(The following story by Greg Clary appeared on the Journal News website on June 12.)
WESTCHESTER, N.Y. — A recent federal rail inspection turned up five track defects in Rockland and, although each was fixed within 48 hours, a state assemblyman wants CSX Transportation to do a better job of taking care of its freight rails and equipment.
“The defects were discovered by the federal government, not CSX,” said Assemblyman Ryan Karben, D-Monsey. “The issue, when you have a large corporation, is whether they’re paying close enough attention to their equipment. They need to be able to assure people across the state that they’re devoting enough money to keep their equipment in working order and they need to be more aggressive about monitoring it.”
A CSX representative yesterday said the company moved quickly to fix all defects the federal inspection found in March, and said the company invested $500 million a year to maintain its rail infrastructure.
CSX, which has headquarters in Richmond, Va., operates the largest rail network in the eastern United States, with 23,000 miles of track in 23 states, Washington, D.C., and Canada. It has 1,350 miles of track and 2,800 employees in New York.
A report released this week by the Federal Railroad Administration included the results of the March inspection of CSX freight rail lines in Rockland that officials called for after a derailment earlier this year in north Rockland.
A small CSX freight train derailed Feb. 19 as it ran north through Haverstraw, spilling nearly 200 tons of aluminum silicon pebbles.
The accident, north of the Haverstraw Tunnel, caused a partial evacuation of a nearby neighborhood and closed Route 9W and surrounding roads for hours.
During the week of March 8, federal inspectors walked the 23.5 miles of rail right of way in Rockland, from Tappan to Tomkins Cove, and included those reports in the larger inspection of CSX rail crossings in New York.
Statewide, the FRA found that 81 of the company’s 199 crossings had some defect, but only 12 had problems serious enough that inspectors recommended a civil penalty be assessed. None of those serious defects was in Rockland, according to the report.
Railroad spokesman Gary Cease said company officials were waiting for the final tally of those fines.
Rockland’s problems at the dozen crossings inspected along the West Shore rail line included an uncharged backup battery for a gate at Glenshaw Road in Blauvelt and lamp voltage that was too low and lights that didn’t flash frequently enough at Greenbush Road in Orangeburg.
The five defects that CSX fixed immediately after inspectors told the company in March were two spots with insufficient rock ballast under the tracks, two defective railroad ties and one center joint bar that was cracked.
The locations of those five defects were not available yesterday, but Cease said none of them caused the February derailment.
FRA officials said March 24 that the derailment occurred after quick-freezing water settled across the tracks and forced the rails out of alignment. Inspectors found no negligence on the part of the railroad.
Residents have long complained about the railroad, but even more so since CSX took over the line from Conrail in 1999 and more than tripled the number of trains going through Rockland, according to county estimates.
Ina Andrews of West Nyack lives within earshot of more than one crossing. She wants noise relief most of all, but doesn’t like the idea that there were potentially dangerous defects the railroad didn’t find on its own.
“If they found five,” Andrews said, “are there five more they didn’t find? I don’t trust anyone anymore.”
Cease said CSX inspection standards met or exceeded those set by the FRA and pointed to the company’s investment in its infrastructure and its safety record as proof of the company’s commitment to maintaining its equipment.
Karben drafted a letter to the railroad yesterday asking for the company to be more proactive than reactive on maintenance matters.
Cease said the railroad would wait to see Karben’s letter and talk to him before commenting in public about his concerns.