By: Hannah Cantin

Fort Collins, Colo. — When I came to Fort Collins from Missouri, one of the first things I noticed was the trains. Sure, Columbia, Missouri has its fair share of roadway train crossings dotted throughout the city, but they’re only really the empty promise of trains – you never actually see any go by.

Fort Collins, on the other hand, sports three active lines, which frequently see freight trains roll in and out of town. But what are they? And what are they carrying?

Three different railroad companies have tracks and trains that run through the city: Burlington-Northern Santa Fe (or BNSF), Great Western, and Union Pacific. The BNSF, which passes by CSU’s campus as it runs parallel to College Boulevard, coins itself as “one of the top transporters of the products and materials that help feed, clothe, supply, and power communities throughout America.”

Their cars haul the likes of wheat and grains, produce, steel, coal, and vehicles – I’ve even seen pieces of passenger aircraft chugging along. Up until 2019, around 8 or so mile-long trains moved along the BNSF line in Fort Collins every day.

After that, the railroad began sending trains north through the city that were over twice as long. Most of us have probably seen, or at least heard the seemingly endless strings of empty coal cars running through town. You may have even seen them stop.

As trains run along the BNSF line, they may be forced to stop due to congestion on the tracks further north or in the switching yard. Even while running, the 3-mile-long trains can cause traffic stops of up to 15 minutes. When they stop, blockage times can persist for up to half an hour. Since the introduction of the BNSF line’s “double-trains” in 2019, the number of blockages lasting over 10 minutes has increased exponentially. They have even resulted in pedestrian deaths.

And this isn’t just happening in Fort Collins. By 2020, long trains and the blockages they cause had become such a frequent issue that the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) released its own online reporting tool, where citizens can make note of the duration, cause, and impact of traffic blockages.

At the time, then-FRA administrator Ronald Batory said that the data collected from the portal “[would] help [the FRA] identify where chronic problems exist”, but, even three years later, it is unlikely that rail transport through cities will slow down anytime soon – 28% of the US freight traveled by rail in 2020, after all. For better or worse, it is an indispensable industry for distribution. But that could all be very bad news for the environment – and the people.

While rail transport makes up only 2% of greenhouse gas emissions produced by the transportation sector, it is far from a clean industry. In the current age of rail transport, freight (and passenger) trains run largely on diesel fuel – far from their coal and steam-powered ancestry. They often transport volatile and toxic chemicals; to understand the potential threats of that, look no further than the recent Norfolk derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, which has released an obscene amount of smoking vinyl chloride into the environment, creating hazardous – if not impossible – living conditions, and killing over 43,000 aquatic animals.

The incident is nothing short of an environmental catastrophe and the probability of even more occurring can only increase as companies, politicians, and lobbying groups fight against labor reforms and safety regulations — like the an electric braking system that could have prevented the severity of the Norfolk derailment.

Clearly, something has to change. But since municipalities have no direct control over where and when rail lines run, it has to change up top. If we’re lucky, the almost mushroom-shaped cloud of toxic flame and disaster in East Palestine might be the one thing the railroad industry and federal government can’t sweep under the rug.

For the sake of underpaid, overworked rail workers, threatened wildlife, and the safety of communities like Fort Collins – where the risk of another Norfolk derailment runs through Old Town daily – I certainly hope it is.