BOSTON — The Boston area’s first weekday commute since the shutdown of the rapid transit Orange Line went relatively smoothly Monday, according to news reports, with the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority gearing up repair work along the 11-mile line that will be closed for 30 days. Boston.com reports that MBTA General Manager Steve Poftak, in […]
BRIDGEPORT, Conn. — A substantial increase in weekday service on Metro-North’s Waterbury Branch and new express trains between New Haven and New York’s Grand Central Terminal highlight new schedules that took effect Sunday, July 10. Reflecting recent infrastructure upgrades, the number of weekday trains on the Waterbury Branch will go from 15 to 22, a […]
MONTREAL — The strike in Canada by members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers against Canadian National Railway has ended. CN announced Monday that the union, which represents about 750 signal and communications workers, has agreed to binding arbitration, bringing an end to the strike at 12:01 a.m. EDT today (July 5, 2022). Those […]
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Transportation is offering more than $573 million in grant funding this fiscal year to address grade-crossing issues as part of its Railroad Crossing Elimination Program, created as part of the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law passed and signed in November 2021. The competitive discretionary grant program, administered by the Federal Railroad […]
Baltimore & Ohio P-7 Pacific 5305 passes through the interlocking at Halethorpe, Md., as semaphore signals are being replaced by color position light signals. Warren E. Olt photo […]
MONTREAL — Canadian National has released Canadian capital spending plans on a province-by-province basis, with total spending projected at C$1.92 billion. “We continue to make significant investments in our network and technology,” Sean Finn, CN executive vice-president, Corporate Services, and chief legal officer, said in each press release announcing the provincial plans. “We are building […]
Canadian National is the first railway to order a new dispatching system that Wabtec says is a major building block toward network automation, the companies announced on June 6. The latest version of Wabtec’s Precision Dispatch System is scheduled to be operational at CN in late 2023. CN completed installation of an earlier version of […]
I’d been hired as second-shift railroad station agent at Channing, Mich., for the Escanaba & Lake Superior Railroad in June 1980. The railroad had taken over operation of the Milwaukee Road’s lines north of Green Bay, Wis., three months earlier. I was 23 years old and had no qualifications for the job, other than I […]
SAN BRUNO, Calif. — National Transportation Safety Board officials say they will be trying to determine why positive train control didn’t prevent the accident as part of their investigation of the March 10 collision and fire involving a Caltrain commuter train. Thirteen people were reported injured after the train struck on-track equipment involved in the […]
PHILADELPHIA — The defense suffered a significant setback in the trial of Amtrak engineer Brandon Bostian on Tuesday, with Common Pleas Court Judge Barbara McDermott ruling the jury would not be allowed to hear any testimony regarding automatic train control. KYW-TV reports the defense had planned to argue that Amtrak was at fault in the […]
CHICAGO — On the day Amtrak placed its first Siemens ALC42 locomotives into revenue service — although not without some problems — the company announced it will acquire more of the locomotives. In a event at Chicago Union Station, Amtrak Vice President and Chief Mechanical Officer George Hull used the operating debut of the two […]
OTTAWA — The Canadian government has announced plans to require its own version of positive train control, which it is calling Enhanced Train Control. Transport Canada has published a Notice of Intent to implement the safety system, which is intended to ensure trains comply with trackside signaling and speed limits and avoid collisions. In the […]
