Federal hearing set for Feb. 10 to review SEPTA’s request for safety waiver The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) today applauded the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) decision to hold a public hearing to review SEPTA’s waiver of federally mandated safety rules. The union opposes SEPTA’s practice of stretching workdays at the expense of rest time available for SEPTA’s locomotive engineers. The BLET has called on the FRA to reject the waiver. The employees affected by this waiver work on-call, have unpredictable schedules and often have their sleep interrupted by calls from the railroad. Interrupted sleep has a direct and negative effect on fatigue and thus safety. Currently many SEPTA engineers work 14-hour days and 6-day workweeks. Most other regional commuter railroads work engineers on 5-day a week schedule with shorter workdays. “Public safety is at risk, so a public hearing is absolutely necessary,” said BLET Vice President Steve Bruno. “We’re glad the FRA listened to our request for a hearing — and we believe it’s important that it will take place in Pennsylvania, so that the panel members can listen to both engineers and passengers.” The hearing on SEPTA’s request to continue reduced rest and recuperation time for locomotive engineers — who are the most critical safety employees on every train they operate — will take place on Tuesday, February 10th. Who: Federal Railroad Administration What: Hearing on SEPTA’s request for extended safety waiver When: 10:00 am, Tues. Feb. 10, 2015 Where: First floor conference room, Baldwin Tower, 1510 Chester Pike, Crum Lynne, Pennsylvania, 19022 “We’re going to testify that safety has to come first,” said Bruno. “There’s no margin of error when it comes to running a railroad the right way. We’ve seen terrible accidents due to sleep deprivation on other railroads, and we want to do everything possible to make sure that doesn’t happen here.” In a recent letter to the FRA, BLET National President Dennis Pierce stated that since receiving a safety waiver in October, 2012, SEPTA has systematically reduced “the number of locomotive engineer assignments while simultaneously increasing the number of trains and route miles in the public schedule.” “The FRA publishes minimum safety standards. The waiver allows SEPTA to conduct its operation below those minimum standards, said BLET Vice President Bruno. Forcing engineers to operate trains with insufficient rest creates a known — and preventable — risk to passengers and crews members. “When the FRA examines the record, we believe they’ll agree with us that SEPTA needs more compliance — not less — with federal safety rules.” * * * The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen represents 53,500 professional locomotive engineers and trainmen throughout the United States, including 220 hardworking members at SEPTA. The BLET is the founding member of the Rail Conference, International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 13:52:07 +0000
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