In the Los Angeles-area crash yesterday involving three trains, the initial impact with the Jeep (parked negligently on the track in an aborted suicide attempt) was by the cab car of an outbound (Northbound) train operating in “push” mode. Now the media are raising the question of whether the push mode of commuter train operation is inherently unsafe; if the more massive locomotive was leading the train, would the Jeep have been simply smashed and flung out of the way?
Some of you may also have heard in interview on KNX radio in Los Angeles with an Engineering faculty member at USC who claimed that the entire Metrolink commuter rail system is a stupid, uneconomical and inherently unsafe idea that should never have been allowed to go into operation. His theory is that all road/rail crossing should be grade separated, that this can’t be done economically, so the entire system should be replaced with bus routes.
So he would rather replace it with bus routes that have the chance of killing far more that 10 every day. I think it is far safer to take rail than not.
Brad
Math equation Train>Bus.
Trains are greater than any bus no mater how safe. I think and know more people are killed on bus related causes than that of passenger trains.
Pushing and pulling argument is semantics. On a passenger rail system the odds are that someone will get injured in a derailment. Its a moral question after that, better to kill the engineer than the passengers. They are all humans aren’t they?
Maybe I’m jaded but I can’t believe busses would be any safer. That idea puts human error at an even higher rate. Great line of thinking.
Thoughts? Yeah, several, but none that are suitable for a forum!
Seriously, though, just because this guy is a faculty member at USC doesn’t mean he’s got any sense. Replace trains with bus service? Oh pleeease! I agree with Brad that the potential for accidents is far higher with busses than it could ever be with trains. Maybe this guy hasn’t thought it all the way through, or maybe, for some reason, he just hates railroads. In any case, he doesn’t make any sense except on one point, and that is that all crossings should be grade separated. That, of course, is in a perfect world, so don’t hold your breath. Gee, I wonder if this guy’s ever ridden the train…
As to your first question, would the locomotive have simply knocked the Jeep out of the way, the only answer is that we’ll never know for sure. I would personally rate the chances of that as slim to none, but that’s just my opinion. I don’t believe that push mode is necessarily unsafe, either, but I’m relying on the fact that it’s used safely in many places around the country. I have no personal experience with it myself. We’ll all have to wait until the investigators make their report to have anything concrete to go on here anyway, so I’m going to save any further speculation until then.
To all whose lives were affected by this tragedy, my most heartfelt sympathy and my prayers. May the Good Lord ease your burden.
i was woundering how long it would take for some lawyer to try and make that argument… and it took all of 24 hours… once agin…insted of trying to place the blame where it lies…the dips*%t that coused it all in the first place…they are trying to place the blame that the trian was unsafe in the first place… im so sick of this crap anymore… the pass the blame game… the sad thing is… when it all comes out…the a$$hole that parked it thier is probley an illeage alian in the first place…and will just end up deported and get away with it all…
its time to end this crap…and this should be a good example to argue the point… time to end the trial lawers stangle hold on this country…and time to start puting blame where the blame lies…not on where we can pass the blame too…
csx engineer
I have to agree with everyone here, everyone is focusing on the safety of the train, seems to me it was perfectly fine till it hit the SUV which was parked there purposely by another human.
We sure do seem to love screwing with innocent people’s lives, don’t we? It’s only just and right that this degenerate of nature has been charged with 11 counts of murder, good on him, i say park his sorry a$$ on the tracks and see if he can derail a train. Well, at least we’d have fun trying that experiment.
Push pull has been proven to be safe. After all,it’s been around for 50 years now,first in Chicago,then spread to the rest of the country and to Canada.
I believe that the professor whom you are talking about is the notoriously anti-rail James E. Moore, who heads up USC’s Urban Planning Institute, funded through an endowment from (Surprise!) General Motors Corporation and ChevronTexaco.
He’s also the very same dim bulb who’s spear-heading the opposition to the proposed “Expo-Line” LRT, which, ironically enough, would serve USC on it’s way west from downtown L.A. to Culver City and Santa Monica. He also has said that the heavily-used “Blue-Line” LRT should be ripped out and replaced by a (supposedly) more flexible Rapid-Bus line.
Sincerely, Ross R. Moore, Jr. (No relation to Professor Moore, thank God!)
I agree with all here about the stupidity of this idiot, and lack of respect for human life he has. However, let’s not make race an issue here because it has absolutely nothing to do with anything in this wreck. What we have is a societal reject with prior drug-related arrests who deliberately drove his truck onto the tracks. He happened to be Mexican, but what does that matter–he would be just as moronic and stupid and deserving of the death penalty if he were white, black or from Mars. So, please, don’t feed the ACLU flames or give their sort any ammunition by putting down this guy in any way based on his race. It would be an absolute shame to see him get any leniancy due to any thoughtless and stupid racial comments.
who said anything about putting him down on his race…i said that im betting that he was an illegal alien and might end up with deportation as his punshiment… im sorry but when the boarders are being overrun with illegals… the odds are about 60-40 that he is one… i am putting him down becouse he was an idiot… insted of killing himself…he ends up offing 11 inocent people… and people like you that automaticly want to turn something into a race issue right off the bat becouse a fact of what race he is known and the talk that becouse of his race means that i am being racest pisses me off… got news for you… his lawers are already going to play the race card… thats the american way now… if you cant play a race card…you play some other card…its always “well he was from a poor community…and couldnt get ahead so it was socioty and {the man} that lead him to do this”…or what ever the sob story for the jury might end up being…now if he was a US citizen…my feelings tores him would still be the same… he is an idoit…the fact that he is mexican or mexican desent only makes a point that if he is an illeagl… the punshment would not be as strong as if he was a citizen…tha
First off let me offer my sincere sympathies to the 11+ people who died in this wreck and to their grieving families. I only hope that no additional bodies are found and those who are in the hospital and their families have a full physical and mental recovery.
On the other thread regarding this wreck there were several ethnic slurs that have no place anywhere. Yes, the alleged person who caused the werck is apparently Hispanic. However, you cannot blame this accident on a Hispanic any more than you can blame it on a Frenchman, an Italian, an Argentiaian, a Cambodian, or any ot the other 450 +/- nationalities in the world. This was the act of one person, not a ethnic or racial entity, so please keep your bigotry to yourself.
The only valid comparison that can be made to European railroads is that that most of the rails are 4’ 8 1/2" apart. Other than that the similarity ends. The EU has significantly different operating rule and laws than we have here. There are even different operating laws and rules between the separate countries in the EU.
Europe, being a high population density continent with major cities in close proximity, followed a different plan of development. European rail “barrons” of 150 years ago realized the potential of rail transit and initially built to a higher standard that was to last essentially for ever. Ihe US, by comparison, had few cities and were scattered over the vast area of our continent. Our railroads were build by speculators to make a quick buck. Witness the wooden trestles in America vs the stone viaducts in Europe. Fortunately we have made great strides to upgrade ou infeastructure over the years.
True, many of the grade crossings have been eliminated in Europe possible due to the use of third rail electrification. To eliminate all at grade crossings in America would be such a financial burdon that even Bill Gates could not afford it. Fortunately the worst at grade crossings are being eliminated on high density l
This could happen anywhere,by any race. Recently in England a man stopped his car on the tracks in front of an HST train. It derailed,killing 7 people, the motorist included.
As was said in the other thread, please stick to the topic and avoid the personal arguments, derogatory comments, and racial remarks. While there is nothing wrong with discussing this topic, the facts and circumstances surrounding what happened, the rest will not be tolerated.
I notice the previous discussion has been locked. Hopefully this thread will stay “on track” (so to speak). [2c]
The big discussions on the airwaves, newspapers, and City Halls are the push-pull issue and the grade crossings. I guess there has to be some sort of knee-jerk reaction to this sort of thing.
Personally, I’ve ridden the Antelope Valley line past that area (and shop at that Costco all the time, too) and will do so again. Most of the commuters they’ve interviewed will keep riding Metrolink, which is good to hear.
It seems to me that this wreck wouldn’t have been nearly as severe if the freight train had not been there.The southbound Metrolink train would probably still have derailed, but with much less loss of life.Possibly no one would have been killed.
I know that it was just an accident of fate that the freight was there,but the southbound would not have jacknifed onto the northbound track otherwise.
You want to replace that train with a pier or bridge column? I’ll take the freight train.
Freak things do happen… The only thing that I see here in need of immediate attention is the muzzle-ing of a wacko prof., a couple of warped LaLa land politicians, bigots and a talk show host or two.