20 Tools That Will Make You Better At Federal Railroad
The Federal Railroad Administration and Technology
The Federal Railroad Administration creates and enforces safety regulations for rail, provides rail funding and researches rail improvement strategies.
FRA inspectors on the ground use discretion to decide which cases merit the time-consuming and precise civil penalty process. This discretion helps ensure that the violations most deserving of punishment are penalized.
SMART-TD members and allies have made history in 2024 by pushing the FRA to ensure that two people are in the cabs of locomotives of freight trains. The fight continues.
Safety
The Federal Railroad Administration has a variety of safety measures in place to safeguard the health and welfare of employees as well as the general public. It formulates and enforces rail safety regulations, administers rail funding and studies strategies for improving rail infrastructure and technologies. It also develops plans, implements and maintains plans for the maintenance of the current infrastructure and services for rail. It also develops and improves the national rail network. The department requires all railroad employers to abide by strict rules and regulations, empower their workers and provide them with tools needed to be successful and secure. This includes participating in the confidential close-call reporting system, setting up occupational health and safety committees with full union participation, as well as anti-retaliation protections and providing employees with needed personal safety equipment.
Inspectors of the FRA are at the forefront of enforcing rail safety laws and regulations. They conduct routine inspections on equipment and investigate hundreds of complaints. Civil penalties can be handed out to those who violate the rail safety laws. The safety inspectors of the agency have a broad discretion on whether an individual violation is in line with the statutory definition of a civil penalty-worthy act. Additionally the Office of Chief Counsel's safety department reviews all reports that are received by regional offices to determine legality before determining penalties. This discretion is exercised at the field and regional levels to ensure that civil penalties are only applied in situations that warrant them.
A rail worker must be aware of rules and regulations that govern his or her actions, and not knowingly violate those rules to be guilty of a civil penalty-worthy offence. The agency does not consider an individual who acted on a supervisor's directive is guilty of committing a willful crime. The agency defines the "general railroad system of transportation" as the entire network over which goods and passengers travel within cities and metropolitan areas or between them. The trackage of a plant railroad in the steel mill is not considered to be part of the overall rail transportation system, even though it is physically connected.
Regulation
The Federal Railroad Administration sets train regulations, including those pertaining to safety and the movement of hazardous materials. The agency also manages rail financing, including grants and loans for improvements to infrastructure and service. The agency works with other DOT agencies and with industry to develop strategies to improve the country's railroad system. This includes ensuring the existing rail infrastructure and services, responding to the demands for new capacity, expanding the network strategically, as well as coordinating the national and regional system planning and development.
Although the majority of the agency's work focuses on freight transportation, it also handles passenger transportation. The agency is trying to connect people to the places they want and provide more choices for travel. The agency's primary focus is on improving the passenger's experience, enhancing safety of the existing fleet, and ensuring that the rail network is operating efficiently.
Railroads must adhere to a number of federal regulations, including those related to the size of the crews on trains. In recent times, this issue has become a source of controversy. Certain states have passed legislation requiring two-person crews on trains. This final rule establishes federally the minimum size of crew requirements, ensuring that all railroads adhere to the same safety standards.
This rule also requires each railroad operating a one-person train crew to notify FRA of the operation and submit a risk assessment. This will allow FRA to better understand the specifics of each operation and compare them with the standard two-person crew operation. Additionally, this rule changes the criteria for reviewing a special approval petition from determining whether the operation is "consistent with railroad safety" to determining if approving the operation is safer or more secure than a two-crewmember operation.
During the time of public comments for this rule, a lot of people expressed their support for a requirement of two people on the crew. A form letter sent by 29 people outlined their concerns that a lone crewmember could not be as quick to respond to train-related malfunctions or crossing incidents or assist emergency response personnel at a highway rail grade crossing. The commenters pointed out that human factors account for more than half of railroad accidents and believe that a larger crew will ensure the safety of both the train and the cargo it transports.
Technology
Railroads that transport passengers and freight employ numerous technologies to improve efficiency, improve security, increase safety and much more. The rail industry vernacular includes a variety of unique terms and acronyms, but some of the most significant developments include machine vision systems, instrumentsed rail inspection systems, driverless trains rolling data centers and unmanned aerial vehicles (commonly known as drones).
Technology doesn't just replace some jobs. It helps people perform their jobs more effectively and more safely. Railroads that transport passengers use smartphones and contactless fare cards to boost passengership and boost the efficiency of their system. Other developments, like autonomous rail vehicles, are moving closer to reality.
As part of its ongoing efforts to ensure safe, reliable, and affordable transportation for the entire nation The Federal Railroad Administration is focused on modernizing its rail infrastructure. This multi-billion-dollar project will see tunnels, bridges tracks, power systems and tracks updated, and stations being rebuilt or replaced. The recently passed bipartisan infrastructure law will dramatically increase the agency's rail improvement programs.
The Office of Research, Development and Technology of the agency is an essential part of this initiative. The National Academies' recent review of the office concluded that it was successful in keeping in touch with and using inputs from a wide range of stakeholders. But it still needs to be more focused on how its research contributes to the department's primary strategic goal of ensuring the safe movement of goods and people via rail.
The agency could increase its effectiveness by identifying and implementing automated train systems and technologies. The Association of American Railroads (AAR) is the principal industry association for the freight rail industry, which focuses on research, policy and standard setting, established an Technical Advisory Group for Autonomous Train Operations in order to help establish standards for the industry.
The FRA is interested in the creation of a taxonomy for automated rail vehicles, a system that defines clearly and consistently the different levels of automation. fela lawsuits would apply to rail transit as well as vehicles on the road. The agency will also want to understand the level of risk to safety that the industry sees with implementing fully automated operation and whether or not the industry is considering additional safeguards to mitigate that risk.
Innovation
Rail companies are adopting technology to improve worker safety, boost efficiency in business processes, and ensure that the freight they transport is delivered intact. Examples of this innovation include the use of cameras and sensors to keep track of freight, and to new railcar designs that help keep hazardous cargo secure during transit. Some of these technologies enable railroads to dispatch emergency responders directly to the scene of an accident to minimize the risk and minimize damage to people and property.
One of the most prominent innovations in rail is Positive Train Control (PTC), which will inhibit collisions between trains and train, situations where trains are on tracks that shouldn't be and other accidents that result from human error. It is a three-part system comprised of locomotives onboard that track the train, wayside networks that communicate with the locomotive and a huge backend server that analyzes and collects data.
Trains for passengers also adopt technology to improve safety and security. For instance, Amtrak is experimenting with the use of drones to assist security staff in locating passengers and other items onboard trains in the event in an emergency. Amtrak is also investigating other ways to use drones, including deploying them to perform inspections of bridges and other infrastructure such as replacing the lighting on railway towers, which can be hazardous for workers to climb.
Smart track technology is a different technology that is used in passenger railroads. It can detect people or objects on tracks and warn drivers if it is unsafe to continue. These types of technology are especially useful in detecting crossings that are not authorized and other issues in the off-hours, when traffic volumes are lowest and there are fewer people to witness an accident.
Another important technological breakthrough in the rail industry is telematics, which allows shippers, railroads and other stakeholders to see a traincar's status and condition through real-time tracking. Crews and railcar operators can benefit from greater accountability and transparency which can help them improve efficiency as well as avoid unnecessary maintenance and avoid delays when delivering freight.