Iowa told: Cut rail-crossing crashes

Federal regulators are prodding Iowa and the nine other states that have the most rail-crossing crashes to reduce them — on pain of losing their shot at grants, perhaps even money Iowa wants to develop high-speed rail service between Chicago and Omaha.

“We're looking at it as an opportunity to look at what we do, an opportunity to evaluate the program we have,” Tammy Nicholson, the Iowa Department of Transportation's rail safety overseer, said of the federal threat that was spelled out Wednesday.

The 10 states have a year, starting Aug. 27, to file plans for reducing collisions. They have five years to implement the plans. Options include new public awareness campaigns, more warning lights or gates, crossing closures and viaducts to separate rail and highway traffic.

Congress passed a law in 2008 that ordered the funding threat leveled at whichever 10 states had the most collisions over three years, which — no surprise — are large states with many road-railway intersections, said Robert Kulat, a spokesman for the Federal Railroad Administration.

Texas topped the list. It had 701 collisions from 2007 through 2009. Iowa was in the 10th spot with 206 collisions, after Illinois, California, Indiana, Georgia, Louisiana, Ohio, Alabama and Florida.

Nebraska ranked 24th, with 141 collisions.

In the first four months of this year, Iowa had 15 rail-crossing collisions, Nebraska had six, and neither state recorded any deaths, according to the latest federal data.

Nationwide there were 7,077 crossing accidents in the three years studied, resulting in 873 deaths, continuing steady declines over several decades, Kulat said.

“Everyone's had a decrease, but it's not where we want it. ... Our goal is to have zero incidents,” he said, adding that he avoids the word “accidents” to emphasize that mostly “these are willful acts by people driving on the tracks,” especially impatient motorists zipping around crossing gates. “A lot of people think they can beat the train.”

Another problem in recent years is personal technology, especially cell phones and music players.

“We've had a lot of stories about people with headphones on” driving into a collision, he said. “They just don't see the train.” Adding to that danger are quieter locomotives and even quieter tracks, thanks to continuous-welded rails, which eliminate the clickety-clack of wheels, he said.

Iowa will be studying crash causes and seeking comment from communities and the railroad companies, said Nicholson.

“I don't right now have anything to predict” about the review's results, she said. Each year the department uses a cost-benefit analysis to determine which of Iowa's 4,473 public rail crossings should get warning upgrades — such as replacing passive crossbucks, the X-shaped signs, with “active” systems of lights, bells and gates. A little over half the crossings, 2,698, have only crossbucks.

Upgrades are financed 90 percent by federal highway funds, Nicholson said. The rest of the money comes from local governments or the railroads.

A typical active warning system costs about $200,000 per crossing, she said.

Iowa will take time to weigh options and work with federal regulators, Nicholson said, noting that the new safety plan isn't due for a year and “we've known that we've been on the list for some while.”

Nebraska, though it had fewer crossing collisions than Iowa, had the same number of deaths, seven, over the period the federal agency examined.

“One death is too many,” said Ellis Tompkins, the division engineer in the Nebraska Department of Roads who oversees rail safety. But “the state of things in Nebraska is pretty darn good,” he said, recalling that when he joined the department two decades ago, 15 to 20 fatalities a year was common.

Tompkins said the department each year works on one or two viaducts and replaces 10 to 15 crossbucks with active warnings. About 2,700 of Nebraska's 3,600 rail crossings have only crossbucks, he said.

Kulat said Iowa's imperiled federal grant money does not include the $1 million awarded earlier this year to study high-speed rail prospects between Chicago and Omaha, one of 10 corridors nationwide where President Barack Obama has proposed such service.

But, Kulat said, follow-up money for the project — if it moves forward — could be jeopardized. Other grants potentially affected, he said — noting the irony — include funds to study and improve rail-crossing safety.

Contact the writer:

444-1140, roger.buddenberg@owh.com

« Metro/Region

Share