Safety

The 40-hour work week? Check. A federal minimum wage? Yup. Ensuring our kids aren’t slaving away in dangerous factories? That, too. Standards that working Americans have come to expect — and that have given millions a chance at better wages and working conditions — can be traced back to historic legislation enacted 78 years ago […]

Other than the lobby for the behemoth, multi-billion dollar railroad companies, almost no one believes we should permit up to 20,000-ton freight trains, many filled with things that blow up, to travel across America with a single crew member at the controls. The American people hate this idea. Across the country, in small towns and […]

Nearly two years after the tragic death of Gerardo Hernandez, the first Transportation Security Officer (TSO) killed in the line of duty, President Obama signed into law common-sense legislation that requires the U.S. Transportation Security Administration (TSA) to make sure airports and high-risk surface transportation hubs have adequate plans in place to deal with shootings […]

While the Tracy Morgan crash has attracted national attention because it involves a well-known comedian, a National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) report confirms what we already know: we have a driver fatigue crisis. Understandably, Morgan’s celebrity gave this particular story and the NTSB’s findings significant national attention. However, incidents like this occur far more often […]

The Amtrak crash in Philadelphia has reopened the debate about what can done to make passenger and freight rail safer for both passengers and workers. At recent Senate Commerce Committee and House Transportation and Infrastructure hearings, a number of solutions were proposed, including immediately installing inward-facing cameras in locomotive rail cabs. Proponents of cameras argue […]

Each year, thousands of transportation workers are hurt or killed on the job. These women and men devote their lives to keeping our transportation system — the backbone of the U.S. economy — running, and they deserve far better. This Tuesday, April 28 is Workers Memorial Day: a time to remember those workers who have […]

Instead of separating partisanship from governing and ensuring funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) doesn’t lapse, Speaker Boehner has decided the House will only vote on a short-term extension. This means that in three short weeks we can go through another manufactured, 11th hour crisis that could shut down the DHS, threaten the security […]

Talking about transportation safety isn’t enough – measures are needed to close gaps in the system that expose both workers and the public. That’s where the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) comes in. Since it was established more than 40 years ago as an independent safety and accident investigation agency, the NTSB has pressed regulators […]

TTD’s rail safety agenda got a boost last week when Senator Richard Blumenthal, along with three other Senators, included several reforms that rail labor has long championed in their Rail Safety Improvement Act of 2014. Some 130,000 miles of freight rail tracks crisscross the United States, driving the economy, supporting more than 175,000 employees, and […]

We tend to assume it’s a given that no one should be made to break the law – it’s one of the tenets we rest on as a society. So it would be ridiculous to have to put additional laws in place that say employers can’t force their employees to break or ignore rules and […]