BLET representatives at meetings with the Federal Railroad Administration in Nashville, Tenn., during the week of September 1, 2025.
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The BLET rose to the challenge created by the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT)’s “regulatory sprint,” opposing nearly two dozen proposed changes that would weaken federal safety regulations and put rail workers and the general public at risk.
The DOT’s “regulatory sprint” is a plan to quickly eliminate about 200 safety regulations it considers to be obsolete while weakening others to “reduce the regulatory burden” on the rail industry. However, these are regulations that provide safeguards for railroaders and the communities they serve and were almost always created in response to proven safety hazards. DOT announced the proposed changes on July 1 and gave unions and the public until September 2 to file formal written comments. The DOT and FRA had never proposed this many rule changes at once, while at the same time imposing such an abbreviated period for response.
Given the sheer number, BLET prioritized responding to the most important rules from a locomotive engineer and operating craft perspective. BLET submitted formal comments on 17 proposed changes by the September 2 deadline.
Additionally, BLET leaders engaged with Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) officials at a meeting last week in Nashville, Tenn. Among the topics of discussion was dissolution of the Rail Safety Advisory Committee (RSAC) as well as automation/AI technology such as zero-to-zero at CSXT. The parties also discussed a proposed “regulatory sprint” change that would remove Rail Labor organizations as stakeholders from the C3RS safety program. Under that change, only FRA and rail carriers would be recognized as formal participants, with unions essentially relegated to a “by invitation only” status. BLET filed comments arguing that union participation in crucial to the success of C3RS. Download and read BLET’s comments on this topic here.
Additionally, to review a full list of comments with a summary of each and a downloadable PDF of the full comment, please use this link to the National Division website.