KEENESBURG, Colo. — Amtrak’s eastbound California Zephyr derailed Monday night after striking a truck at a grade crossing northeast of Denver, KDVR-TV reports. Amtrak said that “no serious customer injuries” occurred in the collision and derailment that occurred about 10 p.m. east of Keenesburg, according to the Colorado State Patrol, although an exact number was […]
Train Topic: Railroad Operations
Northern California short lines receive $31.4 federal loan
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Transportation has extended a $31.4 million Railroad Rehabilitation and Improvement Financing loan to the Sierra Northern Railway and Mendocino Railway for infrastructure improvement work, DOT’s Build America Bureau announced on Monday. Funding will finance almost 100% of work including expansion of 6.7 miles of Sierra Northern’s Oakdale Branch for […]
MBTA completes January Green Line work, eliminating 16 speed restrictions
BOSTON — The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority eliminated 16 speed restrictions during two sets of maintenance shutdowns on the Green Line this month, the agency said Monday, including the completion of all work related to out-of-gauge track stemming from the construction of the Green Line extension between North Station and the Union Square and Medford/Tufts […]
Swiss make commitment to maintain Gotthard Pass line
BERN, Switzerland — The long-term future of Switzerland’s historic Gotthard Pass rail line, which has been in question since the opening of the Gotthard Base Tunnel in 2016, has been assured with the decision of the Swiss government and Swiss Federal Railways, or SBB, to spend some 1 billion Swiss francs ($1.16 billion) to renovate […]
Norfolk Southern first Class I railroad to join FRA’s Confidential Close Call Reporting system
Norfolk Southern, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, and the SMART-TD union will participate in the Federal Railroad Administration’s Confidential Close Call Reporting system, or C3RS, the railroad and labor unions said in a joint statement today. “NS is proud to partner with our labor leaders and FRA to make another industry-leading advancement in […]
Fire briefly closes Gotthard Base Tunnel
FAIDO, Switzerland — Rail traffic through the one functioning tube of the Gotthard Base Tunnel was suspended for about six hours today (Monday, Jan. 29) after a vehicle caught fire at the southern tunnel exit near Faido, Swissinfo.ch reports, citing reports from SRF, Swiss public radio. The vehicle, belonging to a security firm, caught fire […]
Pennsylvania to increase funding for public transit, averting SEPTA crisis
PHILADELPHIA — Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro has proposed a $282.8 million annual increase in public transit funding — the first increase in state funding in more than a decade — to prevent service cuts or fare increases on the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority. The 1.75% increase in statewide funding announced Sunday, reported by WHYY, follows […]
Maya Train will not meet Feb. 29 target for completion
CANCÚN, Mexico — The launch of Mexico’s tourist-oriented Maya Train on the Yucatán Peninsula continues to run into problems, the latest being that the last portion of the looping 950-mile route will not be complete by the end of February, as President Andrés Manuel López Obrador had previously said. López Obrador — the project’s primary […]
First New York ‘open gangway’ cars won’t be used in express service
NEW YORK — New York’s first batch of “open gangway” subway cars — those with accordion-style connections, rather than doors between cars, making it easy to walk from car to car — will not be able to operate on some express lines because their design creates a conflict with New York City Transit operating rules, […]
Blue flags save lives
We’ve all seen blue flags. A sign with words “STOP MEN AT WORK” clamped to the head of a rail, or hanging from the side of a locomotive. It was placed there by a railroader working in the area, and the rules of its use are strict and unbending. A blue flag, is defined by […]
NJ Transit cancels power plant, reallocates funds to other projects
NEWARK, N.J. — NJ Transit has cancelled a controversial natural-gas power plant designed in part to provide emergency power for rail lines, saying the project is “not financially feasible,” and will reallocate federal grant funds to other projects, the transit agency announced on Friday. The TransitGrid Microgrid Central Facility in Kearny, N.J., would have generated […]
Late era railroad dining car meals
In the past, railroad dining car meals were something to write home about, positively. A notable summary of this can be found in the lyrics of the popular song Chattanooga Choo-Choo, with its assertion that “dinner in the diner, nothing could be finer.” As private-railroad passenger service declined in the 1960s, however, this […]