DOT Secretary Will Visit La Crosse For Meeting On Rail Safety

U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx will visit La Crosse on Wednesday after two Democratic members of Wisconsin’s congressional delegation asked for his department to get tougher on Bakken oil rail tankers.

Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wisc., and Rep. Ron Kind, D-La Crosse, wrote to Foxx last week, telling him proposals by his department fall short of what’s needed to protect people from the explosive Bakken crude transported from North Dakota through Wisconsin.

Kind said Foxx will hold a meeting with La Crosse officials and citizens that will address safety issues concerning the high volume of Bakken oil being transported through the region. La Crosse is the only county trafficked by both BNSF and Canadian National tankers. Those trains carry more than a million gallons a load about 45 times a week through 18 counties.

Kind said he’s concerned about the possibility of old tankers with thin metal skin exploding, given the high volatility of the Bakken oil. The letter he wrote to Foxx says that the old tankers need to be replaced by thicker-shelled, insulated and roll-over protected tankers.

Baldwin said that the two-year replacement time for old tankers proposed by the federal government isn’t fast enough.

“You can’t really tell concerned citizens ‘Just wait. Just wait.’ This is happening every day, and we want to make sure that our citizens are safe,” said Baldwin.

She also said that railroads need special attention from the U.S. DOT.

“It’s kind of uniquely governed in America, unlike transport by other modes,” said Baldwin. “Especially the Class-One, across-the-country freight rail companies operate a little more like monopolies than any other competitive business. They do need a lot greater oversight than they have had in the past.”

The letter also said that Bakken tankers need to slow down and the oil needs to be stabilized so it is less flammable.

For its part, BNSF Railway website says that it delivered 99.99 percent of all hazardous material shipments without incident last year, and that its goal to make it 100 percent.