(The following editorial appeared in the January 21 online issue of the Bakersfield Californian.)
BAKERSFIELD, Calif. — Railroad union members call remote-controlled switching engines unsafe at any speed. Management labels the innovation a marvelous advancement. Kern County residents must not be used to settle the debate.
Union Pacific Railroad recently delivered two remote-controlled locomotives to Bakersfield, producing warnings from local railroad engineers.
The national Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers Union is disseminating a brochure that states unmanned locomotives are a danger to public safety.
(BLE Editor s Note: The BLE International Division has not printed nor has it distributed any brochures regarding remote control.)
“There’s going to be people run over in Bakersfield, I can tell you right now,” Larry Fredeen, an officer in the local of the United Transportation Union and a UP conductor told The Californian.
He said in the Bakersfield rail yards, “we’ve got tremendous trespasser problems. People are … walking across the tracks all the time. What you’ll have with these (remote engines) is one end of the locomotive will be completely blind to anybody getting in front of it, and you’ll have people getting run over. It’s that simple.”
Management officials of the railroad, which launched the technology throughout its system early last year, paint a different picture.
Mike Furtney, the railroad’s western region spokesman, calls it a “very safe system. It has been used for many, many years in Canada and we are confident it will have the same success rate down here.”
The system is used in switching yards to move railroad cars and link up sections of train. The company is training local switching crews with a week of classroom instruction followed by a week of hands-on training.
Instead of having an engineer aboard the locomotive controlling train movements, the train is controlled remotely by a member of the switching crew — using a control panel worn around the neck.
Union critics contend that the remote operators may not be able to see obstructions or people in a train’s path from where they stand.
The only visible clue that the locomotives are remote controlled is a small sticker at each end of the new locomotives.
Train engineer jobs will be displaced by the technology, but company spokesmen said that will occur through normal attrition, not layoffs.
Union members say they are fighting the remote-controlled engines because of the safety factor — not just fearing a reduction in engineers.
“This is basically a safety issue,” said Ronald Marney, legislative representative for the Bakersfield division of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers. “It doesn’t take too much for a locomotive to move to cause a lot of damage.”
Furtney said the unions have no evidence to support their claim that remote trains are more accident-prone.
Union members also warn of bigger problems if a collision involves a train carrying hazardous materials.
Some cities have banned remote-controlled locomotives within their boundaries. These include Detroit, Mich., and Baton Rouge, La.
But Furtney called these actions symbolic because railroads are governed by federal law. The Federal Railroad Administration has issued guidelines for the operation of remote-controlled trains, but no enforceable regulations.
Nonetheless, Bakersfield city officials should closely monitor the use of remote-controlled engines and be prepared to seek federal help if the union’s dire predictions prove to be correct.