Was it an honest mistake? Or a calculated move to minimize the effect of bringing more freight trains on the EJ&E railroad tracks? The Daily Herald asks in an editorial. The true answer may never be known. But we agree with those who say Canadian National Railway, EJ&E's owner, should be held accountable for providing flawed data.

BART crews are installing the final section of crossover track between Pleasant Hill and Walnut Creek, Calif., stations. This work requires that closing the tracks between these two stations beginning 7p.m. Friday, May 28 through the end of service Monday, May 31 (Memorial Day weekend). To accommodate customers, BART will provide a free bus bridge service between Walnut Creek and Pleasant Hill (in both directions).

May 15-16, Caltrain used an on-track truck to spray weed killer along the right-of-way. Weed abatement is necessary to prevent brush fires on and around the train tracks. May 16-20, crews will replace crossties, weld and resurface the tracks between the Bayshore and San Mateo stations.

The New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority, elected officials and contractor S3 Tunnel Constructors launched the tunnel-boring machine that will dig the first phase of the Second Avenue Subway.

In June, Hennepin County, Minn., will launch a nine-month, $200,000 study of the cost and community and environmental impacts of adding more traffic to the St. Louis Park tracks, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reports.

The Union Pacific Railroad bridge spanning Coleto Creek was damaged May 15 as a result of the flooding caused by torrential rainfall, the Victoria, Texas, Advocate reports.

When people got off Illinois Central trains on South Main Street in Rockford, Ill., during the early 20th century, they were welcomed by a handsome station, a beautiful garden, a quaint cottage atop a limestone bluff and the sound of water cascading over a dam in Kent Creek, according to a column by Chuck Sweeny in the Rockford Register Star.

Seneca Group LLC has been awarded a contract by the United States Trade and Development Agency to perform a Definitional Mission to Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan to work with government officials to develop projects in the railway sector that will generate U.S. exports.

In a report issued at to the Metra Board of Directors at its may 14 meeting, James G. Sotos, an attorney hired by the Board to look into the possible financial improprieties by Metra Executive Director Philip Pagano, said: "This investigation revealed substantial evidence of financial irregularities and abuses carried out by a person at the highest level of Metra who, as a result of that position, was in the best position to perpetrate these acts. Other than Mr. Pagano, however, we did not find evidence of any other Metra employees seeking to enrich themselves at the public's expense. On the other hand, we believe the rigorous control of Metra implemented by Mr. Pagano, and the magnitude of his accomplishments for the company clearly created a culture of trust in and loyalty to Pagano, which seriously curtailed any realistic hope that he would be held accountable for the financial irregularities that should have been obvious to upper management personnel around him. Ironically, and tragically, it was Mr. Pagano who paid the ultimate price for the creation of that culture."