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PTC Deadline Extended - 12/31/20


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#81 KevinKorell

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Posted 08 October 2016 - 12:42 AM

WBAL Radio, Baltimore, MD, 9/30/16:

Positive Train Control Remains Work In Progress On MARC


Installing Positive Train Control technology on Maryland's MARC system is hitting a snag. Although state money is in place, not everyone is on board with the time table.

Funding has been in place for two years, yet installing positive train control technology that stops or slows commuter trains like MARC remains a work in progress. The original deadline of December 2015 was pushed back to 2018.


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#82 KevinKorell

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Posted 08 October 2016 - 12:47 AM

KIRO-TV, Channel 7 in Seattle, WA, 9/30/16:

System to prevent train accidents not turned on yet in Seattle


Investigators are trying to determine if a system designed to prevent accidents would have helped stop a train in New Jersey from barreling into a station. Over in Western Washington, that potentially life-saving technology is installed, but it isn’t turned on yet for all tracks.

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#83 CNJRoss

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Posted 16 February 2017 - 06:14 PM

The Hill, Washington DC 2/15/17:
 

Freight railroad asks Congress to pay for safety technology in passenger trains

 

 

A top freight railroad made a somewhat unusual plea to Congress on Wednesday: pay for passenger railroads to install a life-saving train technology.

 

SNIP

 

But Matthew Rose, executive chairman of BNSF, said Wednesday that their efforts will be futile if the passenger and commuter trains that they share tracks with aren’t also fully equipped with the technology.

 

“As a freight railroad, it may sound out of line, but I actually urge Congress to fund passenger commuter rail funding for positive train control,” Rose said during a Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation subcommittee hearing. 

 

“I can’t imagine a more difficult train wreck for us to have to go to where we have the positive train control on the freight rail, and the passenger or commuter train didn’t because of lack of funding.”

 

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#84 CNJRoss

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Posted 15 March 2017 - 11:13 AM

USDOT/FRA news release:

 

dot1_crop.gifU.S Department of Transportation
Office of Public Affairs
1200 New Jersey Avenue, SE
Washington, DC  20590

www.transportation.gov/briefingroom

 

News

 

FRA 02-17
Wednesday, March 15, 2017

 

Railroad Progress on Positive Train Control Implementation

Aggressive effort still needed to meet statutory deadline

 

 

WASHINGTON—The Department of Transportation’s (DOT) Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) released a status update today on railroads’ progress implementing positive train control (PTC) systems in the fourth quarter of 2016. The status update, based on railroad-submitted quarterly data, shows freight railroads continue to make consistent progress while passenger industry progress in installing and activating the life-saving technology only slightly increased.

 

The latest data, current as of December 31, 2016, confirms freight railroads now have PTC active on just 16 percent of tracks required to be equipped with PTC systems—up from 12 percent last quarter. Passenger railroads made less progress—with a slight increase to 24 percent from 23 percent. 

 

Due in large part to Amtrak’s significant progress on PTC, 41 percent of passenger railroads’ locomotives are now fully equipped with PTC technology, compared to 29 percent the previous quarter. Freight railroads’ percentage of locomotives fully equipped with PTC technology rose to 42 percent, up from 38 percent.

 

“We continue to closely monitor railroads’ progress implementing Positive Train Control,” said Patrick Warren, FRA Executive Director. “With less than two years remaining to complete the implementation process, it is imperative that railroads continue to meet implementation milestones.”

 

PTC systems are designed to prevent certain train-to-train collisions, over-speed derailments, incursions into established work zone limits, and trains going to the wrong tracks because a switch was left in the wrong position.

 

Congress requires Class I railroads and entities providing regularly scheduled intercity or commuter rail passenger transportation to implement PTC systems by December 31, 2018. Only if some key implementation and installation milestones are met may railroads be eligible to obtain a limited extension to complete certain non-hardware, operational aspects of PTC system implementation no later than December 31, 2020, subject to the Secretary of Transportation's approval.

 

The fourth quarter status update includes railroad-by-railroad quarterly data on track segments completed, locomotives equipped, employees trained, radio towers installed, route miles in PTC operation, and other key implementation data. See the infographics below.

 

Since 2008, when Congress first mandated PTC system implementation on certain railroad main lines, FRA has provided significant assistance to support railroads’ PTC system implementation. Those efforts include:

  • Providing more than $716 million in grants to support railroads’ implementation of PTC systems, including nearly $400 million in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funding and $25 million in fiscal year 2016 Railroad Safety Technology Program funding;
  • Issuing a nearly $1 billion loan to the New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority to implement PTC systems on the Long Island Rail Road and Metro-North Railroad;
  • Announcing the availability of $199 million in grants to commuter railroads and state and local governments in fiscal year 2017 for PTC system implementation;
  • Building a PTC testbed at the Transportation Technology Center in Pueblo, Colorado;
  • Working directly with the Federal Communications Commission and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation to improve the approval process for PTC communication towers; and
  • Dedicating staff to work on PTC implementation, including establishing a PTC task force.

To view the interactive graphic of freight and passenger railroads’ overall PTC implementation progress, visit https://www.fra.dot.gov/app/ptcsummary/ or click on the graphic below:

freight-passer-q4_crop.jpg

 

To view the interactive graphic of each railroad’s PTC implementation progress, visit https://www.fra.dot.gov/app/ptc/ or click on the graphic below:

railroads-q4-progress_crop.jpg

 

To view the public version of each railroad’s full Quarterly PTC Progress Report, please visit: https://www.fra.dot.gov/Page/P0628.

###

 

 



#85 CNJRoss

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Posted 09 June 2017 - 05:17 PM

Born2Invest, 6/9/17:
 

Positive Train Control system implementation helps launch rail safety projects

 

 

An abundance of rail safety projects are about to be launched. That’s because commuter and intercity passenger railroads must meet a federally mandated December 2018 deadline to implement Positive Train Control (PTC) systems. And, it’s also because the federal government just awarded millions to help transit agencies throughout the U.S. meet that deadline. Additionally, cybersecurity is increasingly becoming a concern for the commuter rail industry and funding is available for adding cybersecurity as a safety component to rail systems.

 

Unlike most other project-related funding which has been placed in limbo by the proposed Trump budget, funds for train safety projects have not been affected. Last week, the Federal Railroad Administration and Federal Transit Administration announced the recipients of $197 million in funding for train control system projects. While that is good, a total of $455 million was requested for 27 eligible projects. The ones that were not funded will likely be launched with assistance from alternative funding sources.

 

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#86 CNJRoss

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Posted 26 December 2017 - 12:29 PM

The New York Times,​ 12/20/17:
 

Law Requires Life-Saving Braking Device. Most Trains Don’t Have It.

 

 

 

On a summer afternoon in Southern California nine years ago, a commuter train blew through a stop signal and ran head-on into an oncoming freight train, killing 25 people.

 

After investigators determined that the crash could have been prevented by automatic-braking technology, Congress ordered all passenger railroads to install new systems by 2016. Since then, Congress has extended that deadline and trains have kept speeding into preventable disasters, including the Amtrak derailment that killed three people in Western Washington on Monday.

 

In Amtrak’s case, this is a recurring nightmare. The crash this week was eerily reminiscent of one just two years ago in Philadelphia, where an Amtrak train barreled into a sweeping curve at 106 miles an hour before jumping the tracks and rolling over. Eight people died.

 

That crash, too, could have been prevented by the technology, known as positive train control. But five months after it happened, Congress gave railroads at least three more years to install it.

 

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#87 CNJRoss

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Posted 03 January 2018 - 02:31 PM

Progressive Railroading 1/3/18:

 
Chao calls on railroads to speed up PTC implementation

 

U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao is urging Class Is, intercity passenger railroads and state and local transit agencies to implement positive train control (PTC) by the congressional deadline of Dec. 31.

In letters to railroad executives, Chao said the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) is concerned that many of the nation's railroads are behind in implementing the federally mandated PTC technology by the Dec. 31 deadline.

The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) will work with the railroads "to help create an increased level of urgency to underscore the imperative of meeting existing timeline expectations for rolling out this critical rail safety technology," Chao wrote.

 

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#88 CNJRoss

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Posted 04 January 2018 - 08:37 PM

The Washington Post, 1/4/18:

Trump administration says railroads must meet automatic-braking-system deadline

 

 

The Trump administration has fired a warning shot at the nation’s railroads, saying it plans to hold them to a December deadline to install an automatic braking system that might have prevented last month’s fatal Amtrak accident in Washington state, the Philadelphia derailment that killed eight passengers in 2015 and scores of other train wrecks.

 

The implementation of the system known as positive train control was postponed by Congress, which extended a deadline to have the systems in place from 2015 until December of this year and left open the possibility of an additional extension to 2020.

 

But Transportation Secretary Elaine L. Chao has warned the railroad industry that it is expected to meet the deadline at the end of this year.

 

“We are concerned that many of the nation’s railroads must greatly accelerate their efforts to achieve the congressionally mandated requirements,” Chao said in a letter addressed to the executive officer of each railroad. 

 

SNIP 

 

The Association of American Railroads, a trade group for the freight lines, has said that member railroads expect to meet the current deadline.

 

A number of transit agencies, which rely on passenger fares and government subsidies, are among those furthest behind in meeting the deadline, according to the September FRA report. While a number of them, including the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority (SEPTA) and Denver’s regional transit system are in full compliance, others, such as Maryland’s MARC line, the Long Island Rail Road and New Jersey Transit appear well short of meeting the deadline.

 

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#89 CNJRoss

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Posted 03 February 2018 - 09:26 AM

Transport Topics, 2/1/18:
 

House Panel Schedules Hearing on Positive Train Control

 

 

The status of automatic braking technology implementation will headline a Feb. 15 hearing of the Railroads, Pipelines and Hazardous Materials Subcommittee in the House, the panel’s chairman announced.

 

Railroads are coming up on a deadline at the end of 2018 to install positive train control systems, technology capable of reacting along a route in order to avoid a collision.

 

Key policymakers acknowledge PTC’s safety potential, and call for its usage.

 

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#90 CNJRoss

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Posted 21 February 2018 - 09:27 PM

ABC News 2/15/18:
 

Some railroads won't meet Positive Train Control deadlines, officials say

 

 

Several railroads will likely fail to meet congressionally-mandated deadlines for installation of Positive Train Control, technology that could have prevented at least 23 deaths and more than 300 injuries over the past decade, NTSB chairman Robert Sumwalt testified Thursday.

 

PTC uses an integrated set of sensors on trains and tracks to automatically slow or stop locomotives in dangerous situations. It's designed to prevent overspeed derailments, work zone incursions, and train-to-train collisions, such as the Feb. 4 crash in Cayce, S.C., where an Amtrak train slammed into a parked freight train, killing two people and injuring more than a hundred others. The current technology does not prevent grade-crossing accidents, like the one involving a train carrying GOP lawmakers in Crozet, Va.

 

“It took us less than nine years to put a person on the moon, and the industry can’t get this done?” a frustrated John Tolman, the rail workers union vice-president, asked at the hearing.

 

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