Engineer for a day

n my eight years with this magazine, I've had the opportunity to, among other things, ride in the cabs of high speed trains, walk track with maintenance-of-way crews, drive hi-rail vehicles, and travel in a railroad business car through Mexico's Sierra Madre mountains. But I've never had the chance to operate a locomotive, much less with a remote control pack strapped to my waist. That distinction falls to our Associate Editor, Marybeth Luczak.

It's been a long-standing practice of this magazine to have our editors "on the scene" as much as possible. Last month, we dispatched Marybeth to Pittsburgh to attend the opening of CANAC's new manufacturing facility for locomotive remote control equipment. What made the event well-worth attending was the fact that CANAC would be demonstrating its service-proven Beltpack® system as well as its all-new CANTRAC™ 550 system, which provides full throttle and brake control to the operator.

What Marybeth didn't expect was that she would have the chance to strap on a Beltpack controller and actually move a locomotive (under supervision, of course). What was her impression of this technology?

"Using the Beltpack controller was quite an experience," she says. "It was reminiscent of when I learned to drive a car-and I thought the car was a big machine to maneuver! While I could not control the locomotive's throttle and brakes-only a qualified engineer can do that-I was able to move it forward and reverse and couple railcars. It was much easier to use than I ever expected. With proper training, anyone can learn to use the system-and use it safely."

The Federal Railroad Administration has finally decided to break its silence on remote control, and will hold a technical conference on July 19th in Washington, D.C., to begin discussing the technology's future in the U.S. Perhaps, then, U.S. railroaders can begin the process of catching up to their Canadian colleagues-unions and management alike-who have been safely using remote control for a long time.

This month's featured Commentary is the first installment of a new, bi-monthly rail transit guest column in the magazine that will alternate with Contributing Editor Frank Wilner's Policy Perspective. Free Congress Research and Education Foundation President Paul Weyrich-a conservative as well as a staunch supporter of rail transit-offers his thoughts on why voters often defeat new-build or expansion projects the first time around, and what transit agencies must do to counteract the NIMBYs, Libertarians, and other small but vocal groups who have been successful in convincing voters that rail transit is a bad thing.