Quote:
Originally Posted by Azure
Interesting how people are so quick to blame the rail companies for their neglect, political lobbying to reduce safety regulation, etc, etc, but simply can't accept the fact that media companies who are often beholden to the same shareholders as the rail companies are not going to be inclined to go report on something like this if said shareholders are going to tell them to back off.
I mean its pretty clear here that a lot of what came out in regards to this story was told by independent sources. It took quite a while until it got more attention, and even logger for the feds and the EPA to get seriously involved.
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I'm a locomotive engineer for one of the top 2 Canadian railways, I won't say which one because they have teams of people scouring the internet dedicated to keeping their image squeaky clean. I haven't been following the story or this thread at all, because this is no surprise to me. The way the railways are regulated in both countries these things are just bound to happen. The public would be shocked to find out how often trains derail. In one form or another I would guess cars come off the tracks every few days somewhere in the country, if not every day. My subdivision has seen some nasty ones, but unless there's flames and they're visible from the side of the road, then no one outside the railway ever knows about it. But it's just a matter of time before a hazardous goods train goes off the rails and dumps some nasty stuff into a river. I will say that it blows my mind that they use trains to transport oil instead of a pipeline. The biggest issue imo is work rest rules which the government has been dragging their feet on in implementing since i started. I can only say that working on 4 hours sleep over a 24 hour period is completely normal, and just part of the job. I may get off rest at 8 in the morning, thinking I'm going out right away, and my phone doesn't ring until 2200 that night. Now I'm expected to still be fully rested, and drive a train for 10 hours. Then I can book 8 hours rest away from home (or if im so inclined, i can book no rest, because i can work 18 hours over a 24 hr period), and I might have to still wait another 10 hours and take a train over night again. My point is that the company (all of them) doesn't care. There really is no "schedule". It's a very obvious problem and one that the company and the government pretends isn't. There was an accident 2 years ago where the conductor and engineer were asleep and side swiped another train coming out of the siding at 15mph because they forgot they had to stop. Luckily no one was killed, and the cars that derailed weren't hazardous.
The other problem is track maintenance. They make more and more cuts every year for short term gains, completely ignoring the long term picture. The goal is to compound the stock, nothing else. Its like treliving spending our draft picks on a last ditch attempt to save his job, haha. Well, we've had one curve on our subdivision that has derailed 4 trains the last 3 years, like 40 cars on the ground with units and everything. Again, lucky it wasn't oil or vinyl chloride, but it's just a game of roulette.
Railways operate like it's still the 1800's, and they get away with it because they have a complete monopoly. They are incredibly inefficient (operationally), but it doesn't matter because there's no entrepreneur out there whose going to finance a new cross country track, and the government wouldn't allow it anyway. Here's a fun fact, just on our subdivision, trains run out of fuel on a weekly basis. The train usually has to be pushed by another train to a point they can get a fuel truck to. Probably a 5 hr delay to maybe 5 trains that are waiting behind and in front of, waste of several crews, not to mention mechanical issues I.e. fuel pumps, dirty fuel, oiling, etc. It's something so simple to fix.
Anyways, long story short, imo it's both a government problem and a corporate problem. Everyone will bury their head in the sand and pretend they don't realize there's a problem until the next lac megantic happens, then the government will slap the companies on the wrist, and they'll make some subtle changes that least effect their bottom line. Deep down the railways know they have the government by the balls, because shutting down CN or CP for a period of time has a massive effect on the entire economy. They couldn't do it.