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BLET president testifies for two-person crews at Congressional hearing
I watched a delayed feed of the entire hearing late last night. I’m no union man but am sympathetic to and supportive of the men & women who operate our trains. Mr. Pierce was credible and generally reasonable in his testimony. He kept his cool and did not allow any congressmen to bully him. I do agree with his stated concerns about the use of inward facing cameras as well as the need for on-board freight conductors, thus furnishing a second cab crew member. I do not think passenger trains need a second engine person and NTSB chairman Hart testified that there is no evidence that two crew members in passenger train cabs lead to safer trains.
In general I found Mr. Hart’s testimony credible and succinct, except for his apologies for not having fully determined the engineer’s cell phone activity during the minutes leading up to the crash. I understand his desire for certainty before making announcements, but given NTSB resources no report after three weeks is surprising. Since I respect the integrity and ability of NTSB, I wonder about the state of the record keeping of the cell providers themselves.
Joe Boardman, Amtrak CEO, and Sara Feinberg, FRA Administrator, both made strong appearances with consistent, direct testimony. They were respectful towards but not intimidated by their congressional overseers. Both testified that Amtrak is leading the RR industry in implementing positive train control. Mr. Boardman continually stressed the urgent need for infrastructure investment. Congress may finally be beginning to take note.
If Amtrak had installed an inward facing camera in all of its locomotive fleet the investigation wouldn’t be focusing on the engineer and his cell phone. And if there had been two people in the cab, the investigation would be focused on both of them. As it is now, that particular engineer’s railroad career is FUBAR, despite all the ‘atta boy’s’ he has. The only thing that could have saved him positively would have been an inward facing camera, not another person, whose loyalty would be subject to scrutiny. As it is now, all I hear from Mr. Pierce, is his desire to further the featherbedding process, that his union has been known for. Railroaders and those who follow the trade need to move forward with the all new technology, not just the types they agree with. Who thinks an engineer is going to use his or her cell phone if they are on a camera? Who believes a train crew is going to fall asleep if they know they’re being watched? Is it an invasion of privacy for a supervisor to watch his or her crews while at work?
Two member locomotive crews are an absolute necessity for safe railroad train operations, be they
freight or passenger. A single locomotive engineer cannot see back and look at both sides of the
railroad cars following him, just as this labor union president points out. Automatic video cameras are
also equally important but primarily are for photographing the tracks ahead of a moving train.
@Charles…what makes the U.S. railroads different from European railroads? Practically nothing, and most of them run with a single crew member, especially their passenger services…even freight, all you need to do is watch a lot of video’s of European trains…then count the number of crew members in the cab. Often it will be a single person…two person engine crews do nothing for safety, except perhaps add an additional distraction to the one person running the train as it is…from conversation. Do you have 2 people driving bus, taxi, limo, etc., no, why, it would be distracting as well as confusing and drivers need to watch both sides of the vehicle. Flying an aircraft is a different matter, the second person in the cockpit performs different functions from the pilot, and technically…as we’ve learned from many Asian airlines, the pilots don’t do anything anymore(not even take off and landings, as these can be performed by the computer as well). The comments about being able to split a train in two for emergency personnel are a little off kilter. Think about it for a moment, most times that a train would need emergency personnel to approach it let alone get on the other side is because of a derailment or other such accident…in most of those cases, the train has already split in two and there’s no need to manually perform that function…they wouldn’t split the train in two for non-railroad related emergencies.
Its only a matter of time when DOT and/or FRA mandates it, so this convo will be moot. Its required to have 2 pilots in a commercial aircraft over 20 pax, This is what I love about knee jerk reactions, soon or later 2 man crew on passenger rail will be mandated.
So Mr. McFarlane, you are saying that if the fire dept and their trucks are on one side of the rail line, and a burning house is on the other side of the RR crossing, that the train has no need to split and clear the crossing because it is a “non-railroad related emergencies.” ?
I would like to understand why Mr Pierce thinks that using the camera data to “punitively attack certain” (guilty?) employees is unacceptable. Would it be preferable to only use the data AFTER there has been an accident. Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.
I’m certainly not anti-Amtrak but, please tell me how it is a “good investment” when it has needed a sizable subsidy for decades to even survive ?
Good Investment or not. Isn’t it amazing that no one ever talks about what the government provides to the airline industry and yet they are making record earnings.
Daryl, The airlines are not making record profits, that’s why there have been so many mergers. The people of this country have more or less demanded expansion of the airport infrastructure by increasingly using and needing it, especially in the large urban cities. Also, in more rural areas like Nebraska, airports may be more cost-effective than passenger rail.
Economically, I would tend to believe that the airlines contribute a lot more “bang for the buck” to this nation than passenger rail, but obviously both are necessary and important.
Very split on this issue. I drove truck for 25 plus years and never considered a team operation as one of the few real perks to this job is being able to work by one’s self for decent pay without having to listen to the endless ramblings of a vegan diet convert or a Fox news junkie in the jump seat or sleeper.
But a truck is not a train; the closest I have come to it being train like was hauling coal in the Price Utah area in triple trailer coal trucks.
The fact is that the truck is not likely to break in two at the worst possible time and I never had to close ; realign and lock a manual switch and then walk 100 plus truck lengths to get back to the cab.
A friend of mine who works for a very non union short line and makes less than I did as a truck driver always marvels that a two person rail crew hauling 2500 to 15,000 plus tons makes about 1/3rd more per year than a truck driver on the parallel interstate hauling 20 to 25 tons per trip; and many of the reefer trucks have two drivers making 2/3rds of that train crew to deliver 20 tons.
This really shows the subsidy we taxpayers give to the trucking companies for the use of the national highway system.
So to the poor engineer or conductor listening to a mates hard rock music or other quirks keep remembering that the next trip you may land the good crew person that keeps watch and treats all that tonnage rocketing down the rails at 70 mph as a very serious; potentially dangerous, and wonderful job all at the same time.
James, I can tell you’re obviously split on this issue ! Can I respectfully ask you if you like people and feel comfortable at all, working with other people ? I hope that your answer would be yes !
Other than this, I just wish that all your journeys be safe and happy ones !!