The Obama administration on Tuesday (April 29) sent a bill to Congress that aims to cover an expected shortage in money to spend on America’s bridges, roads and transit systems, but Republican opposition could prevent its passage.
Funding for the four-year, $302 billion legislation would come partly from ending certain tax breaks for businesses, a provision opposed by many Republicans. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said the administration would be open to other ideas to raise the money.
A CSX Corp. train carrying crude oil derailed and burst into flames in downtown Lynchburg, Va., on Wednesday (April 30), spilling oil into the James River and forcing hundreds to evacuate.
CSX said 15 cars on a train traveling from Chicago to Virginia derailed at 2:30 p.m. EDT. Fire erupted on three cars, the company said. Photos and video from the scene showed high flames and a plume of black smoke. It was the second oil-train accident this year for CSX.
BISMARCK, N.D. – Oil drillers targeting the rich Bakken shale formation in western North Dakota and eastern Montana have produced 1 billion barrels of crude, data from the two states show.
Drillers first targeted the Bakken in Montana in 2000 and moved into North Dakota about five years later using advanced horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing techniques to recover oil trapped in a thin layer of dense rock nearly two miles beneath the surface.
Read the complete Associated Press story at Yahoo News.
Surface Transportation Board Chairman Daniel Elliott III yesterday announced Deb Miller has been sworn in as the 12th board member since the agency was formed in 1996.
She will serve a term that expires on Dec. 31, 2017. President Barack Obama nominated Miller for the STB post in September 2013 and the Senate confirmed the appointment on April 9. A Democrat from Kansas, Miller will fill the seat formerly held by Francis Mulvey, whose term expired.
American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association (ASLRRA) officials on April 24 introduced a safety initiative they characterized as the association’s largest-ever undertaking.
To launch in January 2015, the initiative will help make the short line industry the safest industry in the world, ASLRRA officials said during the association’s 101st annual meeting held in San Diego late last week. In cooperation with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), U.S. Department of Transportation’s Volpe National Transportation Systems Center and the University of Connecticut (UConn), ASLRRA plans to develop large libraries of training tools, technical materials and other educational resources to assist small railroads in instilling a good safety culture in their organization in addition to complying with all required safety regulations.
Picanco Carl Picanco stares at the radio on a table across the aisle and when nothing happens, he checks his watch and then taps his iPhone and glances at his watch again. He looks out a window. The brush and desert scrub stretch out in brown and green waves toward the foothills outside Vail in southeastern Arizona. Read the complete story at the Arizona Republic. Picanco is a member of SMART Transportation Division Local 84 at Los Angeles, Calif.
New rules on moving hazardous materials like crude oil on U.S. railroads could settle a dispute between the energy industry and rail companies that boils down to a fraction of an inch of steel in the frame of each tank car.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx wrote Thursday in a blog post that his agency would send its proposals to the White House for review next week. The proposal will include “options for enhancing tank car standards,” he said.
Long Island Rail Road unions left the meeting of Presidential Emergency Board 245 more united than ever in their quest for a fair contract.
The unions submitted a proposed contract that followed the recommendations of the PEB 244, which called for modest net annual increases of 2.5 percent.
The New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority submitted an offer they claim was patterned after the tentative deal reached last week with TWU Local 100, but in reality, it fell far short, the union coalition reports.
The coalition is comprised of SMART Transportation Division General Committee of Adjustment GO 505, the National Conference of Firemen & Oilers SEIU 32BJ, the Transportation Communications Union and the International Association of Machinists & Aerospace Workers.
“It is truly unfortunate that at this late stage, MTA would submit an offer that they know will guarantee a strike if it is selected,” said SMART General Chairperson Anthony Simon. “Their proposal would reduce real wages and effectively eliminate the pension plan for new hires. It is absolutely unacceptable.”
“The MTA is not telling the truth when it characterizes the unions’ position. We have never said that if we don’t get everything we want, there will be a strike. What we are saying loud and clear is that the MTA’s lowball offer, far below the real value of Transport Workers Union Local 100’s deal, will definitely provoke a strike if it was submitted to our membership for ratification.”
The MTA offer, though purportedly following the contours of Local 100’s agreement, actually omitted most of the value of that deal.
“If the MTA offer to us was submitted to the Local 100 membership, it would go down in flames,” Simon said.
The union coalition presented expert testimony showing that the agency could afford the unions’ proposal without raising fares. In fact, MTA Chairman Tom Prendergast testified that MTA was funding the Local 100 deal out of the same LIRR fund that the unions testified were available to the first board, but which MTA said they couldn’t use. It also tapped a fund for LIRR workers’ pensions.
The MTA proposal to PEB 245 omitted almost all of the benefit gains achieved by Local 100. In their place, MTA offered less than 75 percent of their actual value, according to Local 100 officials. MTA offered no evidence to support its valuations of their proposal.
On pensions, MTA proposed that LIRR workers pay more than 9 percent of their salary, where Local 100 members would pay on average 3.5 percent for a pension payment of substantially less value. New hire salaries would be slashed far beyond the modest changes in the tentative Local 100 deal.
“We are shocked that MTA would come before the PEB with a proposal so far below the fair recommendations of the first Presidential Emergency Board, as well as what they agreed to with Local 100 and the MTA police. Their proposal fails the test of reasonableness, and cannot be the basis of a voluntary settlement,” Simon said.
WASHINGTON – The Obama administration needs to take steps immediately to protect the public from potentially catastrophic oil train accidents even if it means using emergency authority, National Transportation Safety Board Chairman Deborah Hersman said Wednesday.
The NTSB investigates accidents. The Transportation Department is drafting regulations to toughen standards for tank cars used to transport oil and ethanol, as well as other steps to prevent or mitigate accidents. But there isn’t time to wait for the cumbersome federal rulemaking process — which often takes many years to complete — to run its normal course, Hersman said.
That little voice nagging you to put down the cake and lace up the running shoes is increasingly coming from your employer and is likely to grow louder with a looming change under the federal health care overhaul.
More companies are starting or expanding wellness programs that aim to reduce their medical costs by improving their employees’ health. They’re asking workers to take physical exams, complete detailed health assessments and focus on controlling conditions such as diabetes. Along with that, many companies also are dangling the threat of higher monthly insurance premiums to prod workers into action.
The Obama administration on Tuesday (April 29) sent a bill to Congress that aims to cover an expected shortage in money to spend on America’s bridges, roads and transit systems, but Republican opposition could prevent its passage.
A CSX Corp. train carrying crude oil derailed and burst into flames in downtown Lynchburg, Va., on Wednesday (April 30), spilling oil into the James River and forcing hundreds to evacuate.
That little voice nagging you to put down the cake and lace up the running shoes is increasingly coming from your employer and is likely to grow louder with a looming change under the federal health care overhaul.