Miles-long freight trains cause problems for communities near railroad crossings

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• Amna Nawaz:

  Freight trains are getting longer and longer in the U.S., some stretching for two or three miles.

  These longer trains allow for more goods to move more efficiently, which lowers fuel use and costs for the railroads.

  But, as William Brangham explains, these trains, especially when they stall, are also cutting some communities in half.

• William Brangham:

  The impact of these longer trains on the daily lives of Americans is the focus of a new investigative report from Investigate TV and ProPublica.

  It highlights the journey of children on their way to school in the rural town of Hammond, Indiana, where parked trains create a literal roadblock for kids, and they're forced to crawl over and under them to get to school. Another concern, long trains can halt traffic, stranding ambulances, fire trucks and other emergency vehicles.

  And, for the record, BNSF Railways, which is mentioned in some of this reporting, is a funder of the "NewsHour."

  For a closer look at all of this, we are joined by one of the reporters on this series, Joce Sterman of Investigate TV.

  Welcome to the "NewsHour."

• Joce Sterman, National Investigative Reporter, Investigate TV:

  Thanks for having me.

• William Brangham:

  Those images of those children crawling under and over those stalled trains is just so jarring.

  I want to read a bit from your report here. It says: "An eighth grade girl waited 10 minutes before she made her move, nervously scrutinizing the gap between two cars. She'd seen plenty of trains start without warning. 'I don't want to get crushed,' she said."

  These stalled trains can literally start at any time.

• Joce Sterman:

  Any moment, no notice. And these children are just waiting. They wait at the bus stop in the morning to see if they can get through. They will collect in large populations.

  Their parents are sometimes with them. They will look under the train. They will listen for noises, any indications that it might be moving. When they feel like it's no left choice, they're out. They go. They give it a try. And they risk their lives doing it.

• William Brangham:

  It's just striking to me that a train is not required to sound a signal or make a clear demonstrable sound before it takes off.

• Joce Sterman:

  They definitely have some sort of signal. But, as you mentioned, these trains could be miles-long. So even if they honk a horn or give some sort of a warning light at the front of the train, the odds that the kids at the back or at the middle are going to hear that may not happen.

• William Brangham:

  Right.

• Joce Sterman:

  So there is no notice. And they're in the most dangerous sections of these trains crawling through, crawling under. So not having any notice is a really big problem.

• William Brangham:

  Why are these trains stalled and stopped the way they are? Is this a mechanical breakdown? What is happening?

• Joce Sterman:

  Breakdowns can definitely be a factor when this is an issue. But that's just one reason.

  Another is rail traffic. It's basically switching practices. They might need to get one train into one place, another into another, and they needed different lanes or space to do it. It could also be a crew time-out issue. Just like with airplanes and pilots, when they hit a certain number of hours, they have to shift out. They have to get rest. It's very important.

  So there are a number of factors that mean they stop. Now, best practices would say they would stop what they say off-crossing, in an area where they're not going to impact a community, say, like Hammond or anywhere else in the country where this happens. But that's not exactly what happens most of the time, because they want the trains to be in the fastest, most efficient place to move forward and keep the process going.

  So, if that means they stop in the middle of a community and they limit the first responders, they cut off communities, that's the cost of doing business, I guess.

• William Brangham:

  This issue of blocking first responders, tease that out a little bit more. What happens in those cases?

• Joce Sterman:

  Well, we're talking about critical minutes here. If you call for an ambulance or you call for police, every second matters here. If you're having a heart attack, something's wrong with your child, you don't want to wait.

  And in many communities, these are life-and-death scenarios. They cannot get around these trains. Just in Hammond alone, they have station their fire stations and their ambulance response compensating for this, knowing that it's a problem. Not everybody can do it. The rail lines have been there for decades. So they can't always do that.

  They try to plan routes around that. Doesn't always work. We know that there have been deaths as a result of this. We have seen fires. We have seen injuries. It's very real, because, if it takes them miles out of their way to respond, that's the time they're not getting to you, and that has real-life implications.

• William Brangham:

  I want to play a clip from an interview that you did with a firefighter in Hammond, Indiana, who was talking about the pushback that they have tried to do when they have gone to the industry about this.

  Let's listen to what he had to say.

  Mike Hull, Hammond Firefighters Local 556: The cities and towns and states have tried to check challenge the railroads. Obviously, the railroads have come out well ahead.

  And so I don't know if they're giving us the middle finger and saying, we're going to do it because we have won in court, or if they're just ignoring it. But we need help. We need help.

• William Brangham:

  The Association of American railroads, we reached out to them.

  They said: Safety is our top priority.

  What has the railroad industry told you in regards to your reporting?

• Joce Sterman:

  Same thing, safety is their priority.

  But, at the moment, they pretty much have all the power here. This is a regulatory gray issue. So no one forces them to move. Nobody can tell them they can move. No one can really fine them. This is an issue where it's been fought at court. It's now potentially going to go to the Supreme Court.

  Attorneys general across the country are fighting to get some sort of decision on who's in charge here, because, right now, no one is. So they can do what they want. And safety may be their top priority. They don't want to see these accidents either. But the demonstration here is, they're willing to sit in wait in many communities, and they're not doing anything about it.

  So, obviously, safety isn't always the top priority. The rail union themselves, the people who are the engineers and the conductors have said today, it was about greed. It's about money. It's about them making money. And that's what they see as the priority. They're not showing that safety is the first priority, if they're willing to let these trains sit for days or — at a time. It's just a crisis.

• William Brangham:

  I know you have talked to lawmakers here in D.C., including Secretary Buttigieg at the Department of Transportation.

  What is the ideal remedy here that lawmakers would like to see done?

• Joce Sterman:

  The remedy is potentially finding repeat operators. But that seems like a long shot at this point. The remedy could also be deciding who actually regulates this problem, who can tell them they can move, because, as I said, it's a gray area. Nobody really can at this point.

  At the moment, the only thing they have is funding. And there's going to be grants given out by the Department of Transportation, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, to just try to get rid of these at-grade crossings altogether. That's the only thing they have at the moment.

  There is safety legislation moving through as a result of the situation in Ohio with the hazmat situation. They're going to try to do a few things with that to address blocked crossings, but it's not anything specific in terms of regulation. So this isn't going to get solved through regulation at the moment or through legislation at the moment.

  And all they have is money to throw at the problem.

• William Brangham:

  Joce Sterman of Investigate TV, such tremendous reporting. Thank you very much.

• Joce Sterman:

  Thank you.