| Silence is golden at city railroad crossings |
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| Wednesday, 02 September 2009 | |
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Managing editor Silence is golden - at least, the city of Coon Rapids hopes so as it applies to trains no longer sounding their horns at railroad crossings in the city. A citywide railroad quiet zone went into effect Tuesday when trains horns went silent at the Main Street crossing. A project putting in required safety improvements at the crossing had been scheduled for late last summer, but was put off by Burlington-Northern Santa Fe Railroad until this year because a delay in the delivery of materials to complete the work. While the quiet zone was scheduled to begin Sept. 1, past experience has shown that it may take a few weeks for the word to get out to all railroad engineers and other users who rent trackage from BNSF, according to City Manager Matt Fulton. "We will probably still have some horn blowing after Sept. 1 until the word gets out," Fulton said. Main Street was the last railroad crossing to have the necessary safety improvements put in place to enable the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) to give the green light to the whistle-free train zone. The improvements included construction of concrete medians about 100 feet on each side of the tracks, pavement widening, necessary pavement markings and signing to denote the “quiet zone,” according to Public Services Director Steve Gatlin. Funding for the project came from the city's state aid street account, Gatlin said. This crossing was not part of a project in 2006 that made safety improvements at most of the railroad crossings in the city which led to them becoming whistle-free Nov. 29, 2006. Until 2007, Main Street was a state highway (242) and the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) had been studying alternative plans for safety improvements submitted by the city. Then the project was put on hold as the process for turning over jurisdiction of Main Street from MnDOT to Anoka County took place in 2007. The city’s efforts to establish whistle-free railroad crossings began back in 1994 when a resident who lived by the tracks at Unity Street and 121st Avenue first contacted then-Councilmember Jerry Newton, who is now a state legislator. After many years of effort, three crossings on the BNSF single-line tracks — Egret Boulevard, Northdale Boulevard and 121st Avenue — became whistle-free quiet zones several years ago, first as a federal demonstration pilot project and then permanently following changes in FRA regulations. Work was completed in 2006 on safety improvements at six other railroad crossings - 119th Avenue, Crooked Lake Boulevard, Hanson Boulevard, Egret Boulevard, Foley Boulevard and 85th Avenue. But the FRA will be doing a review of the quiet zones every two or three years, according to Gatlin. The federal agency will require the city to send it information on rail and traffic counts at each crossing and it will also make sure that the safety enhancements remain in place, Gatlin said. The city is currently providing that information to the FRA on the crossings at which the quiet zones were implemented in 2006. Peter Bodley is at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it |
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