Lots of accountability.

More rules than you can shake a stick at.

That being said all major NA railroads could to a bater job at monitoring track bed integrity. The technology is available.

And further to that being said we could always use trucks.

Accountability

Perhaps you are not familiar with this report:

http://cmte.parl.gc.ca/Content/HOC/committee/392/tran/reports/rp3521696/392_TRAN_Rpt03/392_TRAN_Rpt03-e.pdf

I'll just quote one paragraph:

Throughout the Committee’s hearings we heard evidence that there was a lack of accountability on the part of both Transport Canada and the railroads with regard to rail safety. Witnesses stated that the regulator was not accountable enough in enforcing safety regulations, harmonizing regulations across the regions and conducting safety audits in a timely manner and making audit results public. The railways, for their part, were criticised for the lack of meaningful management-employee consultations, poor crew training and poor prioritizing, implementing and carrying out of safety
procedures.

Please also note the date of the report.

Anyone who knows something about the increasingly neglected and half-hearted maintenance, untrained or undertrained personnel at car and motive power shops - at CN particularly - in the past two decades (all done as part of cost cutting and profit centered moves from head office) would not be at all sanguine about the quality of the rolling stock on CN's tracks. It ain't just the railbed that one needs to worry about.

Their increasingly bad record is clear evidence of what the priorities of this once proud 'Canadian' company are these days.

In my view, the suits have taken over...and it shows.

excellent article

Thanks for bringing this issue back into the news.

As many residents in BC know, the rail corridors in BC are some of the most dangerous rail corridors in North America and require special safety attention.

One should know that the federal government during the Mulroney era, in its efforts to privatize CN and to make Canadian railroad companies successful in the N. American rail industry gutted the rail safety standards.

In the US, rail safety standards are contained in a 250+ page, two volume, set of regulations. In Canada, our rail safety standards are contained in a 24 page booklet.

Important personnel of Transport Canada, the so-called public agency overseeing the so-called day-to-day operations of our national railway companies are former long time employees of both CP and CN. The relationship between our public oversight agency and the railroads is just too cosy to ensure safe operations.

In the US, along the coastline of Puget Sound, the US Geological Survey conducted research indicating that during peak rainfalls the stability of slopes become questionable. Shouldn't we close certain sections of rail corridors that are subject to slides during major rain events rather than risk derailments and subsequent releases of very dangerous chemicals into our atmosphere or into our rivers?

I would suggest that communities concerned about the release of toxic-by-inhalation chemicals (chlorine and ammonia) from a train derailment look up what happened in two communities in the US recently. Both Minot, North Dakota and Graniteville, South Carolina had derailments that led to injuries and death to residents of those communities.

Railroad companies like to say that only a small portion of the freight they carry is hazardous materials (chlorine and ammonia), less than 1% and therefore the risk is very small.

However, what they don't like to mention is that over 50% of their insurance premiums are based on the part of their business that transports toxic-by-inhalation chemicals. It appears insurance companies recognize the risk and so should communities situated near rail corridors.

Communities should review their emergency response scenerios and ensure their residents are aware of some of the chemicals being carried through their neighbourhoods and what the best responses are to those chemicals if they are released during a derailment. Also, responders must have the appropriate equipment to deal with these chemicals.

rail inspections

There is no technology better than the human eyes when it comes to rail inspections and those inspections are best made on foot.

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) in the US recommends that in areas of population, rail inspections should be carried out on foot, however, rail companies for the last three years have avoided putting this into practice and instead are 'studying' ways to do this by truck. Driving at speeds of 30-50 km/hr along a rail corridor does not make for the type of inspection that can find defects capable of causing a derailment.

Regarding warning fences, these have been found to be inadequate. These fences work by continuity. If the wire fence is unbroken then it is assumed that the track is intact, however, in some cases, the track bed has been washed away beneath the tracks and the tracks and fence were not affected. In these cases, trains have derailed and caused human fatalities.

In Canada, our Transportation Safety Board operates the same as the NTSB in the US. Like auditors, they investigate after the fact, meaning after an accident, and only make recommendations. It is up to Transport Canada, to bring regulations to Parliament for implementation. To date, Transport Canada has been focused on rail crossings and not much else

G West

I'm familiar with the report. I am also familiar with the fact that it does not address the issue that precipitated this article, a slide that occurred in the middle of a moving train that was carrying regulated commodities.

The fact that two of the derailed cars plummeted over the side of a rocky cliff and only one of them wound up with three small punctures actually speaks volumes as to the steps that have been taken to avoid disasters when derailments happen.

Each Spring railroads all over the world spend large sums of money on rock scaling where ever their track runs through mountainous terrain. Like climate prediction scaling is not a perfect science and under the right circumstances the earth will move unexpectedly.

To suggest that increased 'accountability' will prevent incidents like this in the future borders on being ludicrous.

Dredging up old news to support this argument adds nothing to it.

There's a lot more than 'that' in the piece

Perhaps you missed this:

Between 2002 and 2005, the number of railway accidents in Canada -- excluding crossing and trespassing accidents -- increased sharply. In 2007, the Transportation Safety Board reported that CP Rail trains alone suffered 51 main-track derailments across Canada, up from 42 the year before. Nearly one quarter of all main-rack derailments reported to the federal government in 2007 occurred in British Columbia.

It clearly isn't just a question of bad weather and topography - the railways, especially CN are being run like a bank - not a railway.

And, as the report says, THERE IS NO ACCOUNTABILITY - only the bottom line.

Sad - and just another consequence of the Mulroney years - a government which just keeps on taking.

Acts of god and acts of man.

The report does not distinguish between these as you point out so nicely. I really have no idea just what the ratio is but this article seems to focus on an unpreventable one.

FWIW 'bottom line' accountability does exist. Derailments can be expensive events.

It is my understanding that most if not all Class A railroads are self insured. I.E. The railroads eat the bulk of the cost of any derailments thus directly affecting the bottom line. Maybe more attention should be paid to it with a redirected focus.

Oh I agree

BOTTOM LINE accountability certain 'does' exist - the fact is that the bottom line has usurped every other kind of accountability.

It's the overweening and feckless quest to squeeze more dollars for fickle investors watching quarterly financial results which has, since the idea that the market rules are the only rules which matter, turned railways - and most other corporate exercises - into reckless monstrosities.

However, even the erosion of the 'bottom line' is no guarantee of propriety and socially responsible behavior let alone management discipline: sadly it sometimes does provide a 'bailout' from some equally ethically challenged neo con government.

Examples of which are readily available in both Canada and the United States.

And that, as I wrote above...is also a question of accountability.