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4 railroads have requested federal appeals courts to throw out a new rule that will require two-person practice crews in most circumstances, saying the mandate is bigoted, capricious and an unlawful abuse of discretion.
The equivalent challenges of the Federal Railroad Administration’s rule had been all filed this week in numerous appellate courts on behalf of Union Pacific, BNSF and two brief line railroads — the Indiana Railroad and Florida East Coast Railway.
The brand new federal requirement, introduced final week, was a milestone in organized labor’s lengthy struggle to protect the apply and got here amid rising scrutiny into railroad security, particularly within the wake of the fiery February 2023 derailment in japanese Ohio.
Most of these railroads didn’t instantly provide extra clarification for why they do not just like the rule, however the business has lengthy opposed such a regulation and the Affiliation of American Railroads commerce group stated final week that the rule was unfounded and never supported by security information. The Indiana Railroad — like many brief strains throughout the nation — already operates with one-person crews, however the main freight railroads all have two-person crews that their union contracts require.
Union Pacific stated in an announcement “this rule, which lacks any information displaying two individuals in a cab are safer than one, hinders our skill to compete in a world the place expertise is altering the transportation business and prevents us from getting ready our workforce for jobs of the long run.”
BNSF deferred remark to AAR, and the 2 smaller railroads didn’t instantly reply to messages Thursday.
The regulators who introduced the rule final Tuesday and the unions which have lobbied for the policy for years all argue there are clear security advantages to having two individuals within the cab of locomotives to assist function the practice as a result of they will preserve one another alert and the conductor can reply instantly to any issues they encounter, together with serving because the preliminary first-responder to a derailment.
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has stated the necessity to enhance railroad safety was made obviously clear final 12 months when a Norfolk Southern train derailed on the outskirts of a city on the Ohio-Pennsylvania border and spilled an assortment of hazardous chemicals that caught hearth. That East Palestine derailment impressed requires reform which have stalled in Congress.
However Buttigieg and the Federal Railroad Administration declined to remark Thursday on the authorized challenges to the brand new rule that’s set to take impact in early June.
The top of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen union Eddie Corridor stated this authorized problem is simply one other signal the railroads “place earnings over security.” He stated holding two individuals within the locomotive will not preserve railroads from investing in new expertise, and the business ought to concentrate on enhancing security.
“This transfer by the railroads was predictable. The railroads and their commerce affiliation enchantment each security reform,” Corridor stated.
Railroads have long argued that the dimensions of practice crews ought to be decided by contract talks, not regulators or lawmakers, as a result of they preserve there’s not sufficient information to indicate two-person crews are safer. Present security stats cannot present how protected one-person crews are as a result of all the most important railroads have two-person crews now.
The brand new rule does embody an exception that will enable brief line railroads to proceed working with one-person crews if they’ve been doing it for greater than two years and have a plan to make sure security. However the rule would make it tough for any railroads to chop their crews down to 1 individual.
The railroads have often challenged states after they tried to require two-person crews, so it is not a shock that they went to courtroom over this new federal rule.
The foremost freight railroads have argued that computerized braking methods which are designed to forestall collisions have made the second individual within the locomotive cab pointless and so they imagine a conductor based in a truck might adequately reply to any practice issues. Plus, they are saying taking that conductor off of the practice would enhance their quality of life as a result of she or he would not need to work unpredictable hours on the highway.
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