The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) issued a Final Rule on April 2, 2024 setting forth a general rule that railroads must operate with two crewmembers. The FRA has made several revisions since it issued its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) in July 2022, including some in response to comments from passenger rail operators. The Final Rule will be effective 60 days after publication in the Federal Register for passenger rail service; the rule will likely be published imminently, putting the effective date sometime in early June. For freight service, different provisions take effect at different times; specific dates vary based on the class of the operator.
As in the Proposed Rule, the key portion of the Final Rule is its two-person requirement, which governs all railroads unless an exception applies. The Final Rule lists several such exceptions. Those relevant to passenger rail include (1) rapid transit operations in urban areas that are temporally separated from conventional rail operations and are subject to a State Safety Oversight Agency and a Public Transportation Agency Safety Plan, and (2) passenger trains with approved passenger train emergency preparedness plans under 49 C.F.R. Part 239. There are also exceptions for certain tourist trains, certain slow-moving unit freight trains, and legacy one-person crews on Class II and III railroads (subject to notice requirements and the adoption of certain operating rules). On other lines, railroads may petition for special approval to operate one-person service.
FRA’s Federal Register notice responds to the thousands of comments it received, including comments from the two transit authorities whose operations would not have met the requirements in the Proposed Rule (Utah Transit Authority (UTA) and the Denver Regional Transportation District (RTD)), the American Public Transportation Association, and the Commuter Rail Coalition. Each of those parties submitted comments arguing that UTA’s and RTD’s operations, although classified as one-person operations under the proposed rule, did not need additional approvals because they had already received sufficient review under the Part 239 emergency preparedness planning process. FRA agreed and accordingly added a provision permitting legacy one-person train operations where the operator has an approved emergency preparedness plan. However, FRA rejected the suggestion to amend its definition of “train or yard crew” so that UTA and RTD’s operations would meet the two-crewmember requirement.
In response to comments from other stakeholders, FRA made several other changes to the rule. The agency extended compliance dates and amended the procedure for risk assessments of one-person operations. For freight operators, FRA moved away from a blanket prohibition on the transportation of hazardous materials by one-person service and instead decided to permit it under limited circumstances on Class II and III railroads. FRA also responded to comments by clarifying the effect of the rule in the Federal Register notice. Most notably, the agency made clear its expectation that the two-crewmember requirement will create a nationwide standard and preempt state laws governing crew size, aside from those that cover “essentially local” (and not statewide) hazards. FRA also defined the term “one-person train crew” to mean that only one person is assigned to the train and performs the duties of both the locomotive engineer and the conductor, or that only the locomotive engineer travels on the train while the train is moving.
If you have questions about the crew size rule, please contact Ayelet Hirschkorn, Suzanne Silverman, Charles Spitulnik, Christian Alexander, or Grant Glovin.