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Watertown, Middle Tennessee prep for Historic Nashville steam train to offer trips again |
Railroad members! If you want to be featured in this section, please email us the link. You can also tag us (@ASLRRA) in your social media posts. Interested in seeing your railroad showcased in your local newspaper? Contact Amy Krouse for assistance.
Surface Transportation Board (STB) Member Patrick Fuchs will be a featured speaker during the general session at ASLRRA’s 2025 Annual Conference and Exhibition, which will be held April 6 to 8 at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver, Colorado.
Fuchs joined the STB in 2019 and was confirmed by the Senate for a second term in May. He has played a key role in developing and enacting major railroad legislation, including reauthorization of the STB and National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), passenger rail reauthorization and other legislation included as part of the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act (FAST Act).
Other general session speakers at the Annual Conference include Union Pacific CEO Jim Vena. There will also be a panel discussion on the RailPulse coalition featuring Norfolk Southern Senior Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer Mike McClellan, RailPulse General Manager David Shannon and a representative from Genesee & Wyoming Railroad Services, Inc.
Click here to register for the event. A conference agenda is available here, and a list of education tracks and individual sessions can be found here.
ASLRRA has added three conference host hotels for the 2025 Annual Conference as many people took advantage of early discounted registration rates for the convention and quickly filled several event room blocks.
There are now six locations included in ASLRRA’s hotel block, all of which are within two blocks of each other and the convention center. Please note some nights at several hotels are already sold out, including Sunday, Monday and Tuesday nights at the conference hotel, the AC Marriott. Click here to go to ASLRRA’s event lodging page for information regarding room availability, rates, booking deadlines and direct links to each hotel. Some hotels offer government rates, which can be booked by contacting Amy Westerman.
ASLRRA does not partner with outside groups to book registration or hotel rooms and does not authorize any individuals or companies to do so on ASLRRA’s behalf. ASLRRA will not contact you directly via phone or email to make hotel reservations.
Those who receive solicitations about hotel rooms or registration should not provide any sensitive information to those individuals and instead forward details about the encounter to ASLRRA’s Amy Westerman.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has extended the comment period for its proposed heat injury and illness prevention rule by fifteen days. Comments are now due Jan. 14.
On Nov. 14, ASLRRA requested a 90-day extension to allow sufficient time to fully analyze the proposed rule. This request, wrote ASLRRA, was due to the rule’s length, the many studies cited in it, and its comprehensive nature.
OSHA will hold an informal public hearing on the proposed rule on June 16. The rule will also be discussed at the next Small Business Labor Safety Roundtable being held Dec. 13. In 2023, the proposed rule was addressed in a Small Business Advocacy Review (SBAR), also known as a SBREFA panel. ASLRRA member Farmrail participated in the SBREFA, and the final panel report and other background materials are available here.
More information about the rule can be found on OSHA’s heat injury rulemaking website.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), in partnership with the National Security Agency (NSA), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and international partners, has released the Enhanced Visibility and Hardening Guidance for Communications Infrastructure, that provides best practices to protect against a People’s Republic of China (PRC)-affiliated threat actor that has compromised networks of major global telecommunications providers. The recommended practices will strengthen visibility and harden network devices against this broad and significant cyber espionage campaign.
Although tailored to communications infrastructure sector, CISA encourages other critical infrastructure operators to review and implement recommended actions in this guide. Visit CISA’s People's Republic of China Cyber Threat webpage to learn more about this cyber threat.
CISA and FBI recently warned of this campaign, and this guide provides recommended actions to quickly identify anomalous behavior, vulnerabilities and threats, and to respond to a cyber incident. It also guides organizations to reduce existing vulnerabilities, improve secure configuration habits, and limit potential entry points.
ASLRRA has filed comments in response to the Federal Railroad Administration’s (FRA) Information Collection Request (ICR) concerning grant management requirements for grant awards and cooperative agreements.
In the ICR, the FRA proposes to add one new form, revise two forms and discontinue a form that is no longer required. ASLRRA supports the proposal for the new form, which would replace the current letter-submission procedure and streamline grant recipients’ requests for authority to incur pre-award costs. The Association notes the new form would speed up the time-sensitive process of pre-award authority by ensuring requests are submitted to FRA personnel according to a uniform structure with all necessary information included.
Regarding the two form revisions and the discontinued form, ASLRRA has no concerns with the FRA’s proposed updates.
The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) has posted the new accident reporting threshold for calendar year 2025 on its website.
The new threshold is $12,400, an increase of $400 over the previous threshold. The new amount was calculated according to a revised method published in 2020 that takes into account changes in wage rates and the equipment index.
The Railroad Retirement Board (RRB) has announced changes to payroll taxes in 2025, saying that the amounts of compensation subject to railroad retirement tier 1 and tier 2 payroll taxes will increase in 2025. However, tax rates on employers and employees will remain the same.
For tier I and Medicare taxes, the rate remains 7.65 percent, divided between retirement and Medicare hospital insurance at 6.20 percent and 1.45 percent, respectively. In 2025, the maximum amount of an employee’s earnings subject to the 6.20 percent rate increases from $168,600 to $176,100. There is no maximum on earnings subject to the Medicare rate.
For the tier II tax, rates will still be 4.9 percent for employees and 13.1 percent for employers, with the maximum earning amount subject to taxes increasing from $125,100 to $130,800. The press release also discusses railroad unemployment insurance contributions for employers.
In addition to the press release, the RRB published its December Question and Answer (Q&A) column that discusses how pension payments from employers not covered by railroad retirement or social security affect railroad retirement annuities.
Pensions from these employers, also known as noncovered service pensions, may result in a reduction of an individual’s tier 1 portion of their annuity. The Q&A explains which employees may be subject to this reduction, how a reduction is calculated and identifies certain exemptions. Also discussed is how a spouse or a widow(er) may have their annuity reduced under this rule.
Applicants can now submit Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) concept papers to the Federal Railroad Administration’s (FRA) Office of Research, Development, and Technology (RD&T) for consideration. Papers are due Jan. 16.
A detailed list of potential paper topics, which includes a brief description for each, is available online, along with contractual requirements and general program information. In general, the RD&T focuses its research on track, rolling stock, train control and communication, human factors and railroad systems issues, including workforce development.
View the FRA’s BAA website here.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has released a draft of its Interim Framework for Advancing Consideration of Cumulative Impacts, which offers tools and principles to help agency programs and regional offices consider cumulative impacts in their work.
According to an EPA press release, “cumulative impacts are defined scientifically by the totality of exposures to chemical and non-chemical stressors and their effects on health and quality of life outcomes.” The agency is inviting public comment on the draft to help ensure meaningful engagement and enable the EPA to develop and implement ways to incorporate cumulative impacts in delivering public health and environmental protections. Comments are due Feb. 19.
ASLRRA encourages its members to save the date for Railroad Day on Capitol Hill 2025, which will take place on May 7. Registration for the event will open in February.
On Railroad Day, rail representatives and stakeholders travel to Washington, D.C. to speak with elected officials and congressional staff about important freight rail issues. The event offers an opportunity for those in the freight rail industry and their supporters to unite their voices and raise awareness of important issues with federal elected officials and others.
For the 2024 event, over 300 participants visited the offices of over 270 lawmakers from both sides of the aisle and both houses of Congress to discuss freight rail regulation, infrastructure investments, the environmental benefits of rail and more. Railroaders met with office staff representing Senators Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), John Thune (R-S.D.) and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), as well as House Representatives Mike Johnson (R-La.), Hakeem Jeffries (R-N.Y.), Sam Graves (R-Mo.), Rick Larsen (D-Wash.) and hundreds of others.
The week before Thanksgiving, six House representatives signed on to cosponsor the bill to update the short line railroad track maintenance tax credit, commonly known as 45G. And, just yesterday, three more became cosponsors.
There are now 19 cosponsors of the bill, H.R. 9522. Ten cosponsors are Democrats and nine are Republican, continuing the historically bipartisan support of the tax credit. Together they represent 12 different states.
ASLRRA’s government affairs team continues to work with members of the Association’s Legislative Policy Committee (LPC) and others to educate lawmakers on the importance of the 45G tax credit and encourage them to cosponsor the bill.
The House and Senate Committees on Appropriations have received copies of the Federal Railroad Administration’s (FRA) report on the status of certain competitive grant programs for the third and fourth quarters of fiscal year 2023 and the first and second quarters of fiscal year 2024.
The report covers grant agreements and obligations from fiscal years 2017 to 2024 awarded through six FRA grant programs including Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and Safety Improvements (CRISI) grants and Railroad Crossing Elimination (RCE) grants. Included is an overview of grants in the later stages of the grant lifecycle, including the grant obligation process, grant administration and monitoring and the final closeout.
The Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation (DRPT) is accepting grant applications for its nine grant programs for fiscal year 2026, including programs that may benefit small railroads in the state.
Local railroads might consider applying for the FREIGHT Program, which provide funding for infrastructure projects that help increase freight rail network capacity and functionality; the Rail Industrial Access Program, which offers funding to help connect new or expanding businesses to the freight rail network; or the Rail Preservation Fund, which specifically benefits the nine short line railroads operating in Virginia.
All grant applications must be submitted through the DRPT’s WebGrants online grant management system and are due Feb. 1.
The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) has published the presentation from its November grant selection kickoff webinar held for recipients of Consolidated Rail Infrastructure and Safety Improvements (CRISI) grants and Special Transportation Circumstances (STC) grants.
FRA representatives discussed the grant lifecycle, providing a general timeline and description of activities undertaken in each stage of the project. The webinar also covered project prerequisites, pre-award spending and other things grant recipients can expect to experience in the grant process.
The FRA makes recordings and webinar presentations available online. A list of upcoming webinars is available here.
What are the latest ways Association members can engage with ASLRRA? What is ASLRRA’s most recent call-to-action? Below are some of the different types of information the Association would love to gather.
ASLRRA will hold its 2024 Membership Meeting virtually on Dec. 10. All ASLRRA members are invited to attend the online event. Use this link to register to attend.
ASLRRA Chair Matt Walsh, ASLRRA board regional vice presidents, ASLRRA President Chuck Baker and Association staff will provide updates regarding various ASLRRA activities. This includes review of efforts in the legislative and regulatory arenas, as well as a discussion of finances, communications, technology, education, business services and more.
Interested participants are urged to register soon for the first ASLRRA training seminar of 2025 – the Drug and Alcohol (Part 219) Training Seminar and Short Line DER Roundtable taking place Feb. 25 to 27 in San Diego, California. Space in this seminar is limited, and likely to fill quickly.
ASLRRA’s JR Gelnar and Federal Railroad Administration Drug and Alcohol Program Specialist Melissa Van Dermeir will provide an in-depth review of the rules and requirements for railroads and contractors under Part 219. The third day of the event, the Short Line DER Roundtable, will feature presentations and discussions specifically designed for short line railroad Designated Employer Representatives (DERs).
To help employees of small railroads attend industry training, ASLRRA offers the Doug Golden Scholarship and the Jake Jacobson Memorial Scholarship. Both scholarships are meant for employees of railroads earning $10 million or less in annual revenue. The Doug Golden Scholarship can be applied to costs incurred for registration, travel and lodging for certain industry-specific training, including ASLRRA’s events. The Jake Jacobson Memorial Scholarship covers registration fees for an ASLRRA-hosted training seminar. Follow the links above for more information and to access an application form.
Developed by ASLRRA in partnership with the Iowa Northern Railway Company (IANR), the Short Line Training Center provides essential regulatory, compliance, and safety training programs and materials to short line railroads throughout the US. The project combines an online Learning Management System (LMS), accessible 24-7 at the click of a mouse, with in-person classroom seminars and locomotive simulator training delivered on-site to railroad employees.
With the LMS, short line railroads may access custom-built railroad industry training programs, interactive coursework, and assessment materials. At least 30 new technical training courses will be developed under the project, including the recently launched Part 214 Railroad Workplace Safety course and Virtual Reality (VR) training focusing on Locomotive Daily Inspections, Freight Car Anatomy, and Class I Airbrake Test & Inspection. Watch a Virtual Reality training program demo and view a complete list of planned courses on ASLRRA’s website.
Railroads may also schedule in person training with the Mobile Technical Training Center, equipped with two FRA Type II locomotive simulators and classroom space for six students. The mobile training center delivers personalized, instructor-led seminars and locomotive simulator training to railroad employees on site and can address a range of requirements from basic train handling to positive train control and distributed power operations.
Learn more about industry training and resources available from the Short Line Training Center or contact ASLRRA SVP, Education and Business Services, Sabrina Waiss for more information and pricing.
As an exclusive ASLRRA Preferred Provider, Loram offers discount pricing on its Aurora Track Inspection Technology featuring state-of-the-art imaging technology that scans track to reveal the specific condition of every tie along the way, pinpointing potential problems and marking their exact location.
A comprehensive tie inspection using Loram’s Aurora technology provides a detailed report that enables a railroad to streamline capital maintenance programs and helps ensure industry compliance, while helping plan repairs efficiently.
All ASLRRA Member Discount Program Preferred Providers are carefully vetted companies committed to providing discounted pricing, special offers and guaranteed exceptional services on a range of industry-specific products and services. Visit the Association’s Member Discount Program page to view all Preferred Providers and learn how Loram’s Aurora Track Inspection Technology can make railroad operations safer and more efficient.
ASLRRA’s in-house subject-matter experts have presented several webinars focused on important regulatory topics. Recordings of these webinars are available at any time to ASLRRA members through the Association’s On-Demand Webinar Library. Log in and search the regulatory category to find titles like:
Visit ASLRRA’s webinar homepage and log in to view all the on-demand offerings in the Association’s webinar library.
The Short Line Safety Institute (SLSI) announced Kristin Bevil has joined the organization’s Board of Directors. Bevil, who is general counsel and chief legal officer at Pinsly Railroad, is one of eight board members who provide oversight and guidance to SLSI.
Bevil first worked with railroad clients through law firm Fletcher & Sippel LLC, and has served as general counsel at both The Indiana Rail Road Company and Pioneer Lines. She is currently the ASLRRA Board of Directors’ Central Region vice president and a member of the Association’s Executive Committee. Bevil is also active with rail safety organization Operation Lifesaver and was named a 2024 Women in Rail honoree by Railway Age magazine.
“The SLSI is fortunate to be advised by individuals who have dedicated their careers to advancing the industry in the areas of safety and safety culture,” said SLSI Executive Director Tom Murta. “Kristin Bevil’s experience in guiding short line railroad management in issues as diverse as litigation, governance, regulatory compliance and labor relations will provide a broader perspective to our team. These areas of operations are directly impacted by the strength of safety culture on a railroad.”
The 132nd Damage Prevention and Freight Claims Conference will take place in Atlanta, Georgia next year, and organizers have issued a call for speakers for the event.
Interested speakers are asked to submit information regarding their proposed session to conference organizers by email by Dec. 20. Requested information includes a session description, explanation of session value for the damage prevention industry, speaker nominee name, title and company and description of type and length of presentation. Send information to dpls@aar.com.
Click here for a calendar of industry events.
Views & News is published by American Short Line and Regional Railroad Association.
Please contact Mariel Takamura, associate editor, with questions or comments.
