10/02/2026
There have been several surprises during my time as mayor, and having the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) blast train horns throughout the city is definitely one of them. These train horns are occurring day and night, and are disrupting businesses, residents, and entire communities.
Under federal laws, trains can be silent while passing through a city if the railroad crossings meet federal safety standards. Like so many of the city’s deferred maintenance issues, crossings have been deteriorating for over a decade and the FRA has been warning the city about this. Unfortunately, they had been sending emails to the previous administration's director of operations, and my office was not aware that the quiet status was in jeopardy until the day before the status was lifted.
Within 24 hours of that notice, we held an emergency meeting with mayoral staff and City department leaders. We got to work on a plan to upgrade all crossings so we can regain our quiet status as quickly as possible. Our Street Department has already begun removing out-of-date railroad bars, inserting stop bars, and has ordered all necessary signs. We are focusing on residential areas first, and hope to have all installations done by mid-December.
I know this is incredibly frustrating. I would like to assure you, we are doing everything we can to fix this as quickly as possible. You can follow our progress with weekly updates on our website (link in comments).
