WASHINGTON, D.C. — Heat-related speed restrictions imposed by CSX on some rail lines after this week’s Amtrak crash delayed the trip home for thousands of commuters yesterday afternoon, the Washington Post reports.
After federal investigators raised the possibility that heat-warped track contributed to Monday’s accident, CSX Transportation, which operates in 23 states east of the Mississippi River, announced hot-weather speed restrictions for 23,000 miles of track, requiring passenger trains to creep along at the rate of the slowest freight train.
“The afternoon commute is going to be peppered with delays. I wouldn’t say it’s destroyed it,” Pete Sklannick, chief operating officer for Virginia Railway Express, said yesterday.
Fourteen people injured in the Kensington derailment remained hospitalized yesterday. Amtrak’s Capitol Limited, carrying 161 passengers and 13 crew members from Chicago to Union Station in Washington, left the tracks about 1:55 p.m. Monday, injuring more than 100 people.
The National Transportation Safety Board, which is investigating the derailment, did not release any new information on the incident yesterday.
CSX announced Tuesday that Amtrak and commuter trains on its lines would have to heed speed restrictions imposed on freight trains when temperatures rise above 90 degrees for two consecutive days or fluctuate more than 40 degrees in a 24-hour period. The heat orders are expected to remain in place until the end of September.
“Until we have more information, the most conservative course was to implement these restrictions,” CSX spokesman Gary Sease said.
VRE’s morning commute went as usual yesterday, with trains operating at normal speeds of up to 70 mph in some places. But at 1 p.m., when CSX’s heat-related speed restrictions were to take effect, VRE officials realized that would mean slowing trains to 35 mph. CSX then advised VRE that 45 mph would be safe for all trains.
The 1 p.m. train to Fredericksburg sat at Union Station for half an hour while railroad officials sorted out confusion over whether the maximum speed should be 35 or 45 mph, Sklannick said. Once trains started rolling, commuters encountered delays of 15 to 25 minutes on the Fredericksburg line and about 10 minutes on the Manassas line, he said.
VRE, which serves about 13,000 riders divided almost equally between the two lines, uses CSX track between Washington and Fredericksburg. On the Manassas line, VRE trains run on CSX track from Washington to Alexandria and then use rail belonging to Norfolk Southern, Sklannick said. Norfolk Southern did not impose heat-related speed restrictions.
MARC trains, which serve about 13,000 riders in Maryland, were still shut down yesterday morning. Service was restored for the afternoon commute, and trains were restricted to 45 mph on CSX lines, said Maryland Transit Administration spokeswoman Suzanne Bond.
Bond said the speed restrictions slowed afternoon and evening trains by as much as an hour, affecting commuters on the Brunswick line, which carries about 2,500 people between Union Station and Martinsburg, W.Va., and the Camden line, which carries about 2,000 people between Washington and Baltimore.
Better communication and orchestration of crews should eliminate delays on high-temperature, low-speed days, Bond said.