U.S. Transportation
Secretary Ray LaHood opened the first meeting of the Transit Rail Advisory
Committee for Safety (TRACS), an advisory group created to guide Federal
Transit Administration safety rulemakings when the Obama Administration’s
Public Transportation Safety Program Act of 2009 becomes law.
Officials from the city
of Sioux Falls, S.D., the state of South Dakota and BNSF celebrated the closure
of the 5,000th grade crossing on BNSF’s rail network, setting a new
national record for grade-crossing closures and safety improvement.
At a press conference
hosted by Houston Mayor Annise Parker, METRO’s leaders commented on the
findings of the Federal Transit Administration’s "Buy America" investigation
and review of plans to purchase 103 new light rail vehicles.
At the Santa Clara Station
Improvement Project, work will be done this week on the shoring and the
foundation for the new pedestrian underpass at the station. The underpass will
connect the north- and southbound platforms, allowing two trains to pass
through the station at the same time and improving safety for pedestrians in
the station. Passengers at the station are boarding the train from a temporary
platform.
SCI Verkehr, the German
railway and logistics consultancy, has released a new edition of its World
Market for Railway Technology that calls for global railway investment to
increase from a currently estimated $168 billion to approximately $205 billion
in 2015. Of the total, 53 percent is expected to come from after-sales.
Norfolk Southern’s
Heartland Corridor – one of the most extensive railroad engineering projects in
modern times and a template for public-private partnerships that strengthen the
nation’s transportation infrastructure – officially opened for business Sept. 9.
The train that ran on the
railway between Pullman and Colfax, Wash., on the morning of Sept. 2 may have
been the last, The Daily Evergreen reports.
Trains are nothing new in
central Ohio, but they are poised to play am increasing role in the economy, the
Columbus Dispatch reports. Beginning Sept. 9, Norfolk Southern will use the
revamped Heartland Corridor line, taking advantage of what the company calls
the "single biggest railroad engineering project in modern history."
It included enlarging tunnels through mountains and raising bridges in other places.
On September 8, 1910, the
first Long Island Rail Road trains departed from a grand structure dedicated to
transportation-Pennsylvania Station-and traveled under the East River using
four tunnels. Long Island celebrated. LIRR is celebrating that century-old
achievement with the opening of a special photo display in the 34th Street
Entrance Corridor, one of the LIRR’s newest Penn Station areas.
The final round of public
meetings for the Metra SouthEast Service Alternatives Analysis study in northeastern
Illinois are set for Sept. 22 and Sept. 28. The meetings are an opportunity for
the public to provide feedback on the proposed Locally Preferred Alternative identified
in the SouthEast Service Alternatives Analysis Study. The proposed 33-mile
SouthEast Service is a new transportation line that would link close to 20
communities in the south Suburban Cook and Will counties. Meetings are open to
the general public and are ADA accessible.
Washington, D.C., Metro
will close two Blue and Orange Line stations and there will be no Blue and
Orange Line service at the Metro Center Metrorail station during the three-day
Columbus Day Holiday Weekend from 10 p.m., Friday, Oct. 8, to closing on
Monday, Oct. 11, as the agency undertakes a major rehabilitation and rebuilding
project to improve safety, to comply with a recommendation made by the National
Transportation Safety Board and maintain service reliability and a state of
good repair.
A summit bringing together
parties from all sides of the North Charleston commercial rail debate was
always likely to be somewhat contentious, the Charleston Regional Business
Journal reports. But an economic impact study released by a public-private
partnership could ratchet up tensions ahead of the Sept. 9 meeting of the
Review and Oversight Commission on the State Ports Authority.
The Metropolitan
Transportation Commission voted 6-2 to allocate all $20 million of this year’s
state transportation improvement funding to the Oakland, Calif., Airport
Connector (OAC) project.
Virginia Beach, Va.,
city officials said that they’ve struck
a last-minute compromise with the state to complete a $40-million deal to buy
an old rail line for a possible light rail project, The Virginian-Pilot
reports. The city expects to close on the 10.6-mile corridor owned by Norfolk
Southern later this month.
The historic Rock Island
Lines’ depot in downtown Des Moines, Iowa, should be restored as the city’s train
station – if Chicago-to-Des Moines passenger railroad service is re-established
– a new report recommends, according to the Des Moines Register.
The Sacramento, Calif.,
Regional Transit District re-opened the 12th and I light rail station on
schedule on September 7, 2010. RT temporarily closed the 12th and I light rail
station in downtown Sacramento on August 2 to perform station improvements as
part of the Alkali Flat/La Valentina and 12th & I Light Rail Station
Improvement Project.
In one of the largest
railroad engineering project in the past century, Norfolk Southern raised the
height of 28 tunnels in the Appalachian Mountains to open the Heartland
Corridor, the fastest, most-direct route for double-stacked freight from the
Port of Virginia to Chicago.
Steel on steel plus speed
equals noise. No doubt about it – sometimes a ride on BART can be noisy. If you’ve
ever tried to hold a conversation going through the Transbay Tube, you know it
can be difficult to hear.
The track overhaul on the
Red Line that closed the Takoma, Silver Spring, Forest Glen, Wheaton and Glenmont
Metrorail stations in the Washington, D.C., area during the three-day Labor Day
weekend was completed successfully and all five stations reopened on time at 5
a.m. Tuesday, Sept. 7.
Results are in for the
Helena, Mont., Citizens Council survey on a quiet zone in the city. More than
half of the respondents described noise from trains as a "quality of life issue,"
the Independent Record reports. The majority of people who responded to a Helena
Citizens Council survey this summer supported the idea of using taxpayer money
to implement a quiet zone in the city, saying the sounds of train horns pose
quality of life issues for area residents, especially at night.