Ann Dawn Begeman was designated permanent chairman of the Surface Transportation Board (STB) March 19 by President Trump. She has been acting chairman since January 2017.
I read with great interest the Railway Age article on March 9 announcing the winners of the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) Genius Transit Challenge.
Far too often, when the National Transportation Safety Board investigates a rail accident, it concludes that poor communications proved to be a critical factor, including breakdowns in communication between rail operators, dispatch and maintenance crews.
“Riding the brand”—a code of conduct exemplifying unbendable trustworthiness, integrity and commitment—is an expression as old as the Wild West, yet as contemporary as Federal Railroad Administrator Ron Batory. Nowhere is this code more needed than at the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), lacking permanent leadership since January 2015 and suffering discord and an organizational brain-drain even longer.
CSX’s unions are the latest in a long line of the railroad’s stakeholders to experience distress from the continued deterioration in the carrier’s service and operations.
Until I draw my last breath, I’ll remember that the speed on the curve at Dry Wall is 55 MPH. There were 331 speed restrictions on the 330 miles of the former B&O between Washington, D.C. and Pittsburgh, Pa. (as well as 22 open train order towers) I had to know to qualify as the engineer of Amtrak’s Capitol Limited in 1986, but I’ll never forget that one.
The railroad industry is making steady progress implementing Positive Train Control. You wouldn’t know it though, if you believed some of the choreographed histrionics the House Subcommittee on Railroads and its chairman displayed at a Feb. 15 hearing on PTC.
The battle between labor and the management over mandatory two-person crews is far from over and will heat up if a new Democratic-controlled Congress takes charge in 2019. Hoping for big Democratic wins in the U.S. House and Senate later this year, railroad labor quietly continues to set the stage to push for mandatory two-person train crew legislation.
Those who have spent many years in the rail industry know that rail workers are among the most loyal of employees, spending entire careers on the railroad and often following a parent into railroading. This loyalty is expressed in a myriad of ways, including today’s internet chat rooms devoted to railroad topics where railroaders discuss everything from operating plans to locomotive livery, and share photos and recollections.
Kenneth Kermit Kitts was not only the man who facilitated the interview that resulted in my being hired as a switchman on the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad in 1977. He was my mentor and friend. He also had the undying respect of every man and woman who ever worked for, or personally knew him. He died Jan. 23, 2018.