Rail union leaders, Congress reps discuss rail safety gaps

By Julie Sneider, Senior Editor 

In yet another sign that rail safety will be a bipartisan issue in the 119th Congress, four House representatives on Feb. 3 rolled out a newer version of the Railway Safety Act, building off a similar proposal introduced in March 2023 but not passed in the aftermath of the derailment of a Norfolk Southern Railway train in East Palestine, Ohio. 

The congressmen — U.S. Reps. Chris Deluzio (D-Pa.) Nick LaLota (R-N.Y.), Michael Rulli (R-Ohio) and John Garamendi (D-Calif.) — introduced a new version of the measure on the second anniversary of the derailment, which occurred Feb. 3, 2023. The National Transportation Safety Board concluded that the accident occurred because a bearing on a hopper car overheated and caused an axle to separate.  

The Rail Safety Act of 2025 adds a requirement that Congress be regularly informed on the implementation of the NTSB’s safety recommendations. Two of the congressmen who introduced the new bill — Deluzio and Rulli — said they represent continuants who were directly impacted by the derailment. 

“The labor movement will continue to lead the fight to operate railroads in the safest way possible.” — Greg Regan, president of Transportation Trades Department Transportation Trades Department

Specifically, the legislation would: 
• give the U.S. Department of Transportation the authority to modify new safety requirements for trains carrying hazmat such as vinyl chloride, a material that was  transported by NS through East Palestine; 
• require rail carriers to notify state emergency response officials about the content and materials they transport; 
• create new requirements to prevent blocked rail crossings; 
• mitigate derailment risk with rules for train size and weight; 
• increase requirements for wayside defect detectors; 
• require hazmat trains to be scanned by hotbox detectors every 10 miles; 
•strengthen inspection requirements rail cars containing hazmat;  
• require two-person train crews; and 
• increase maximum fines that USDOT can issue for safety violations. 

On Feb. 3, rail labor leaders held a media call with Deluzio and other lawmakers who have been in favor of passing rail safety laws since the derailment in East Palestine. Deluzio said the reintroduced Railway Safety Act would build on the bipartisan momentum established in the last Congress. He noted that Vice President JD Vance, who was a senator from Ohio when the derailment occurred, was a cosponsor of rail safety legislation in 2023 and called on the vice president to deliver a rail safety message to the White House.  

“There is strong lobbying [from the rail industry] to kill bipartisan bills like mine,” Deluzio said on the call. “The time to pass railway safety legislation is overdue.” 

[Editor’s note: On Feb. 4, Deluzio and U.S. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) reintroduced the Decreasing Emergency Railroad Accident Instances Locally (DERAIL) Act to broaden the definition by which trains are classified as a “high-hazard flammable trains.” The bill would ensure that trains carrying hazmat are properly classified and railroads are required to take safety precautions — such as slower speeds, newer rail cars, better braking equipment and required reporting — when transporting those materials across the country.] 

“The time to pass railway safety legislation is overdue.” — U.S. Rep. Chris Deluzio (D-Pa.) deluzio.house.gov

Also addressing the labor leaders on the call was U.S. Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas), who last year introduced a bill that would have increased safety requirements for trains transporting hazmat. In a video message, Nehls said he would continue to push for new rail safety laws. He added that he was “thrilled” that VP Vance, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine were touring the East Palestine cleanup site on Feb. 3. 

“Rail safety in Congress is a bipartisan effort,” Nehls said. “We will move full steam ahead to advance rail safety, and I want to assure each one of you that rail safety will not fall by the wayside. I will fight like hell for it in Congress.” 

Labor leaders, who asserted that rail safety has not advanced since the Ohio derailment, implored the Class Is to fully join the Federal Railroad Administration’s close-call confidential reporting program, known as C3RS. Since then-U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg called on the carriers to join the program in 2023, only two — BNSF Railway Co.  and NS — have enrolled in the program, albeit through pilot project versions of it. 

After Buttigieg called on the Class Is to join the C3RS, the Association of American Railroads publicly pledged that the railroads would do so, but they have not yet, noted Tony Cardwell, president of The Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division-IBT (BMWED).  

In their Feb. 3 letters to the Class I CEOs, the BMWED and other rail unions said they remain “united and ready to immediately sign a permanent C3RS agreement” with the carriers. 

“We strongly urge you to improve safety on your railroad by signing the C3RS IMOU [implementing memorandum of understanding] with us,” the letters state. 

The long-standing C3RS, the unions argue, allows workers to confidentially report close- call safety incidents that provide valuable information that can be used to prevent future catastrophic incidents, without fear of discipline or retaliation. The FRA established a demonstration project in 2003 in collaboration with the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Today, more than 31 railroads participate in C3RS; dozens of IMOUs have been signed, including ones with Amtrak, commuter railroads and several short lines, according to the unions’ letters. 

Other rail-safety concerns also were mentioned on the call. Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen (BRS) President Mike Baldwin said more federal funding is necessary for upgrading safety at rail crossings that don’t have warning signals or gates. 

“There are many grade crossings that are in curves or blind spots, in many instances they are in rural areas, that are not protected by a system that would warn [auto vehicle drivers] of an approaching train,” Baldwin said. “The problem we see with [improving safety at such crossings] is it’s a funding issue.” 

Although the federal government has a grant program for eliminating grade crossings, a separate set-aside fund should be established for installing warning signals, he suggested. 

Additionally, Baldwin called for regulations that would require railroads to adopt hotbox detectors or other technology that would detect wheel and bearing defects while a train is in transit, then notify the railroad of the problem before the defect results in an accident or derailment. The BRS, in partnership with the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley’s railway safety center, recently obtained a $9.7 million grant from the FRA’s Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and Safety Improvements program to conduct research into state-of-the-art technology that could prevent derailments caused by wheel-bearing failures. The future plan is for the technology to be connected to the railroad’s positive train control system, which would communicate the defect to the railroad’s back office and ultimately to the train crew, Baldwin said. 

At the end of the media call, host Greg Regan, president of the Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO, said the East Palestine anniversary is a reminder of the need for safer railroading. 

“Anniversaries are reminders about progress and lack of progress,” Regan said. “I view them as a launching point to remind people what the stakes are ... There is a lot of work to be done, and the labor movement will continue to lead the fight to operate railroads in the safest way possible.”