Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan led public- and private-sector leaders in breaking ground on the $466 million Howard Street Tunnel expansion project, which will reconstruct the 126-year-old freight rail tunnel to accommodate double-stack container trains to and from the Helen Delich Bentley Port of Baltimore.
The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) has renewed the charter of the Railroad Safety Advisory Committee (RSAC) for a two-year period. The renewed charter, or “recharter,” as FRA terms it, increases the number of represented organizations by three, from 23 to 26, and the number of individual voting members by 17, from 34 to 51.
Amtrak will resume Cascades service on the Point Defiance Bypass between Seattle, Wash., and Portland, Ore., on Nov. 18, nearly four years after an overspeed derailment stopped service there.
On Nov. 8, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Administration (PHMSA) published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) that would suspend the transportation of liquefied natural gas by rail “until more research and testing can be done to ensure the safety of moving this commodity by rail.” The NPRM would presumably negate a Final Rule issued in 2019.
RAILWAY AGE, NOVEMBER 2021 ISSUE: Railway Age’s Women in Rail awards recognize leaders for driving their businesses forward while making a difference in the industry and in their communities.
The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) has issued a Safety Advisory requiring State Safety Oversight Agencies (SSOA) to report “out-of-tolerance wheel gauges” on all rail transit rolling stock in revenue service, and recommending fleet-wide inspections of wheel gauges at public transportation systems in their jurisdictions.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has released a preliminary report on its investigation into the Sept. 25 derailment of Amtrak’s Empire Builder train 7/27 near Joplin, Mont.
In an unusual twist of circumstances, there are three events ongoing at this writing that have a lot to say about Amtrak corridors and trains in the Midwest. All were scheduled to take place within a three-day span.
Amtrak’s Empire Builder train 7/27 traveling westbound from Chicago to Seattle/Portland on Sept. 25 derailed near Joplin, Mont., at 3:55 p.m. MT. The passenger train was traveling between 75-78 mph, below the 79 mph speed limit, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) reported on Sept. 27 during its first media briefing.
Amit Bose, Deputy Administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration, took on questions about automated track inspection, crew sizes, hazardous materials transportation, and port congestion, among other topics, during a Sept. 22 hearing on his nomination by President Biden to be the next Federal Railroad Administrator.
