The Federal Railroad Administration published a notice of proposed rulemaking proposing to amend certain positive train control systems regulations.
The feds said the proposed rule seeks to improve the efficiency and safety of railroad operations by standardizing regulations concerning railroad operations when PTC systems are not enabled. This can occur due to a PTC outage or when PTC systems are temporarily disabled to facilitate maintenance, repairs or upgrades.
Under the Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2008, Congress mandated the implementation of PTC systems on Class I railroad main lines that carry high levels of freight traffic and certain hazardous materials, on main lines over which intercity or commuter rail passenger transportation is regularly provided, and other tracks as prescribed by the Secretary.
As of December 2020, PTC technology functions on all required freight and passenger railroad route miles. The technology currently governs rail operations on nearly 59,000 route miles.
PTC technology is designed to prevent train-to-train collisions, over-speed derailments, incursions into established work zones, and movements of trains through switches left in the wrong position.
