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NTSB to host forum on railroad trespassing March 24-25
They should show videos of, for instance, when a train slammed into a log truck, which was a true event; or how a train can turn a dead cow into hamburger by the time it stops. It will demonstrate the real power behind such collisions and maybe wake a few folks up.
And, the elephant in the room…rampant graffiti vandalism will be once again ignored.
My question is: How is this going to get out to the public? Having a forum in a meeting room in Washington doesn’t do any good to the people who are out trespassing everyday.
When I was a kid in St.Louis in the 40’s, the Wabash main line ran 3 blocks away from my house. Many times I lay by the tracks while huge steam powered trains roared past. I was usualy on the fireman’s side and often got a wave. Sometimes I would put a penny on the rail to flatten it. There was a maned road crossing nearby and the flagman never ran me off.
The hypocrisy here is noteworthy. If the railroads were really serious about trespassing we would not have a railroad industry covered in graffiti.
Jim, Still amazed how you can turn any railroad story, whether good or bad, into your one note…graffiti. You diminish the problem by attaching it to everything. It is not the main problem railroads face and you lose any credibility you might have on any subject that you comment on. Would guess that most people killed or injured in railroad accidents have any relationship to graffiti. Can’t believe you don’t have anything else to bring to the table.
If only Jim knew how much vandalism occurs off railroad property at customer owned facilities where the common carrier has no jurisdiction over protection of their equipment.
A big part of the trespassing problem is that people without cars often have very poor choices when it comes to getting around on foot. Roads often have no sidewalks along them, so that someone either faces the risk of getting hit by a car or a train if walking on the tracks seems like the better alternative. The same with getting across tracks. It is often a very very long distance between designated crossings so as a practical matter, the person may feel that they have no choice than to trespass. Public transportation is also seldom an option outside cities. It’s easy to say “no trespassing” if you have your own personal transportation, but far less easy if you don’t.
When I took driver’s ed back in 1972, a film on automobile safety was played, which featured the result of a truck-train collision, even showed the charred remains of the truck driver. The heck with today’s “sensitivity” nonsense, the NTSB and/or AAR needs to produce and disseminate stuff like that to get the message across that railroad tracks are dangerous, and to cross with care only at designated crossings. Driver’s ed classes are only one possible venue for getting the message out, more funding to take Operation Lifesafer to school programs is another. (BTW, the train involved in that film was an Erie-Lackawanna freight …)
No mention is made that many people use railroad tracks to commit suicide.
I hope this will take a reasonable middle of the road consideration about “trespassing”. Railroads use the term because this is private property. However, the property is unique in that it is long and narrow, as opposed to a large block of property. The underlying issue really is more about “right of way”–a concept well understood as it pertains to “private property.” I own property; utilities have a right of way (and therefore a right of access) to my private property. In some areas of my state, there are historic “trails” that offer some legally protected access across otherwise private property.
As pointed out previously, pedestrians often have limited safe or reasonable ways to cross tracks–particularly as more road crossings are closed. I also think of areas where for miles a railroad follows a coastline or lakeshore or river–it makes no sense that a person with the legal right to be on any one side or the other of the tracks should be guilty of trespass just for attempting to cross the few feet separating one parcel from another.
Private property is somewhat of a misnomer anyway: there are taxes and regulations on use (railroads have a TON of regulations to follow) such that nearly all “private property” is, in some way, public.
WOW, the FRA is going to deal with crossing safety, NTSB is going to deal with trespassers. What is the STB going to deal with or TSA or Homeland Security? We might need a few more federal agencies and some more laws, like we don’t have enough already on the books to handle the problems now.