(The following editorial appeared on the Roanoke Times website on February 13.)
ROANOKE, Va. — The evidence is in, and the conclusion is unsurprising: U.S. railroads need a diligent regulator, not a friendly partner.
A report by the Transportation Department’s internal watchdog raises major concerns about safety at the four biggest railroads, including Norfolk Southern Corp. Underlying the problems, Inspector General Kenneth Mead found, is the Federal Railroad Administration’s “partnership” approach to regulation, which relies more on industry self-policing than inspections and penalties. The FRA stresses cooperation as the quickest and cheapest way to correct deficiencies. Its Safety Assurance and Compliance Program, for instance, works through committees of union representatives and railroad managers.
But even the FRA concedes the safety assurance program has been ineffective. Mead’s report, moreover, suggests the partnership system as a whole is dangerously ineffectual.
Mead focused mainly on the Union Pacific Corp. but said “substantial safety and inspection” issues exist for the others. He found a stubbornly high overall accident rate and rising “defect ratios” at three of the four railroads.
The recent death toll and revelations of hazardous practices, meanwhile, bring the danger into stark focus.
Most prominently, nine died in South Carolina last month in a Norfolk Southern accident that released poisonous chlorine gas. Union Pacific Corp. has had nine accidents causing four fatalities in the San Antonio, Texas, area alone since May, including another poison gas release. More than 1,600 people have been killed at rail crossings since 2000 – a toll that rose sharply last year.
Related reports deepen concerns: Tankers filled with poisons were repeatedly found unguarded and unsecured. Railroads are suspected of destroying evidence, failing to properly report hundreds of car-train collisions and foisting blame onto Amtrak to reduce liability.
Against such dangers has been aligned a Federal Railroad Administration whose former head took vacations with an industry lobbyist, that has fewer than 450 inspectors overseeing 230,000 miles of rail, and whose spotty use of financial penalties – capped at $11,000 in any case – brought “the strength of a wet noodle” to bear, as one senator put it.
Congress and the Bush administration should shift railroad regulation into reverse. Rail safety requires a sharp-eyed overseer, not a lenient pal.