GUEST POST ON TRAIN ALERT

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "UNEXPECTED CONSEQUENCES": 

This is not a comment for this post but a new one for discussion.  

I read in Thursday's Era Banner dated October 13 that Council was to have debated on October 11 (that is correct, a newspaper talking about what was supposed to have happened 2 days previously) train whistle banning.... AGAIN!!

Why do we continue to waste time and money on finding a way to make it less safe on our roads? Transport Canada mandates that a train must blow their whistle/horn when approaching a level crossing. The mandated sounding is a long-short-long. Each engineer has his or her own style of this sounding - stop and listen and you will hear the differences.

As a train approaches a level crossing, it will encounter a small sign with a "W" on it. That is the trigger to make the sounding.  

In the newspaper, Mayor Dawe makes a brilliant statement. "There are 5 trains in the morning and 5 trains in the evening. Increasing the GO schedule will mean more trains." (I have paraphrased).  

We have GO transit level crossings at Englehard, Wellington and St Johns within the Town. We have had a death before at Englehard. Wellington is our "gateway" to downtown Aurora and the trains are either slowing down or starting out (depending on the direction). St Johns is a major 4 lane road taking a lot of traffic. 

I grew up in a railroad town with 24 hour rail traffic. The horns on the old diesels were a lot louder than the new GO equipment. I found it comforting to hear that sound. Even now, I will hear the whistle of the train as it approaches the Bloomington Road crossing just west of Bathurst. It is a reminder of my youth but more importantly it is a safety feature that has been in place for over 100 years.

Let's not screw around with something that will 1. cost the Town money and 2. make it more dangerous to cross the tracks.

Posted by Anonymous to  Our Town and Its Business at 17 October 2016 at 08:09