As a 23 year old, that wants to join a railroad, what do you think about going to one-man crews? Do you think the FRA will step up and make two man crews mandatory? I wanted to join BNSF, but they seem to be leading the charge towards one man crews, and this worries me about job security within BNSF? What Class ! do you believe is the most secure for a conductor? All opinions are appreciated. Thank you.
I'm sure they wouldn't mind going to one man. Saves them $$$ in operating costs. But there will surely be questions asked about safety. As a member of the general public, the idea makes me rather uneasy.
I know it saves them money, theoretically. 1. What if the engineer falls asleep, heart attack, passes out, misses a signal, etc. There is no way that having an one man crew is safer. Isn't that the first rule of railroads, safety and the public's safety? 2. Saves labor costs, but with less safety= lawsuits/PR damage, which will equal this short term gain. 3. How much more money do corporations need? How many more billions does Warren Buffet need? The rich get richer, and the poorer get poorer. I could go on, but I don't see how this is feasible? I love the railroad, and have wanted to work on the railroad my whole life, but right now it seems like I was born in the wrong period.
The negatives I can see are, to my mind, huge. Safety is first and foremost followed by the utility of having at least two sets of hands for those times when something breaks. The only plus would be on the bottom line. And you can bet the unions will have quite a lot to say if such a proposal is actually made.
The SMART union already agreed to the one man crews, and conductors are freaking out about it. It will be here soon. http://www.galesburg.com/article/20140724/NEWS/140729861
Yes, lots of talk among the rail press. What will happen if an engineer falls asleep or has a heart attack or whatever? Well, right now what would happen is he'd fail to tap the alerter and the train would go into emergency. What, in theory, will happen in about a year is PTC will stop the train. Although I'm sure they won't be getting rid of the alerter either.
I'd love to know the "behind the scenes" on the union higher-ups arriving at that position. I would doubt that the rank and file will just go along.
With these new "master conductors" they will be running numerous trains, what if they don't see the engineer go down or it may be too late. Also, with a conductor there he can help resuscitate the engineer. It sounds like the engineers are being let out to die or fail. Also, if the engineer is asleep, he is already sitting and it may be tough to tell he is asleep till its too late to tell. It'd be much easier with a conductor there.
There's an old saying, I don't recall it exactly, but it goes to the effect of 'two sets of eyes are better than one.'
First, I agree with Ken. I dislike the idea of one man crews, but come on, how many engineer heart attacks are occurring in a given year and again, please explain why the alerted and now ptc wouldn't stop the train as they're designed to.
Let me see, I live next to a huge BNSF terminal and have a lot of friends on the railroad, in the last year they've heard of about 2 heart attacks on the train, one pass out from dehydration, 2 guys passing out because lack of sugar(diabetes), five throwing up while driving the train and I can't remember others stuff does happen. Cause PTC will be controlled by a "master conductor" that will have to watch multiple trains, what if he is focusing on one for 2 or 3 minutes at the wrong time, it would just be easier with a conductor on board. Even the engineers are extremely uneasy about this, so that says something.
I work near a large bnsf yard and have only responded in the last 5 years to 2 emergencys. One a security guard for food poisoning, the other a box car on fire...... lol
From personal experience, I can attest to the efficacy of the alerters on the motive power, both in freight and passenger. In my brief tenure on the railroad, I knew of only one engineer who was taken out of service while on duty and that was at CUS during a layover between runs. I was relived of duty once myself while working as a brakeman(collector)on the dinky. It was at the end of a WB trip and it was due to my right knee problem, ANYTHING operating in cyberspace can and will be hacked into so dont go thinking that PTC or remote control operation are the "be all and end all" of safety devices. Even while I was still working, there were reports of "near miss" incidents involving remote control boxes at certain yards. The carrier(s)have suppressed any reports of that happening. Don't believe me? I have written proof of management attempting to suppress information relative to a MSD incident at Eola Yard when I was a switchman. The trainmaster was attempting to withhold information relative to my situation so that a "lost time" incident would not be reported. I have shown said documents to a law firm but that was as far as it went, since I had already retired. This whole situation regarding the SMART union is a red herring. This could possibly be the undoing of that union. Most of the people were unaware of that merger happening until after it had begun. Charlie
Never meant to imply Alterers or PTC were full proof, but come on. 99 out of 100 times, that train will go into emergency or even a graceful stop. And the master conductor will have no control over PTC. That's not how PTC works. And again, I'm not suggesting I'm for 1 man crews. I just don't think the specific concerns raised are that major.
The thing that always strikes me is the way I was taught to do risk management. In assessing the potential risk of a course of action (as, say, operating a train using alerters/PTC) you judge the potential for a mishap and the effects of a mishap. Even if the chance of such a mishap is very low, the potential for both damages/destruction of equipment and loss of life would say that risk mitigation would still need to occur. And relying on any one factor, whether it be the training of the engineer or a technological system, has been historicaly shown to be a losing proposition.
Detroit has been using risk management aka "acceptable casualties" for years. That doesn't make it right. Risk management may be acceptable in investment banking but in relation to human lives, it is smoke in the wind. Humans have been operating trains since their invention. There have been casualties. Computers have failed and been hacked since their invention and believe me, I worked with some of the early ones(RAMAC). Nothing is foolproof. We should heed "Oacham's Ass" postulation and go with the easiest solution. We already have the people in place. Give them better tools to work with rather than replace them with a machine that will fail. Charlie
I think you're misunderstanding what I'm pointing at. Risk management (as I was taught it) is a method of identifying potential hazards, their effects, and techniques or practices to minimize their chance of happening and/or effect. Not simply accepting the risk but working to lessen it, preferably with more than one layer of checks.
