Railroad News

By This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., Associate Editor

The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (SFMTA) will end switchbacks on the T Third Street light-rail line in an effort to provide more reliable service to southeast San Francisco, agency officials announced this week.

To accommodate the elimination of switchbacks, a train will be on standby along the route to fill gaps of service and the agency will provide updated schedules with more accurate travel times.

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has formed the Surface Transportation Security Advisory Committee, which will advise the agency on security issues related to rail and other modes of surface transportation.

The committee's makeup includes representatives of freight and passenger railroads. Voting committee members will represent surface transportation providers and users, and nonvoting members represent federal departments and agencies with surface transportation oversight.

Union Pacific Railroad will host a celebration May 9 in Ogden, Utah, to mark the 150th anniversary of the transcontinental railroad's completion.

The ceremony will be held at Ogden Union Station, a day ahead of Utah's celebration at Promontory Summit where the "golden spike" was originally tapped into place, according to a UP press release.

Grade crossing collisions and fatalities related to rail trespassing in the United States increased in 2018, Operation Lifesaver Inc. (OLI) announced yesterday.

Citing recent but preliminary Federal Railroad Administration statistics, OLI officials said crossing collisions in 2018 rose to 2,214 to from 2,122 collisions in 2017 — a more than 4 percent increase. Total casualties — injuries and fatalities — related to rail trespassing climbed 2.8 percent last year, according to an OLI press release.

U.S. railroads reported a 2.8 percent decline in carload and intermodal volume for the week ending April 6 compared with the same week a year ago, according to Association for American Railroads (AAR) data.

Combined, the railroads logged 510,192 carloads and intermodal units during the week. The total number of transported carloads fell 3.9 percent to 251,417 units, while intermodal dipped 1.6 percent to 258,775 containers and trailers versus year-ago levels.

By Michael Popke

Trackmobile LLC, Zephir SpA and the LEAF locomotive commercial business have joined to form the Global Railcar Mover Group under Marmon Holdings Inc.’s rail product and services sector. The group will provide solutions for industrial operations, shipping and receiving materials and finished goods via rail shipping transportation, according to a Trackmobile press release.

The Greenbrier Cos. reported net earnings of $2.8 million on revenue of $658.7 million for its second fiscal quarter that ended Feb. 28. In comparison, net earnings attributed to Greenbrier in the first fiscal quarter were $18 million.The quarterly result change includes $4.7 million related to loss accruals on rail-car contracts and facilities closure costs in its rail-car repair operations. Greenbrier expected the quarter to be the least profitable of fiscal 2019 due to planned product line changeovers temporarily reducing manufacturing efficiency, officials said in a press release. Greenbrier's backlog of 26,000 units valued at $2.7 billion will produce sustained rail-car deliveries through fiscal 2019 and provide good visibility into fiscal 2020, they said.

Utah Transit Authority (UTA) officials earlier this week marked the completion of construction on a new section of double tracking on the S-Line streetcar route, which connects the Fairmont Station in Salt Lake City to the Central Pointe TRAX light-rail station in South Salt Lake City.

Begun in 2018, the project was designed to reduce the amount of time riders wait for trains, reduce congestion, improve air quality and provide better connections with UTA's other modes of transportation, officials said in a press release. 

The Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) last week released final recommendations for a transit service plan that will be implemented when Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) service begins later this year in Santa Clara County, California. 

The plan proposes to create a new Orange Line light-rail route, change two service line names and replace the Ohlone/Chynoweth-Almaden light-rail route in San Jose with bus routes. 

A CSX conductor and conductor trainee died in a 2017 accident after they were struck by an Amtrak train while walking on active track, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) announced yesterday.

The accident, which occurred June 27, 2017, in Washington, D.C., prompted the NTSB to issue a safety alert calling on railroads to prohibit employees from walking or working too closely to adjacent track of another railroad unless the employees are protected by communication between the two railroads.

By Jeff Stagl, Managing Editor

The American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association (ASLRRA) handed out more awards and installed new officers yesterday at its annual meeting in Orlando.

By This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., Senior Associate Editor

Former Amtrak President and Chief Executive Officer Joseph Boardman died March 7 after suffering a stroke in Florida, where he shared a vacation home with his wife, Joanne. He was 70.

The Peninsula Corridor Joint Powers Board (JPB) last week named Shamann Walton to serve as a member.

Walton will represent the San Francisco County Board of Supervisors on the JPB, the governing body of Caltrain. He is taking over for former member Monique Zmuda, according to a JPB press release.

Tri-County Metropolitan Transportation District of Oregon (TriMet) crews today will begin a six-week rail profile grinding project on 25 miles of track along the MAX light-rail route. 

The grinding will be done overnight when trains are not running, according to a TriMet press release. Crews will begin in downtown Portland and work toward the Portland International Airport. 

The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) yesterday launched a new public awareness campaign to stop harassment.

Advertisements, developed to empower riders to report and intervene if they witness or experience an incident of harassment, were placed in stations today, according to a WMATA press release.

Norfolk Southern Railway is continuing to address service interruptions due to flooding conditions in Hannibal, Missouri, the Class I announced yesterday.

The situation is requiring NS traffic between Decatur, Illinois, and Kansas City, Missouri, to be diverted and operated via St. Louis, NS officials said in an operations alert to customers. Conditions along the route are expected to improve by April 14.