Residents of the Town of Windsor should be able to sleep in a bit longer this week. Town Manager Jon Davis said that the town would have a final inspection from the Federal Rail Administration on Monday, Aug. 4, following which “Quiet Zone” signage along the railroad track would be unveiled that would forbid SMART trains from using their horns within city limits.
Right on schedule, SMART issued a press release at 1pm on Monday: “The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) has approved the establishment of a Quiet Zone in Windsor. With the Windsor Quiet Zone now approved, routine use of the train horn at designated crossings in Windsor will be discontinued beginning Tuesday, August 5, 2025.”
So the good news is that the morning trains should be a lot quieter crossing intersections inside town limits, not only in the early morning hours but throughout the train’s daily schedule. The other side of that is that the trains will still run—and they are not entirely silent on their own.
The implementation of a Quiet Zone (QZ) in Windsor became crucial to residents as soon as the first early morning train left Windsor Station at 4:35am on Monday, June 2. That and two other trains before 6am were scheduled to head south to the airport and beyond every weekday, per the full schedule that SMART follows for its north-to-south route.
A chorus of complaints from town residents over the pre-dawn sounding of a 110-decible train horn, however, forced Davis to request the transportation agency cease the three earliest weekday departures, at least until the requested QZ was approved.
SMART agreed after brief consideration and stopped running the early trains. However, it promised to return to the early morning schedule once the QZ was approved. Julia Gonzalez, SMART’s communications manager, assured quick reaction to the FRA decision when it comes.
“The same day that it becomes effective is when we will resume the full train schedule,” she said. “We’re able to provide that service from one day to the next because that’s already our train schedule.”
SMART’s Aug. 4 press release also stated, “SMART engineers will continue to sound the train horn in emergency or safety-critical situations—such as when people, vehicles, or construction crews are on or near the tracks—or when required by SMART’s operating rules.”
Engineers can still use the horn in emergency situations or where the FRA has determined that it’s needed at an unsafe crossing, as allowed by federal law.
When service resumes, 21 southbound trains will depart Windsor Station daily between 4:35am and 7:05pm, with eight departures on holidays and weekends between 7:12am and 6:06pm. A like number of northbound trains would arrive as late as 10:10pm on weekdays and 9:07pm on weekends. That adds up to 42 train passages through Windsor on a weekday, 16 on weekend days.
Train horns
The sounding of a train horn is not an automated action, it is performed by the engineer. In rural areas, trains make a lot of noise: Locomotive engineers are generally required to sound train horns at least 15 seconds and no more than 20 seconds before reaching a public highway-rail grade crossing.
But local government agencies can apply to restrict the usage of train horns at railroad crossings which meet specified criteria. These crossings are then considered QZs and on approach to such crossings train locomotives are required to not sound their horns.
The request for and implementation of a QZ is by no means unique to Windsor. Most cities in Sonoma and Marin counties now have them.
But the history of QZs along SMART’s rail line has not been smooth sailing, or railing. In 2017, the relatively new SMART services got as far as Petaluma before residents were able to do something about the horn noise the trains made as they approached intersections. Petaluma installed Quiet Zone signage, but SMART drivers ignored them, not accepting their legal validity.
SMART’s general manager at the time, Farhad Mansourian, initially considered litigation against Petaluma for prohibiting horns at eight in-city locations. But he found that the Federal Rail Administration endorsed Petaluma’s QZ applications and, facing a fine for willfully sounding horns in violation of QZs, SMART backed off.
To view the full train schedule, visit: sonomamarintrain.org/schedules-fares.
