2010 and trains still have to blow horns?

[Roadhawg]

I don't need to move, I don't live near any railroad tracks

[rcjunkie]

I don't need to move, I live about 1 mile from tracks/crossings, but I enjoy the sounds of the train. (including the horn)

[torea]

I don't need to move neither since I live already more than a mile away from your noisy honking machines. Please think a little bit further than your own little house!

Maybe you railroad guys don't realize that you are not only killing your credibility but also your own business:
I found several companies (just in my area) looking to move away from their current railroad connected locations because of the noise made by your blowing horns.
Of course they will have to look also for alternative (truck) transportation methods.
A manager told me they have to stop talking to their customers each time a passing train starts honking. As mentioned in the fox4kc article, this represents 5 hours (or more than 20%) of unproductive time per day and lots of nervous and lost customers:

http://www.fox4kc.com/wdaf-olathe-qu...,7084851.story

Good luck railroad guys! Keep on blowing your business away

[Thunder]

Torea, you must have super-sensitive hearing or overly exaggerating the situation. When I was hearing during the years ago, the trains was not even such a problem. People and business owners need to stop complaining.

[Roadhawg]

I don't need to move neither since I live already more than a mile away from your noisy honking machines. Please think a little bit further than your own little house!

Maybe you railroad guys don't realize that you are not only killing your credibility but also your own business:
I found several companies (just in my area) looking to move away from their current railroad connected locations because of the noise made by your blowing horns.
Of course they will have to look also for alternative (truck) transportation methods.
A manager told me they have to stop talking to their customers each time a passing train starts honking. As mentioned in the fox4kc article, this represents 5 hours (or more than 20%) of unproductive time per day and lots of nervous and lost customers:

http://www.fox4kc.com/wdaf-olathe-qu...,7084851.story

Good luck railroad guys! Keep on blowing your business away

I'm confused... if you live over a mile away and don't need to move then why all the bitching about it? It sounds like those business's you mentioned moved there because of the availability of the railroad. Do you live in KC? You sure make a lot of references to how they do things up there.

[torea]

Thunder, Roadhawg, you are acting (just as administrations like the FRA) as good old monopolies:

- listen and obey to our orders even if they are useless, annoying and noise polluting.
- Hard working people and businesses have to accept the noise, to stop complaining and even to shut up and stop doing business during 20% of the day.
- Every difficult question is irrelevant. Everyone who dares to think and ask questions is an idiot.

Maybe I should go and talk to the bureau of better business or the Federal Trade Commission for antitrust enforcement in the US.
You railroad guys only think about your personal situation and enjoy that your house is not nearby a railroad.

[kevinpate]

...
You railroad guys only think about your personal situation and enjoy that your house is not nearby a railroad.

FWIW, I've never worked in the rail business, had a relative successfully sue a rail business once for a not unimpressive sum, and the bulk of my life I have lived anywhere from two miles to 1/3 mile from tracks and crossings, including within a mile of multiple crossings on a line that carries 28+ horn blowing trains a day.

None of that means much of nothing except to point out that I have no skin in the game when I note you do tend to go on about train noise more than a young child goes on about a dropped ice cream cone.

Bu then, I am weird I suppose in that I don't mind the train horns.

[torea]

Now that's a nice statement, kevinpate
I live nearby the railroad described in the following fox4kc article.
http://www.fox4kc.com/wdaf-olathe-qu...,7084851.story

If you pay one ice cream cone per horn blowing, the 120 daily trains here would allow you to make 1440 kids happy!

[jmarkross]

"If there was a soft rain falling...and a train whistle off in the distance...this would have the makins' of a great country song..."

--Big Daddy to Blanche--after a disagreement late one night as he left her home on Richmond Avenue after arguing about his new country singing career...from The Golden Girls

[torea]

You are a real good old romantic, jmarkross.
But what do you want to tell the business people each time train honking forces them to ask their customers on the phone to stop talking? Start singing your great romantic country song?

[Thunder]

Torea, tell them to get a better building. Geez.

[jmarkross]

You are a real good old romantic, jmarkross.
But what do you want to tell the business people each time train honking forces them to ask their customers on the phone to stop talking? Start singing your great romantic country song?

I have a friend whose place is near the tracks...for decades we have been saying--without loss of mind or limb--"just a sec--train coming by". Of course, it is pretty obvious once the horn goes off at ear-splitting level. I suppose we could spend trillions re-routing all the trains outside of any inhabited area. Or--we could just expect people to be a little less *sensitive* to things around them. People are so whiny. Don't like train horns--don't move near the tracks--or buy/set-up a business there. Free country.

[torea]

jmarkrross, we don't need trillions to re-rout trains. Trains are more than welcome to continue to support our economy just the way they do now.
But we don't need new rules to create additional horn blowing noise. We don't need to ask every city to spend millions in "quiet zones".

Our railroad and FRA people seem to be satisfied as long as their house is not near a railroad. Maybe they should be paid to move their butt and go and see how other countries (Europe or Japan) have organized their railroad traffic in highly populated areas.

[rcjunkie]

I don't need to move neither since I live already more than a mile away from your noisy honking machines. Please think a little bit further than your own little house!

Maybe you railroad guys don't realize that you are not only killing your credibility but also your own business:
I found several companies (just in my area) looking to move away from their current railroad connected locations because of the noise made by your blowing horns.
Of course they will have to look also for alternative (truck) transportation methods.
A manager told me they have to stop talking to their customers each time a passing train starts honking. As mentioned in the fox4kc article, this represents 5 hours (or more than 20%) of unproductive time per day and lots of nervous and lost customers: http://www.fox4kc.com/wdaf-olathe-qu...,7084851.story

Good luck railroad guys! Keep on blowing your business away

IMO, all I'm hearing now is a bunch of BS

[Dustin]

I don't need to move, I live about 1 mile from tracks/crossings, but I enjoy the sounds of the train. (including the horn)

Freak.

[torea]

Thunder, you designed a nice website man ...
But a link to a map is missing!
I guess your next update will have a nice aerial view to show this shopping center from a flying goose point of view

[torea]

Here is another interesting website about the archaic FRA, how they killed the high speed trains in the US and now add honking noise to disturb the life of many citizens:

http://www.ebbc.org/rail/fra.html

The end reply is more than worth reading:

Thanks for this nice summary of FRA nonsense rules, which were created with the help of the automotive and oil , highway lobby to make passenger rail almost impossible.

Modern rail systems are inherent safe and collisions are a rare instance, as rare as planes falling from the sky at cruising altitude.
Regarding the scilly horn requirements: There should be better a horn rule for cars, because they can hit anything anytime from pedestrians to other cars or structures. Cars have due to their uncontrolled nature, no safety at all. There is no system keeping them miles apart like trains, no system to prevent them from leaving their lane ( like rails ) and many things more.

I can only conclude that one of the federal spending cuts currently examined in Washington should definitely include the complete cut of all FRA funding. Current FRA staff should be reassigned to other and usefull projects.

[Roadhawg]

I'm thinking torea must be related to Dana somehow.

[torea]

Dana? What Dana? Who is this?
I'm just one of these people who dare to asks questions about every nonsense rule made by the FRA. They don't promote safety but rater their own existence.
By this attitude the FRA killed the high speed trains and constantly makes all trains honk allover the US (probably to loudly remind everyone that the FRA still exist as a useless administration)
Please read this article, Roadhawg:
http://www.ebbc.org/rail/fra.html

[Roadhawg]

Interesting article but the FRA didn't kill high speed rail nor did the article have anything to do with train horns. It sounds like your issue with FRA goes beyond noise levels, which you admitted to living more than a mile away from.

Dane is a person on here who rants on about DFS and claims to have evidence people are crooked but when asked specific questions she avoids answering them and goes off in a different direction. I say that because you've been asked specific questions and you dance around and don't answer them. Personally I don't care anymore because after admitting you live over a mile away from the train tracks and the horns aren't a bother you've lost all credibility with me. I would suggest pointing your attention towards those who could make changes rather than just posting your rants here. Have a good one.

[torea]

I'm glad you find this an interesting article. Even at a mile distance this constant honking still bothers me because it's completely useless and invented by the FRA who can't even justify why the whole USA is now confronted with this noise pollution -day and night-.
You forgot to read the last part of the article.
The last part of this article gives interesting information about the FRA imposed train horn honking. Here are some copied parts:
Horn Blowing
Imagine you are at a railroad crossing. The gates are down, lights are flashing, bells ringing, a big giant locomotive with flashing lights can be seen speeding down the track. Heading out across the tracks would be crazy, but nonetheless 600 Darwin Award candidates get killed each year -- usually by driving around the gates because they are too impatient to wait 30 seconds for the train to pass.

Would it make any difference to these drivers if the locomotive were also blasting a 100 decibel horn? The FRA seemed to think so. Traditionally, horn blasting regulations were determined locally, but in 1995 the FRA began a rulemaking process to Federalize regulations and in the process dramatically increase horn blasting by going after so-called "Quiet Zones" -- i.e. places where whistle blowing was prohibited. Armed with a study that showed as many as 3(!) fatalities a year could be prevented, the FRA proposed rule would only allow Quiet Zones exemptions at crossings that had been improved with "four-quadrant" gates and curb medians.

In Illinois, which has 900 of the nearly 2000 whistle bans nationwide, cash-strapped local government would have to spend $116-234 million to meet the Federal mandate. Ironically, the FRA's own numbers show that in Illinois, collisions at crossing with hornblowing bans were actually 4.5% less frequent than at crossings where horns were sounded.
Many communities throughout the US sprung up along rail lines. In the greater Chicago area (a major rail hub) some 1.2 million residents live within one quarter mile of a grade crossing. In Beverly, MA (a suburb of Boston) the lifting of the horn ban on the city's 17 crossings would result in an average of two horns blowing every minute of every day.

Legitimate homeowner complaints over horn blasting makes it difficult to build political support for increased rail service. In her testimony before Congress, Rita Mullins, Mayor of Palatine, Illinois, notes the conflicting policies between Federal agencies: "In order to clean our air, reduce auto congestion, and improve quality of life, several federal agencies including the EPA, HUD and the Federal Transit Administration are encouraging Transit Oriented Development. The idea behind this type of development is to bring residents closer to train stations, so that they can use mass transportation, and so that downtown revitalization can occur. At the same time, the proposed train horn rule in effect is discouraging the development community and our residents from locating around transit.

"A great example of how this inconsistency in policy plays out is in the Village of Arlington Heights, Illinois. In the last several years, this village directly to the east of my community has invested over $30 million of its own money to spur transit-oriented development in its downtown. 330 higher density residential units are currently under construction, and an additional 300 are planned. 45 new businesses have moved into the downtown development to support the new residential community.

"Arlington Heights Mayor Arlene Mulder tells me she has spoken to residents who have purchased condominiums next to the train station who tell her they do not want to stay if faced with train horns around the clock. And they will hear them around the clock. Both freight and commuter trains run through her village and mine an average of seventy times daily. Developments such as this should be encouraged, not squelched by conflicting federal policies."

Interesting article but the FRA didn't kill high speed rail nor did the article have anything to do with train horns. It sounds like your issue with FRA goes beyond noise levels, which you admitted to living more than a mile away from.

Dane is a person on here who rants on about DFS and claims to have evidence people are crooked but when asked specific questions she avoids answering them and goes off in a different direction. I say that because you've been asked specific questions and you dance around and don't answer them. Personally I don't care anymore because after admitting you live over a mile away from the train tracks and the horns aren't a bother you've lost all credibility with me. I would suggest pointing your attention towards those who could make changes rather than just posting your rants here. Have a good one.

[Roadhawg]

Odd you chose Illinois as an example....

January 20th, 2011
As 2011 dawns, Railroad Safety advocates are discouraged to learn that train accidents – and fatalities from such accidents – increased in 2010. There were increased fatalities in both major types of train accidents: train-automobile collisions and pedestrian accidents. According to statistics compiled and shared by the Illinois Commerce Commission, in Illinois between January and November of 2010, there were 17 people killed in train-automobile accidents and 10 people killed in train-pedestrian accidents.

This increase ends a recent trend of decreasing fatalities in the state each year. As to train-automobile deaths, there were only 10 such deaths in all of 2009, 15 in 2008, 16 in 2007, 18 in 2006 and 18 in 2005. As to train-pedestrian fatalities, there have not been this many such deaths since 12 pedestrians were killed by trains in 2007.

The total number of collisions also increased this past year. In the first 9 months of 2010, there were 76 accidents in Illinois involving a train and an automobile. Thus, the ICC calculates that once all accidents are accounted for, there will have been between 125 and 130 such accidents in Illinois in 2010. In 2009, by contrast, there were only 80 such collisions in the state over the course of the entire year. The total number of collisions between vehicles and trains had also declined in each of the previous two years.

In a different article:

Chicago pedestrian accidents at railway crossing and Illinois train accidents both increased last year, the Chicago Tribune reported.

The Illinois Department of Transportation also reports the number of fatal Illinois traffic accidents increased, although there were fewer Chicago car accidents. There were 128 fatal accidents in Chicago last year, compared to 141 in 2009. Statewide figures have not yet been released, but 916 motorists were killed through Dec. 29 last year, compared to 911 who lost their lives in 2009.

The Illinois Commerce Commission reports 17 fatalities occurred at railroad crossings from January to November last year and 10 pedestrians were killed after being hit by trains. Those numbers reverse a recent decline in accidents involving trains in Chicago and elsewhere in Illinois.

Fifteen motorists were killed by trains in 2008, compared to 16 in 2007 and 18 in 2006. The 10 pedestrian fatalities is the most since 12 were killed in 2007.

Injury accidents involving trains also increased last year. Seventy-six were reported in the first nine months of the year, compared to 80 in all of 2009. More than 125 were reported in both 2007 and 2008.

[jmarkross]

jmarkrross, we don't need trillions to re-rout trains. Trains are more than welcome to continue to support our economy just the way they do now.
But we don't need new rules to create additional horn blowing noise. We don't need to ask every city to spend millions in "quiet zones".

Our railroad and FRA people seem to be satisfied as long as their house is not near a railroad. Maybe they should be paid to move their butt and go and see how other countries (Europe or Japan) have organized their railroad traffic in highly populated areas.

People should re-locate to those areas of the world where the trains suit their needs. India--for example--has the lowest rates--just jump onboard and hang on for dear life--free for a great many. Of course, the curry-stench is overpowering for those who are not fenugreek fans--and many westerners are not...

[OKCisOK4me]

still complaining...

[Roadhawg]

still complaining...

still