Unions urge Amtrak to put 2nd crew member in locomotives.

[elleng]

The union for Amtrak's locomotive engineers urged the railroad on Tuesday to put a second crew member at the controls of trains on the busy Northeast Corridor, where a derailment killed eight people and injured more than 200 others.

"The public would never accept an airline operation with a single person in the cockpit," the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen said in a statement. "There is no reason that rail employees and rail passengers' lives should be viewed any differently."

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/789e8f23c93245f49559bd657fdbb3a3/investigators-uncertain-anything-hit-train-derailment

[Big Slim]

1. yup

I love riding the trains. With a ticket, that is. Yup, I'm all for a co-pilot.

[bigwillq]

2. Hello.

Welcome to DU!

[Travis_0004]

3. I'm surprised trains can't run themselves by now

Planes operate on GPS and autopilot can take you to where you need to go.

I would think it should be easy enough to program a route for the train and don't allow the conductor to exceed the speed limits. On a normal route the conductor wouldn't do a thing but would still be there for an emergency.

[elleng]

4. Too much stuff might require being seen BEFORE,

like cattle, cars, etc., on the track, to enable pure GPS, I think.

[TheCowsCameHome]

6. The conductor doesn't operate the train, anyway.

Let's start with that.

[KamaAina]

5. Lest we forget, safety was as important an issue as wages were

in the early days of the labor movement. Especially for the UMW.