Queens has the unhappy distinction of being home to one of the four Metro-North passengers killed in the commuter train derailment early Sunday near the Sputyen Duyvil station in the Bronx.
The death of the dedicated Woodside nurse who commuted to Ossining every day to care for severely ill children was a reminder of how fragile and fleeting life can be. Queens mourned her death as the borough president and other officials questioned the railroad’s safety record after a series of disturbing accidents in the system this year.
Sunday’s catastrophe occurred near the site of the July derailment of a freight train that jumped the tracks and left a commuter nightmare in its wake for days. In May, a Metro-North train derailed in Bridgeport, Conn., injuring 76 people.
Closer to home, the Long Island Rail Road has two derailments on the books for 2013. The first took place west of Jamaica station in March and interrupted regular service for several days until the track was repaired. The second accident happened inside an East River tunnel in June, when an LIRR commuter train went off the tracks, snarling the evening rush hour and curtailing service the next day.
Five derailments in one year are not acceptable and the casualty list of four dead, more than 135 injured makes riding on Metro-North seem like a dangerous game. But, in fact, the city counts on the railroad to provide dependable service for thousands of workers, students and tourists in the tri-state area. Anything less threatens the bedrock of the city’s economy and its connection to the counties surrounding Manhattan.
It’s up to the National Transportation Safety Board to determine the cause of these derailments and recommend any needed overhaul. The U.S. Department of Transportation should get into the act, too.
Are these accidents the result of rail travel, particularly in the Northeast, playing second fiddle to the highways in terms of congressional dollars yet again? Are the tracks not maintained properly and the cars outdated? With Sunday’s train traveling at 82 mph in a 30 mph zone, Metro-North must examine the training and scheduling of its engineers. The railroad must also move up the installation of crash prevention technology on all its trains.
Whether human error or technical failure was at fault in these derailments, Metro-North has some soul-searching to do.
The human toll has far exceeded the public’s level of tolerance.
