Federal Railroad Administration – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The DOT's TIFIA Joint Program Office (JPO) announces the availability of funding to support new applications for credit assistance. Under TIFIA, the DOT provides secured (direct) loans, lines of credit, and loan guarantees to public and private applicants for eligible surface transportation projects of regional or national significance. Projects must meet statutorily specified criteria to be selected for credit assistance. Because demand for the TIFIA program can exceed budgetary resources, the DOT is utilizing periodic fixed-date solicitations that will establish a competitive group of projects to be evaluated against the program objectives. This notice outlines the process that applicants must follow.

FRA proposes to revise the existing regulations containing Railroad Locomotive Safety Standards. The proposed revisions would update, consolidate, and clarify the existing regulations. The proposal incorporates existing industry and engineering best practices related to locomotives and locomotive electronics. This includes the development of a safety analysis for new locomotive electronic systems. FRA believes this proposal will modernize and improve its safety regulatory program related to locomotives.

To carry out a 2008 Congressional rulemaking mandate, FRA is proposing to create regulations prescribing minimum safety and health requirements for camp cars that a railroad provides as sleeping quarters to any of its train employees, signal employees, and dispatching service employees and individuals employed to maintain its right of way. The proposed regulations would supplant existing guidelines that interpret existing statutory requirements, enacted decades earlier, that railroad-provided camp cars be clean, safe, and sanitary, and afford those employees and individuals an opportunity for rest free from the interruptions caused by noise under the control of the railroad. In further response to the rulemaking mandate, the proposed regulations would include the additional statutory requirements, enacted in 2008, that camp cars be provided with indoor toilets, potable water, and other features to protect the health of such workers. Under separate but related statutory authority, FRA is proposing to amend regulations on construction of employee sleeping quarters. In particular, FRA proposes to implement a 2008 statutory amendment that, on and after December 31, 2009, camp cars provided by a railroad as sleeping quarters exclusively for individuals employed to maintain the right of way of a railroad are within the scope of the prohibition against beginning construction or reconstruction of employee sleeping quarters near railroad switching or humping of hazardous material. FRA's existing guidelines with respect to the location, in relation to switching or humping of hazardous material, of a camp car that is occupied exclusively by individuals employed to maintain a railroad's right of way would be replaced with regulatory amendments prohibiting a railroad from positioning such a camp car in the immediate vicinity of the switching or humping of hazardous material. Finally, FRA would make conforming changes, clarify a provision on applicability, remove an existing provision on preemptive effect as unnecessary, and move, without change, an existing provision on penalties for violation of FRA regulations.

In accordance with Appendix D to Title 49 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Part 222, Use of Locomotive Horns at Highway-Rail Grade Crossings, FRA is updating the Nationwide Significant Risk Threshold (NSRT). This action is needed to ensure that the public has the proper threshold of permissible risk for calculating quiet zones established in relationship to the NSRT. This is the fourth update to the NSRT, which has fallen from 18,775 to 14,007.

FRA is issuing this notice to advise the public that a Tier I Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) will be prepared for the Milwaukee, WI to Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN (Milwaukee-Twin Cities) High- Speed Rail Corridor Program. The project includes passenger stations, maintenance facilities, and the construction of a high-speed rail line between Milwaukee and the Twin Cities. This corridor is part of a larger network of high-speed passenger rail corridors in the Midwest, with a hub in Chicago, IL. The effort to develop these high-speed rail corridors and expand the passenger rail system in the Midwest is known as the Midwest Regional Rail Initiative (MWRRI). FRA is issuing this notice to solicit public and agency input into the development of the scope of the EIS and to advise the public that outreach activities conducted by FRA will be considered in the preparation of the EIS. Alternatives under consideration include taking no action (No Build), as well as several build alternatives along a variety of corridors between Milwaukee and the Twin Cities.

This rule increases the rail equipment accident/incident reporting threshold from $9,200 to $9,400 for certain railroad accidents/incidents involving property damage that occur during calendar year 2011. This action is needed to ensure that FRA's reporting requirements reflect cost increases that have occurred since the reporting threshold was last computed in December of 2009.

Due to comments received from the Association of American Railroads (AAR) during the initial comment period, FRA is reopening the comment period for its proposal published on September 21, 2010. The proposal, if adopted, would amend, line by line, FRA's schedules of civil penalties issued as appendices to FRA's rail safety regulations, as well as other guidance. AAR stated in its comments on the proposal that FRA did not give the railroad industry adequate time to review all the penalties listed in the proposal to determine if they match the severity-scale criteria, which are also listed in the proposal. Therefore, FRA is reopening and extending the comment period in order to allow AAR more time to review the penalties in the severity scale and to identify and comment more fully on which individual penalties do not in its opinion satisfy the severity-scale criteria. FRA also seeks further comments from other interested parties that were unable to comment during the initial comment period. The comment period is reopened until February 1, 2011.

FRA is issuing this notice to advise the public that it intends to grant the Northern New England Passenger Rail Authority's (NNEPRA) waiver request from FRA's Buy America requirement, 49 U.S.C. 24405(a), for the purchase and use of 3,340 AREMA specified carbon steel standard 1\1/8\ nominal diameter nuts. FRA intends to grant the waiver because there are no domestic commercially available track nuts that meet the needed specifications and custom made fabricated track nuts that cannot be delivered for 10-16 weeks are not ``reasonably available'' under 49 U.S.C. 24405(a)(2)(B), especially given NNEPRA has mobilized for the track construction and Maine has a short construction season. In addition, NNEPRA used a competitive bidding process to procure the track nuts and no bidders came forward at that time who could comply with Buy America. Finally, FRA published public notice of the NNEPRA waiver request in the Federal Register on August 2, 2010. This notice also failed to identify a reasonably available domestic source. 49 U.S.C. 24405(a)(4) requires that the Secretary provide public notice of a determination that it is necessary to waive the Buy America requirement and provide a maximum fifteen day opportunity for public comment before the waiver becomes final.

FRA announces the forty-third meeting of the RSAC, a Federal advisory committee that develops railroad safety regulations through a consensus process. The RSAC meeting topics will include opening remarks from the FRA Administrator, and status reports will be provided by the Passenger Hours of Service, Training Standards, Track Safety Standards, Passenger Safety, and Medical Standards Working Groups. Further discussions will also be held on the previously accepted RSAC Task 10- 02 regarding the Development, Use, and Implementation of Rail Safety Technology in Dark Territory. This agenda is subject to change, including the possible addition of further proposed tasks under the Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2008.

This final rule revises FRA's existing regulations addressing accident/incident reporting in order to clarify ambiguous regulations and to enhance the quality of information available for railroad casualty analysis. In addition, FRA has revised the FRA Guide for Preparing Accident/Incident Reports (FRA Guide), its accident/incident recording and reporting forms and its Companion Guide: Guidelines for Submitting Accident/Incident Reports by Alternative Methods (Companion Guide).

By this document, FRA is issuing a technical correction to the notice published in the Federal Register on September 29, 2010 (75 FR 60165) regarding consideration and processing of applications for financial assistance under the RRIF Program.

FRA is issuing Safety Advisory 2010-03 to remind railroads and their employees of the importance of situational awareness and the need to stay alert whenever the job that is being performed changes, particularly in main track territory. This safety advisory contains various recommendations to railroads to ensure that these issues are addressed by appropriate policies and procedures.