(The following appeared on the Los Angeles Times website on March 17, 2011.)
LOS ANGELES — The nation’s leading coalition of local transit agencies wants Congress to delay a key rail safety reform prompted by the deadly Metrolink commuter disaster three years ago in Chatsworth.
Citing funding and technical challenges, the influential American Public Transportation Assn. is asking for a three-year extension on a 2015 deadline to roll out a high-tech collision avoidance system for the nation’s major passenger railroads.
The request, expected to be presented Thursday at a Washington hearing, has drawn fire from California’s senior U.S. senator and Southern California’s Metrolink rail system, which is racing to complete the nation’s first so-called positive train control system, or PTC, by the end of next year.
APTA said this week that “an overwhelming majority of the nation’s commuter railroads” have concluded that technology issues, questions surrounding radio frequency availability and lack of federal funding “make nationwide implementation by the deadline impossible.” The association’s president, William Millar, said the group remained committed to deploying the safety systems when feasible and pressing for more federal funding, particularly for pioneering agencies like Metrolink.
The full story is on the Los Angeles Times website.