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Statement of Need: This rule is required by the Swift Development Act of 1994 (Act). The Act requires the use of locomotive horns at every public highway-rail grade crossing but gives FRA the authority to make reasonable exceptions. Congress amended this law in 1996 to require that FRA take into account the interest of the communities with pre-existing restrictions on locomotive horns.

Summary of the Legal Basis: Issuance of this rule is required by 49 USC 20153.

Alternatives: There was no alternative to initiating this rulemaking, as it is required by statute. However, the rule would provide a list of supplementary measures the FRA has determined to be effective substitutes for the locomotive horn in the prevention of highway-rail grade crossing casualties. The rule would also allow for whistle bans if there are alternative safety measures that compensate for the lack of a locomotive horn.

Anticipated Costs and Benefits: The problems considered by this rule are collisions and their associated casualties and property damage involving vehicles on public highways and the front ends of trains at whistle-ban grade crossings. The costs of this rulemaking will be incurred predominantly by communities. However, there are also costs to railroads and to the Federal government. At this time, FRA does not know how many businesses would be impacted or the severity of the impact if a community elects to follow the mandate and become subject to whistleblowing at crossings. Nevertheless, the estimated benefits in terms of lives saved and injuries prevented will exceed the costs imposed on society for the proposed rule. Even under the best case scenario (falling collision rates over time) the safety benefits alone, excluding any benefit to railroads, exceed the most costly realistic scenario for community safety enhancements.

Risks: As a result of studies conducted on accident rates at crossings at which locomotive horns are banned, FRA has concluded that such crossings generally result in a higher risk of accident than at crossings at which horns are sounded. FRA has compared the number of collisions occurring within ten different groups of crossings grouped by risk and found that the risk of a collision was 62 percent greater at crossings equipped with automatic gates and flashing lights than at similarly equipped crossings across the nation without bans. FRA analysis also indicated that whistle ban crossings without gates, but equipped with flashing light signals and/or other types of active warning devices, on average, experienced 119 percent more collisions than similarly equipped crossings without whistle bans. Congress requires that FRA issue a regulation requiring the sounding of locomotive horns at all public highway rail grade crossings. However, an exception to the requirement is permissible in circumstances in which there is not a significant risk of loss of life or serious personal injury, use of the locomotive horn is impractical, or supplementary safety measures fully compensate for the absence of the warning provided by the horn. Issuance of the rule would lower the increased collision risk associated with crossings at which no locomotive horns are sounded.