Just days after a thousand-person-strong welcome party was thrown at the new SMART station in Windsor, the city manager asked the transportation district to stop running their early-morning trains.
“This morning, based on a great deal of community sentiment, Town Council made a request to SMART to pause the early morning trains prior to 6:00 am until the quiet zones are implemented,” said Town Manager Jon Davis in an email on Wednesday, June 18. He said the request was made through him, but several council members had made their opinion clear based on constituent input.
The affected routes are the three earliest departures from Windsor, headed southbound to Larkspur. Morning departure times scheduled at 4:35, 4:58 and 5:30am will be temporarily discontinued starting Monday, June 23. The first morning departure on weekdays will then become 6:02am. Weekend departures are not affected – they begin at 7:12am, and that will not change.
“SMART, being the great partner that they are, quickly reviewed the request and approved stopping those trains until the quiet zones are in.”
Regular southbound departures from the next stop, at the Santa County Airport station, will continue with their normal schedule.
Quiet Zones
As noted, the schedule change is only effective until the “quiet zones” are implemented, intersections where the train will not be required to sound its horns.
That is currently anticipated for the end of July, but it is by no means a date certain.
Davis said the town had been discussing quiet zones with SMART for about a year, but at a meeting in May new tasks were presented that delayed the program’s implementation.
“The Town of Windsor is actively working with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA). If the FRA approves quiet zones, then routine train horn use at designated crossings will be eliminated, except in emergency or safety-critical situations,” reads a statement on townofwindsor.ca.com.
“Until the Quiet Zone is in place, train horns will continue to sound between Shiloh Road and the Windsor station.”
How loud is it?
The distance from the Airport station to the Windsor station is just over three rail miles. But at Shiloh Road, nearly two miles south of the Windsor platform, residential communities have sprouted up on the west side of the tracks, such as near the Windsor Golf Course.
“There’s a crossing at Shiloh Road and the train starts blaring its horn 1.5 miles before that crossing coming from Airport terminal,” one area resident told the Healdsburg Tribune. “Then it continues blaring horn from Shiloh Road to Mitchell Lane crossing and then at the Town Green circle crossing. It is extremely loud affecting hundreds of families,” she stated.
She described the repeated and frequent noise of the train passing as “excruciating.”
Under current federal rail requirement, according to Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) website, “locomotive engineers are required to sound train horns at least 15 seconds and no more than 20 seconds before reaching a public highway-rail grade crossing” reads.
That agency also established a policy for a city, county or other “public entity responsible for traffic control or law enforcement” to establish quiet zones. Windsor is in the late stages of that process, and hopeful that the prohibition on train horns will be implemented as soon as July 22.
That agency requires train horns to be between 96 and 110 decibels when measured 100 feet in front of the engine. That sound level is louder than a car horn or blender, in a range usually occupied by power tools such as sanders, welders or chain saws.
However, the FRA states that even in a quiet zone, “it is important to note that horns may still be used in emergency situations or to comply with other Federal regulations and railroad operating rules. For example, the horn may be sounded to alert animals, vehicle operators, pedestrians, trespassers, or crews on other trains or due to other railroad operations where sounding the horn is a necessity.”
SMART trains also have bells sounded when crossing intersections, and that practice will continue.
Information about the Windsor SMART station, including Quiet Zone updates, can be found at https://www.townofwindsor.ca.gov/1533/Sonoma-Marin-Area-Rail-Transit-District-
