[Federal Register Volume 70, Number 57 (Friday, March 25, 2005)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 15274-15275]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 05-5906]


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DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION

Federal Railroad Administration

49 CFR Parts 222 and 229

[Docket No. FRA-1999-6439, Notice No. 15]
RIN 2130-AA71


Use of Locomotive Horns at Highway-Rail Grade Crossings

AGENCY: Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), Department of 
Transportation (DOT).

ACTION: Notice of public conference.

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SUMMARY: FRA is issuing notice of a public conference that will be held 
in Fort Lauderdale, FL to discuss the appropriate excess risk estimate 
that should be applied to highway-rail grade crossings that are 
currently subject to FRA Emergency Order 15 (``E.O. 15''). The public 
conference will provide an opportunity for interested parties to 
provide information to FRA on the effect of silencing the locomotive 
horn at highway-rail grade crossings that are currently subject to E.O. 
15.

DATES: Public Conference: The public conference will be held on Friday, 
April 15, 2005, beginning at 9 a.m.

ADDRESSES: The public conference will be held at the Holiday Inn Fort 
Lauderdale Beach, 999 Fort Lauderdale Beach Blvd., Fort Lauderdale, 
Florida 33304.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Ivornette Lynch, FRA Docket Clerk, 
Office of Chief Counsel, 1120 Vermont Avenue, NW., Washington, DC 20590 
(telephone: 202-493-6030); Ron Ries, Office of Safety, FRA, 1120 
Vermont Avenue, NW., Washington, DC 20590 (telephone: 202-493-6299); or 
Kathy Shelton, Office of Chief Counsel, FRA, 1120 Vermont Avenue, NW., 
Washington, DC 20590 (telephone: 202-493-6038).

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Any person who would like to provide an oral 
statement at the public conference should notify the FRA Docket Clerk 
at least 10 calendar days prior to the date of the public conference 
and provide either a telephone number or e-mail address at which the 
person may be contacted. (Please refer to the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION 
CONTACT section for contact information for the FRA Docket Clerk.) Any 
speaker who will be speaking on behalf of an organization should also 
provide the name of the organization that he/she will be representing.
    FRA will attempt to accommodate all persons who wish to provide an 
oral statement. However, depending on the number of conference 
participants, FRA may find it necessary to limit the length of oral 
statements, in order to accommodate as many people as possible. 
Conference participants may choose to submit complete written 
statements for inclusion in the record, while providing an oral summary 
of their written statements at the conference.
    Please note that anyone is able to search the electronic form of 
all comments received into any of our dockets by the name of the 
individual submitting the comment (or signing the comment), if 
submitted on behalf of an association, business, labor union, etc. You 
may review DOT's complete Privacy Act Statement in the Federal Register 
published on April 11, 2000 (volume 65, number 70, pages 19477-78) or 
you may visit http://dms.dot.gov.

Background

    Effective July 1, 1984, a Florida statute authorized counties and 
municipalities to restrict the nighttime sounding of the locomotive 
horn by intrastate railroads at highway-rail grade crossings equipped 
with flashing lights, bells, crossing gates, and advance warning signs 
indicating that the locomotive horn would not be sounded at night. 
However, FRA noted an alarming increase in the number of accidents at 
highway-rail grade crossings subject to these nighttime whistle bans. 
Therefore, FRA issued Emergency Order 15 (``E.O. 15'') on July 26, 
1991, which required the Florida East Coast Railway Company (an 
intrastate railroad) to sound the locomotive horn when approaching and 
entering public highway-rail grade crossings. E.O. 15 was later amended 
to allow communities to establish quiet zones, provided FRA approval 
was obtained prior to the implementation of sufficient safety measures 
at every highway-rail grade crossing within the proposed quiet zone to 
alleviate excess risk resulting from the absence of the warning 
provided by the locomotive horn.
    On November 2, 1994, Congress passed Public Law 103-440 (``Act''), 
which added Sec.  20153 to title 49 of the United States Code. This Act 
required FRA to issue regulations that would require railroads to sound 
the locomotive horn at public grade crossings, but gave FRA the 
authority to make reasonable exceptions. After issuing a Notice of 
Proposed Rulemaking on January 13, 2000 (65 FR 2230), FRA published an 
Interim Final Rule on the Use of Locomotive Horns at Highway-Rail Grade 
Crossings on December 18, 2003 (68 FR 70586).
    Under the Interim Final Rule, public authorities are authorized to 
create quiet zones by implementing supplementary safety measures and 
alternative safety measures to offset the excess risk that results from 
prohibiting routine use of the locomotive horn at highway-rail grade 
crossings within the proposed quiet zone. However, the Interim Final 
Rule provides greater flexibility in the types of safety improvements 
that can be employed within a proposed quiet zone than E.O. 15. 
Therefore, FRA stated in the Interim Final Rule that it would re-
examine the effect of silencing the locomotive horn at E.O. 15 grade 
crossings.
    The upcoming public conference will provide an opportunity for 
interested parties to provide information to FRA on the effect of 
silencing the locomotive horn at highway-rail grade crossings that are 
currently subject to E.O. 15. In particular, FRA is soliciting comments 
on whether the national excess risk estimate on the effect of silencing 
the locomotive horn at highway-rail grade crossings equipped with 
flashing lights and gates (i.e., 66.8% increase in risk) should be 
applied to E.O. 15 grade crossings. In that regard, participants are 
requested to address FRA's findings in the report titled, ``Florida's 
Train Whistle Ban'', that accident frequency increased by 195% when 
train horns were banned at nighttime at crossings later subject to E.O. 
15. In the alternative, should a regional excess risk estimate be 
applied to E.O. 15 grade crossings? Or, would a nighttime-specific 
excess risk estimate be more appropriate?
    Conference participants are asked to review the following documents 
available in the electronic docket of this rulemaking at http://dms.dot.gov prior to the conference: Document no. FRA-1999-6439-16 
(``Florida's Train Whistle Ban''); Document no. FRA-1999-6439-2391 
(``Analysis of the Safety Impact of Train Horn Bans at Highway-Rail 
Grade Crossings: An Update Using 1997-2001 Data''); and Document no. 
FRA-1999-6439-2392 (``Interim Final Rule on the Use of Locomotive Horns 
at Highway-Rail Grade Crossings'').


[[Page 15275]]


    Issued in Washington, DC on March 21, 2005.
S. Mark Lindsey,
Chief Counsel.
[FR Doc. 05-5906 Filed 3-24-05; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4910-06-P