it would be more like an easement than a taking.
I read his intent slightly different from what it appears you may have. Notice he states "property value"
Current property owners located within an (proposed) "evac zone" have remedies that Blue Streak is proposing be forfeited. Unless existing residents are compensated for this proposed forfeiture, doesn't that basically amount to seizure?
More to the point, the effect that loss of rights will have on the value of the property thusly compromised.
Convicted One tree68 I would suspect it would be more like an easement than a taking. I read his intent slightly different from what it appears you may have. Notice he states "property value" Current property owners located within an (proposed) "evac zone" have remedies that Blue Streak is proposing be forfeited. Unless existing residents are compensated for this proposed forfeiture, doesn't that basically amount to seizure? More to the point, the effect that loss of rights will have on the value of the property thusly compromised.
tree68 I would suspect it would be more like an easement than a taking.
Correct. Although the railroad ROW is there, that does not give it carte blanche to do whatever it wants on its land anymore than any of us have such an unequivocal "right" in our society. Thr rails seem to ignore the duty we all have to be good neighbors.
If a rail line wants to change operations from 4 trains per day to 24 monster trains, that is not an automatic given.
Convicted OneI read his intent slightly different from what it appears you may have. Notice he states "property value"
Indeed - it was the "gifting it to the railroads" part that got my attention. I'm not sure I understand how that works. I saw that is simply forcing a potential buyer to understand that they live next to the railroad, with its inherent risks. The punitive part is a reach. That's like saying that you can't collect punitive damages if someone drives off the highway and hits your house with their car.
This type of thing goes on all the time outside of the railroad world. A village near me is seeing some controversy because a group wants to build a shelter for homeless/disadvantaged people and the neighbors feel it will negatively impact their property value.
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charlie hebdoIf a rail line wants to change operations from 4 trains per day to 24 monster trains, that is not an automatic given.
On the other hand, they CAN demand that no crossing be kept unblocked more than 15 minutes, and I personally think there ought to be severe fines when that is not accomplished. I suspect that in the wake of East Palestine someone at DOT or FRA is going to wake up to the idea that any 'loud' mainline train is going to be a less safe train, and allow fines for trains or lines that generate certain kinds of noise (say, flatwheel noise above a certain dBm) and use the time-honored enforcement mechanism from the double-nickel speed limit law to permit anyone with an adjusted meter to bring an "enforcement action" or "penalty".
Not much different than a trucking company significantly increasing their fleet, resulting in more traffic on area roads. As long as their facility meets zoning laws, there's not much that can be done.
tree68Not much different than a trucking company significantly increasing their fleet, resulting in more traffic on area roads. As long as their facility meets zoning laws, there's not much that can be done.
The trucking FACILITY and approach roads necessary to reach it cannot be banned, but municipality DPWs can assuredly charge every bit they want for the cumulative damage to public roads. Subject only to wanting to keep the tax revenue and jobs benefits from the enhanced facility operations, of course... but many of those will not be 'local'.
tree68 As long as their facility meets zoning laws, there's not much that can be done.
Codes can be dynamic, tailored to suit whatever demons are perceived to be a threat to the social order. We have dozens of arcane restrictions the local authotity can impose (no matter how out of place they appear in today's world) upon how private land owners utilize their "plant". And many of those restrictions were crafted to address problems perceived to be worth mitigating at the time of inception.
It's not unthinkable to envision this current set of unfortunate incidents as being someone's motivation .
Just my personal suspicion, but I believe one of the biggest changes that will come from this tragedy, is that the railroads will lose some of their immunity to local intervention...
And for those who live near a public street where 100s of vehicles carrying hazmat pass daily?
Overmod charlie hebdo If a rail line wants to change operations from 4 trains per day to 24 monster trains, that is not an automatic given. Actually, it is. That's a matter of how a company can use its private property. Furthermore the federal presumption makes it less possible for municipalities or owners to complain about the additional noise, potential trespasser risk, etc. and pass legislation mandating quiet operation on particular days, number of trains at certain times of day, etc. (as has been so often tried -- remember the reports in Trains of local sheriffs using a radar gun on trains?) On the other hand, they CAN demand that no crossing be kept unblocked more than 15 minutes, and I personally think there ought to be severe fines when that is not accomplished. I suspect that in the wake of East Palestine someone at DOT or FRA is going to wake up to the idea that any 'loud' mainline train is going to be a less safe train, and allow fines for trains or lines that generate certain kinds of noise (say, flatwheel noise above a certain dBm) and use the time-honored enforcement mechanism from the double-nickel speed limit law to permit anyone with an adjusted meter to bring an "enforcement action" or "penalty".
charlie hebdo If a rail line wants to change operations from 4 trains per day to 24 monster trains, that is not an automatic given.
Actually, it is. That's a matter of how a company can use its private property. Furthermore the federal presumption makes it less possible for municipalities or owners to complain about the additional noise, potential trespasser risk, etc. and pass legislation mandating quiet operation on particular days, number of trains at certain times of day, etc. (as has been so often tried -- remember the reports in Trains of local sheriffs using a radar gun on trains?)
"Actually' [I was taught to beware of the use of "actually" in a dialog or response as its being a passive-aggressive way of simply saying *You're wrong, bud"] it depends. As I said, the use of private property is subject to restrictions. The rails' carte blanche exemption from state and local regulations as interstate commerce is likely to be modified, maybe soon.
I never said RRs would be shielded from damages. However in retrospective punative damages need some thought, Punative damages should go to persons affected maybe by an ackknowledgment document. Additional punative damages should go to say maybe directly to Amtrak improvements on a route selected by Amtrak. The south of lake route as one example.
Actually, the proposal that all trackside neighboring properties sign an acknowledgement that the choo-choo hauls dangerous materials....OR...suffer a forfeiture of rights to collect punative damages, still seems a bit one sided. What inducement do they have to enter into this agreement? Or are we saying "since the railroad want's this, then so shall it be"?
I can think of all sorts of hazards or perils we are forced to coexist with, without having to surrender rights.
If a dangerous war criminal moves in next door, are we expected to just accept that our residency has now become high risk, and sign away rights to the benefit of the hazard? I would not want to...Even if the war criminal was there first...I still see no reason to award favoritism to the hazard
charlie hebdo...[I was taught to beware of the use of "actually" in a dialog or response as its being a passive-aggressive way of simply saying *You're wrong, bud"]
On the other hand, semantics of many expressions have changed, and I'll take under advisement that the construction has come to have the meaning you bring up.
...the use of private property is subject to restrictions.
I am frankly astounded that the Congress and Presidency did not act to introduce considerable legislation, both safety-related and potentially re-establishing ICC-style oversight over all the myriad ways the Easman-and-after ICC loved to meddle with railroads and their operations. I see no objective reason whatsoever why a re-establishment of many currently-proposed schemes of re-regulation would be deemed unconstitutional if applied on the Federal and not state or local level; we in fact see a first step toward that in the two-man-crew and crossing-blocking provisions that are nominally irrelevant to a response to the East Palestine disaster. I am not sure how much clout the Rail Customer Coalition and similar organizations actually wield, but I think there is a groundswell of reaction against PSR-as-usual that is finally going to result in serious Government action.
And to be honest, there are quite a few places that some kind of 'mandatory oversight' would be beneficial -- the problem is that I wouldn't trust many of the twentysomethings in Congress and agency line and staff to develop and word proposals effectively and fairly enough. Nor would I trust most 'representatives' of the railroads to do so. That leaves an important role for shipper organizations and lobbyists... if they can get out of the common where-you-stand-is-where-you-sit attitude that so contributes to our present social fragmentation.
The rails' carte blanche exemption from state and local regulations as interstate commerce is likely to be modified, maybe soon.
Without passing a value judgment, on the governmental level of the Supremes and elsewhere, there seems to be a trend towards deferring to local and state conditions.
Here is a letter publishedin a NARP bulletin from a carman that notes that required inspections of cars have been cut severely by NS. This letter will be devastating as lawyers will be able to suponea employment records to deterine if the noted cutbacks have actually occurred.
It is almost guaranteed that the last inspection records and maybe other locations of all the cars in this train will come out!
A carman's perspective on the East Palestine derailment and the railroad industry as a whole (therealnews.com)
The URL worked for me. Thanks. Surprised and unhappy that so-called PSR and other management decisions did so much harm. But I appreciate being informed. Thanks
Perhaps a carman's name attached, but undoubtedly written by Union lawyers.
I sure do want to see the specific ways the NS 'reduced inspections' specifically reduced practical attention to bearing and axle condition. I continue to worry that existing 'carman' inspections don't, and possibly can't, detect the problems that might catastrophically degrade safe operation with little to no effective warning.
"Other" inspection concerns are... in the context of East Palestine... at best the kind of attempted red herrings that the mention of unrelated safety violations so often is in Canadian TCA accident reports.
Both the Union and government response would be much better, and much more honestly, focused on effective strategies to improve bearing quality, detect actual failures quickly, and determine best practices for rapid remediation.
Overmod I sure do want to see the specific ways the NS 'reduced inspections' specifically reduced practical attention to bearing and axle condition. I continue to worry that existing 'carman' inspections don't, and possibly can't, detect the problems that might catastrophically degrade safe operation with little to no effective warning. "Other" inspection concerns are... in the context of East Palestine... at best the kind of attempted red herrings that the mention of unrelated safety violations so often is in Canadian TCA accident reports. Both the Union and government response would be much better, and much mor honestly, focused on effective strategies to improve bearing quality, detect actual failures quickly, and determine best practices for rapid remediation.
Both the Union and government response would be much better, and much mor honestly, focused on effective strategies to improve bearing quality, detect actual failures quickly, and determine best practices for rapid remediation.
This. Exactly.
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
The video needs to be recognized for what it is, which is labor union advocacy. It is part of a new genre of videos addressing a variety of grievances such as PSR being a ruse to further enrich the wealthy investors, company cost cutting that compromises safety, inadequate employee time off, etc. There are many such videos on-line now. The only solution that will satisfy the demands are numerous new regulations, or full nationalization.
EuclidThe video needs to be recognized for what it is, which is labor union advocacy. It is part of a new genre of videos addressing a variety of grievances such as PSR being a ruse to further enrich the wealthy investors, company cost cutting that compromises safety, inadequate employee time off, etc. There are many such videos on-line now. The only solution that will satisfy the demands are numerous new regulations, or full nationalization.
PSR on its face has always been word salad to further enrich investors, employees be damned.
While I don't dispute 'The Carmans' complaints. The only way those complaints would manifest themselves in the East Palestine incident would be if the car that had the hot box had been tagged for a bad journal in some prior inspection and that inspection report had been overruled and the car sent on its way without shop attention.
Not having been a carman, I don't know everything that needs to be looked at or hammer tested in the arrival or departure inspections of trains, so I don't know how apt the inspection time per car actually is.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
https://railroads.dot.gov/elibrary/safety-advisory-2023-02-train-makeup-and-operational-safety-concerns
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.
PDF version of FRA Safety Advisory 2023-02, the notice referenced by Zug:
https://railroads.dot.gov/sites/fra.dot.gov/files/2023-04/Safety%20Advisory%20Train%20Build%20final%204.6.2023.pdf
Another view
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPno1IVTkFY
I can tell you this much as a railroad customer we find way more defects in our cars that we get in our SIT yard now than we used to just a few years ago before US railroads put in PSR. It has gotten to the point were we have a FRA certified crew employed in house now at all our major SIT yard locations just to make needed repairs to equipment before we ship it out after getting the cars empty. I am not talking about just brake shoes either we literally have had to change out trucks brake beams draft gears and other items that should have been repaired before we got the freaking cars.
EuclidRight after the Springfield wreck
How does the likelihood of an out-of-guage wheelset factor in to your conclusions?
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