Are There Railroad Safety Issues? 3rd UPDATE On Train Crossing Gate Malfunction.

Photography and Report by Paula Antolini

A little research easily reveals a number of train accidents in the recent past in Connecticut and New York, including two in our neighboring towns of Danbury and West Redding.

The most recent Metro-North train accident in our area was in Danbury CT this past weekend, on the morning of January 4, 2014, at the train crossing on Shelter Rock Road between Lee Mac Avenue and Jansen Street, where a train hit a pick up truck with one occupant, but fortunately there were no injuries to train passengers or the pick up truck driver. (See my report here: "PHOTOS: Danbury Metro North Train Accident Today January 4, 2014") There were no train gates at this location.

Another accident happened on December 30, 2012 in West Redding, where a car was hit by a train at another un-gated crossing near West Redding station and there was one fatality of a 21 year old passenger in the car, Wayne Balacky. Three other occupants in the car, including the driver, were injured, according to Metro-North police.  A later Danbury Patch update on January 8, 2013, indicated that the driver Jausheema Perkins died from her injuries

There was also the recent derailment of a commuter train in the Bronx, New York on December 1, 2013, that had 4 fatalities, at least 67 injured and 11 in critical condition. (See USA Today video here: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/12/01/bronx-train-derailment/3795231/). According to a CNN report on December 3, 2013, Federal safety officials said discovered that "extreme speed" was the cause of the accident. National Transportation Safety Board member Earl Weener told reporters that preliminary data showed that the train was going 82 mph around a sharp curve as it approached a 30-mph curve where the Hudson and Harlem rivers converge.  Also in another CNN report dated December 3, 2013, a union representative, Anthony Bottalico, who had been meeting with the train engineer William Rockefeller Jr., told CNN apparently Rockefeller "was nodding off and caught himself too late" right before the accident happened.  The article states, "I think most people are leaning towards human error," Bottalico said.

According to another December 4, 2013 report from CNN entitled "Feds: Metro-North train accidents 'unacceptable,' information is as follows, "Federal Railroad Administration chief Joseph Szabo listed three other recent accidents [besides the December 1st derailment] involving Metro-North trains." Szabo stated, "The specific causes of each of these accidents may vary, but regardless of the reasons, four serious accidents in less than seven months is simply unacceptable." He wrote this in a letter to the head of New York's transit authority.  Accidents mentioned were: "a May 17 train derailment and collision in Bridgeport, CT; the death of a Metro North employee on May 28 in West Haven, CT; and a CSX freight train derailment in the Bronx on July 18."

These are just a few of the accident reports and although the incidents vary, the rising number of accidents has now brought railroad safety issues to light.  Are these accidents due to missing train gates, malfunctioning train gates or vehicles, vehicle driver or train conductor error, high speed, or poor supervision and maintenance of the railroad, etc?  Extensive research usually follows to determine the actual cause. However, no incident or cause is too insignificant to not be an area for concern for the safety of citizens.   

I recently discovered there is a history of a number of train gate malfunction problems right here in Bethel at the Greenwood Avenue crossing.  (See my past two reports on Patch in my blog, and also a third update report below, revealing the history of Bethel train gate malfunction.)  These train gate malfunction safety issues were not revealed to the public at all, previous to my reports (unless someone did research of recent police or MTA incidents). Is it acceptable to not alert citizens about local railroad safety issues, especially on a main road?

There have been too many train collisions having to do with train crossings, or other issues. Are we assuming there are safety measures in place when perhaps there are not as many as we think? Obviously the rising number of recent accidents has alerted citizens to possible problems.

Should we be concerned about safety issues of the railroad, especially at train crossings? The situation definitely needs assessment, monitoring, and improvement before any more accidents, injuries or deaths occur.

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3RD UPDATE: Bethel Train Gates Malfunction is a Recurring Problem

I previously reported on a malfunction of the Bethel train gates at the tracks crossing Greenwood Avenue, that required the dispatch of both Bethel Police and the MTA.  (See Patch story dated November 13, 2013, entitled, "Bethel Police Scene Last Night: What Is All The Secrecy?" and a follow up on November 22, 2013, "UPDATE: Bethel Police Scene At Railroad Crossing.") 

I requested and recently received more information about this safety situation from Media Relations Department (MTA Press Office) representative Aaron Donovan. He supplied me with the history of repairs of the train gates at the Greenwood Avenue crossing.  Apparently the November 12, 2013 Bethel train gate malfunction was not an isolated incident.   

Donovan stated, "In early October we had three separate incidents where there was a report of a problem with the [Greenwood Avenue] gate.  We work very closely with the Bethel PD to monitor the gates and make sure they're functioning.  On October 2nd we had a report the same as November 12th where the gates were reported to be down, staying down. This is on October 2nd. We went to inspect the report and found that the gates were functioning normally, by the time we got there, our signal maintenance personnel."   Donovan was not sure of the time frame from when the report came in to when the signal maintenance personnel arrived, but he said it was "certainly the same day."
   
"The second one was October 5th, this was a different nature. This was the opposite. Bethel Police had reported that the gate had NOT come down and should have.  However, that was accounted for because we were conducting work, we were doing construction work on the signal system, which is the same signal system that controls our trains, and also controls our gates," stated Donovan.  

"So they were very diligent and reported it but it was not a problem because we had a manual override on it.  The conductors would stop the train and come out and warn traffic ahead of time and the train would inch through the stop. So that actually was known because we are rebuilding the signal system on the Danbury branch," Donovan said.

He continued, "The third one was October 9th, we had a report that the gates were down, staying down, and again, same situation as October 2nd, by the time we got there there was no indication that there was a problem, we found that they were working normally. So those are the incidents." (besides the November 12th one).


Donovan said, "We are always working and striving and that's one of the reasons we're actually reconfiguring the the signal system. At the behest of the Connecticut Department of Transportation, we are overhauling the signal system on the Danbury Branch. Certainly one of the reasons this happened is that we are doing that work, and once the work is completed we will have a more robust stronger system that is better able to function. This is a signal system that controls the entire branch, it's wired, not an over-the-air type of system. The whole branch is being modernized, the Danbury Branch is quite old, as you know, the signal system is being modernized, and when the work is done, A) work related issues will stop, like the one on October 5th, and B) we'll have a more robust stronger system that can function, brand new."

The signal system work is called the "Danbury Branch Signalization Project" Donovan said.

I will post more updates if there is any further information.